(Ebook PDF) The Anthropology of Language: An Introduction To Linguistic Anthropology 4th Edition PDF Download
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vi CONTENTS
●
Speaking “Computer” 26
●● Using the Tools 2.1
LINGUISTIC RELATIVITY 31
Linguistic Relativity and Cultural Emphasis 32
Challenging Linguistic Relativity: The Search for Universals 33
Up and Down 40
Experiencing Linguistic Determinism 41
Chapter 3
• THE SOUNDS OF LANGUAGE 50
In the Field, Comoro Islands, October 1967 50
SOUNDS 51
PHONOLOGY 51
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CONTENTS vii ●
Big Hello 66
Beyond Phonetic Charts: Suprasegmentals and Diacritics 67
●● Cross -L anguage M iscommunication 3.3
Chapter 4
• WORDS AND SENTENCES 86
In the Field, U Zlatého Zvonu, Praha, February 2001 86
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viii CONTENTS
●
MORPHOLOGY 91
●● Using the Tools 4.1
Beer and Morphology 91
Morphological Analysis 93
How Morphemes Are Arranged 97
Allomorphs 100
●● Using the Tools 4.2
SYNTAX 103
Syntactic Analysis 103
●● Doing L inguistic A nthropology 4.1
I H ave a 105
How Syntactic Units Are Arranged 110
Ambiguities and Other Difficulties 111
Kinds of Grammars 112
●● Doing L inguistic A nthropology 4.2
Chapter 5
• SILENT LANGUAGES 120
In the Field, Iowa City, IA, July 2004 120
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CONTENTS ix ●
Chapter 6
• LANGUAGE IN ACTION 158
In the Field, K ansas State University, Manhattan, K ansas,
Early 1990s 158
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x CONTENTS
●
INTERCULTURAL COMMUNICATION:
ISSUES AND IDEOLOGIES 191
When Things “Go Wrong”: Cultural Miscues as “Rich Points” 192
Using Linguistic Anthropology to Develop
Communicative Competence 192
Analyzing Rich Points 193
Summary 196
Key Terms 197
Student Activities 198
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CONTENTS xi ●
Chapter 7
• WRITING AND LITERACY 199
In the Field, Tororo, Uganda, August 1967 199
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xii CONTENTS
●
Chapter 8
• HOW AND WHEN IS LANGUAGE POSSIBLE? 251
In the Field, Comoro Islands, July 1982 251
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CONTENTS xiii ●
Chapter 9
• CHANGE AND CHOICE 287
In the Field, Manhattan, K ansas, July 1974 287
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xiv CONTENTS
●
Chapter 10
• AN ANTHROPOLOGY OF LANGUAGE 341
In the Field, K ansas State University, September 1989 341
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CONTENTS xv ●
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TABLES, FIGURES, AND BOXES
• TABLES
3.1 Scaled-down phonetic chart for consonants 57
3.2 Scaled-down vowel chart 64
9.1 Examples of the Great English Vowel Shift 306
9.2 Proto-Polynesian consonants 311
9.3 Proto-Polynesian vowels 311
• FIGURES
1.1 Linguistic anthropology is fieldwork-based. Here Pine is
learning to transplant paddy rice in Thailand. 7
1.2 Language and culture are inseparable. Here Ottenheimer
becomes part of a cooking group in the Comoro Islands. 11
2.1 Comparison of word ranges for English hand and arm
versus Russian ruka 21
2.2 Words for different varieties of fish reveal an important
emphasis in Taiwanese cuisine. 23
2.3 Two mental maps for dandelions 25
2.4 Shinzwani speaker Nounou Affane helps anthropologist
Martin Ottenheimer to learn the correct names for varieties
of bananas and papayas. 27
2.5 Different words, different frames: looting and finding 47
3.1 Diagram of the speech organs. See the workbook/reader
for a more detailed diagram. 56
3.2 Section of the International Phonetic Alphabet showing
basic (pulmonic) consonants. See the workbook/reader
for the complete IPA chart. 60
3.3 Section of the International Phonetic Alphabet showing
vowels. See the workbook/reader for the complete IPA
chart. 64
3.4 Section of the International Phonetic Alphabet showing
diacritics. See the workbook/reader for the complete IPA
chart. 69
4.1 Kinds of morphemes: roots, stems, bases, and affixes 96
4.2 Tree diagram for Time flies like an arrow. 116
4.3 Two tree diagrams for Fruit flies like a banana. 116
xvi
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TABLES, FIGURES, AND BOXES xvii ●
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xviii TABLES, FIGURES, AND BOXES
●
• BOXES
Cross-Language Miscommunication
1.1 Showing Up Early 8
2.1 Shifting Frames, Challenging Ideologies 46
3.1 Thai Li(m) 54
3.2 Big Hello 66
3.3 Horses and Dog Poop 68
3.4 Hot and Bitter Chocolate 73
4.1 News of the World 89
5.1 All You Hearing People 126
5.2 Down the Hall 144
5.3 Thanks for the Help? 149
6.1 Corn Pudding 161
6.2 Ukrainian No 162
7.1 Reading across Cultures 202
7.2 Photographic Truths 236
9.1 Losing Shinzwani 299
9.2 Axing an Interview 325
10.1 Globish versus English? 348
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TABLES, FIGURES, AND BOXES xix ●
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PREFACE
xx
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PREFACE xxi ●
for lectures, and an Instructor’s Manual with guidelines for teaching the
materials and grading the workbook exercises.
