ORCID Profile
0000-0001-6946-272X
Current Organisation
University of Canterbury
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Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing Company
Date: 12-07-2022
DOI: 10.1075/SL.21052.SCH
Abstract: This paper provides a first description of verbal number in Idi, a language of the Pahoturi River family spoken in Western Province, Papua New Guinea. Idi shows an intricate system of marking verbal number, evident in verb stems and two sets of suffixes occurring in different positions on the verb, based on a distinction between nonplural (1 or 2) versus plural (more than 2). Verbs also agree in person and number with core arguments this system of nominal number is distinguishing singular (1) from nonsingular (more than 1). Elements from the two systems are combined to arrive at composite number values for both events and participants. In addition, verbal number interrelates with a lexical aspectual distinction of punctual/telic versus durative/atelic, manifesting on verb stems and in inflectional patterns. The paper provides evidence for the thesis that verbal number in Idi is not merely lexically determined, but largely inflectional.
Publisher: Project MUSE
Date: 2013
DOI: 10.1353/OL.2013.0009
Publisher: PARADISEC
Date: 2015
Publisher: De Gruyter
Date: 04-12-2017
Publisher: Project MUSE
Date: 2017
DOI: 10.1353/OL.2017.0009
Publisher: Brill
Date: 29-12-2017
DOI: 10.1163/19552629-01001005
Abstract: Many studies have focused on substrate influence on the creole languages of Melanesia – Tok Pisin, Solomons Pijin and Bislama. The same cannot be said with regard to influence in the opposite direction: contact-induced change occurring in local vernaculars due to pressure from the creole. This paper presents a case study of several instances of structural borrowing and semantic category change in Paluai, an Oceanic language spoken in Papua New Guinea. It is shown that a number of functional elements originating from Tok Pisin are now firmly embedded in Paluai grammar: two verbs, gat and inap , and a conjunction, taim . Moreover, semantic categories are undergoing change and possibly attrition due to many-to-one correspondences. This suggests that it is important to view language contact situations as dynamic and involving two-way processes of change.
Publisher: Acoustical Society of America (ASA)
Date: 06-2016
DOI: 10.1121/1.4954395
Abstract: This study presents the first acoustic description of the vowel space of a Papuan language—Nambo, spoken in southern Papua New Guinea—based on duration and first and second formant measurements from 19 adult male and female speakers across three age groups (young, middle-aged, senior). Phonemically, Nambo has six full vowels /i, e, æ, ɑ, o, u/ and a reduced vowel tentatively labeled /ə/. Unlike the full vowels, the quality of /ə/ showed great variation: seniors' and young females' realizations tended to be more open and retracted than those by young males, while middle-aged speakers' productions fell between these two variants.
Publisher: Elsevier BV
Date: 02-2014
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing Company
Date: 09-06-2021
Abstract: The present study reports on verb-final variable realisation of the alveolar nasal /n/ in the Papuan language Idi. Elision of /n/ is correlated with both linguistic and social factors: present tense, a following consonant, and speakers over 60 show significantly greater rates of /n/ elision. Data from a 1988 grammar sketch indicate that for the present tense, variable realisation of verb-final /n/ is a case of stable, and perhaps age-graded, variation. Conversely, spread of n-less-ness into the other tenses may be a case of a change-in-progress, but at present this cannot clearly be confirmed. The older generation (speakers over 60) consistently show the highest rates of /n/ elision in all tenses. Elderly people are seen as the most proficient Idi speakers, and their position in society perhaps allows them to be more variable in their language use.
Start Date: 2023
End Date: 2026
Funder: Marsden Fund
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