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xxii PREFACE
●
Sign Language
In this edition, as in the previous one, we discuss sign language through-
out the work as well as foregrounding it in a chapter of its own. The
chapters on phonology and morphology/syntax come first, presenting
examples from both spoken and signed languages, thus encouraging
instructors to emphasize the structural and analytic similarities and
differences between these modalities. The chapter on signed languages
follows immediately, adding greater depth to students’ understand-
ing of signed communication, its history, and issues concerning Deaf
communities. The chapter also includes a short section on nonverbal
communication in order to clarify the important differences between
sign languages and gesture systems. Because special care has been
taken to include discussions of sign language throughout the book, we
can keep reminding students that sign language is indeed language and
deserves to be studied as such.
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PREFACE xxiii ●
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when it is properly conducted. It can be understood, therefore, why
the conductor of the fire-escape, who had saved many lives,
enraged at the act of Hal Vivian, shouted so vehemently to him to
return.
He knew by many instances that such a proceeding as that of
which the youth was guilty, while it imperilled the rescue of those
sought to be saved, added to the number he was called upon to
preserve. His own life was always in jeopardy in the performance of
his duty, to which he was quite equal, and it was vexing to find
another placing himself in peril without occasion for it, and, in all
probability, doing far more harm than good.
Quick as he was in his chase after Hal, he failed to reach him
before he was at the window, where clustered the affrighted girls.
Ere he could clutch hold of him, Hal sprang on the window-sill, and
was the next instant in the room.
He was recognised immediately by those whom he came to
deliver.
Flora, as she saw Hal’s form upon the edge of the window, and
witnessed him bound into the room, uttered a cry of joy.
As the light from the street flashed upon his animated excited
countenance, her heart received upon it the impression of a face it
was not likely to permit easily to be effaced.
“Heaven reward you, Mr. Vivian!” she exclaimed, hysterically, “you
have come to save us.”
“Or perish with you!” he replied, excitedly, “for I will not leave the
room until you are all safely down.”
“God bless you! God bless you!” sobbed Lotte Clinton, who, as
white as death, was trembling like an aspen.
“Now then, young fellow,” cried the conductor, putting his head
into the window, “since you are here, you must make yourself
useful, and be as cool as a cowcumber. Recollect, we ain’t here to
spend a week. Shut that door; look sharp, or you’ll all be stifled in a
minute.”
No sooner commanded than done.
At the same instant the clattering of horses’ feet at full gallop over
the ringing stones, the heavy rumble of whirling wheels, the rattling
cheers of a mob which was fast growing into a multitude, announced
the arrival of the first practicable fire-engine.
By this time Lotte was placed within the cradle of the fire-escape,
and was safely lowered down to those beneath.
A roar of gratification burst from the lips of the spectators as they
beheld one added to the list of the saved.
Hal watched until Lotte was lifted out of the escape, and then he
turned to Flora, to request her to be in readiness to take her place in
the little life-boat.
It must be understood that these operations were performed with
the utmost rapidity consistent with safety. The room was more than
half filled by a dense smoke when Hal entered; and, although the
door was since closed, it had streamed in through crannies and
chinks so as to fill it—the open window rather holding it in the room
than suffering it to escape.
When Lotte and her companion, the conductor of the fire-escape
departed, the atmosphere had become heated and stifling. It was
also so thick that scarcely a thing a foot off could be distinguished.
Hal’s astonishment and alarm can be imagined when, on the return
of the cradle, he spoke to Flora and received no answer.
But a moment past and she was at his elbow; she was now gone
—he could not see her—he called to her, but received no reply. He
felt about the room, but he was nearly suffocated, without
succeeding in finding her. He heard the roaring of the flames
beneath him: the smoke grew each moment thicker and denser:
large drops of perspiration poured from him: instinctively he
cowered to the floor and spread his hands in all directions, afraid to
open his mouth for fear of being stifled.
The conductor of the fire-escape now poked his head into the
window, and shouted for the pair to save their lives while they had a
chance, but he received no answer.
He leaped into the room, and threw himself on the floor, groping
about upon his hands and knees. He uttered a shrill cry, but met
with no response. He persevered as long as he could breathe, but
without meeting the bodies of either the youth or the maiden.
It was his impression that, overpowered by the smoke they had
sunk senseless upon the floor, but he could nowhere find them, and
at last mystified, and all but suffocated, he was compelled to retreat
to the window.
The fire was at the door of the room, shooting its long forks of
flame into the old wood of which it was composed, and with such
intense heat, that it was quickly one mass of flame, and sputtering
sparks.
With a heavy heart, the conductor got out of the room, on to his
machine, and he was barely upon it, when a long blast of flame
followed him with the speed of lightning, and darted out of both
windows, cracking and smashing the fragile glass panes, causing
them to fly in all directions, playing fantastically over, and wreathing
up the architraves of the windows, lighting up as it did so the excited
faces of the swaying, yelling mob below.
The conductor slid down the escape, and communicated the
appalling intelligence, that in the burning rooms above were two
miserable young creatures who, by the time he was relating the
occurrence, had become shapeless, blackened, charred masses of
human clay.
The scene had now grown intensely exciting; more engines had
arrived, and hundreds of persons were added to those already
assembled. A body of policemen were employed in forcing the
turbulent crowd back, so as to give the firemen room for their
exertions. The street was turned into a river, and the fire brigade—
accoutred like the heavy dragoons of a former period—were plashing
through the muddy stream, getting their engines into working order
with the systematic, and, as it appeared to the anxious gazers, the
rather apathetic regularity of organised action.
Frantic occupiers of adjoining houses were flinging out their
furniture—their little all, and that uninsured. The beds and chairs,
tables and drawers, formed, as they were brought, or thrown, hastily
into the streets, a motley jumble—some of them being borne away
by active parties, never more to be returned to the original owner.
“Two persons burned to death!” was a cry which ran through the
crowd, and was again and again re-echoed by the individuals of
which it was formed, a thrill of horror accompanying it wherever it
went.
An explosion, and up shot a body of flame into the air, attended
by a shower of sparks, fragments of burning wood, and flaming
articles, the volumes of smoke, of gold and rose-blush tint rolling
away, painfully contrasting with the violet-hued heavens.
The roof was gone!
A brilliant glare was thrown over all objects, far and near, making
the place around as light as day.
Lo! a sudden and tremendous cry burst from the agitated
multitude, pressing, crowding, and crushing upon the foot and
roadways.
“There! there!—look there!” burst from a thousand throats, and as
many hands pointed to a particular spot.
The adjoining house to Wilton’s—now a burning mass—had a tall,
irregular, but pointed roof, as though two rooms had been built
above the old roof of much less dimensions than those beneath, at
the smallest possible cost, and with an utter disregard of
architectural rule.
Up the jagged side of this slanting erection a human figure was
observed climbing slowly, his arm encircling a form all in white. His
position was terrifyingly dangerous—the least slip, and he, together
with his burden, would be precipitated into the burning ruins, still
roaring, spluttering, and flaming below him.
He lay almost flat upon his face on the rough tiles, his right hand
grasping the carved edge of the angle of the roof. Gradually he
worked his hand upwards, and by a tremendous exertion of
strength, he drew himself and his companion up a foot at each
movement. It was desperate labour—a fearful struggle with death. It
seemed to those who gazed upon him a mere impossibility that he
could save himself and the girl whom he still clutched round the
waist.
On he went slowly, the bright flames lighting him in his task, but
reducing his strength by the intense heat they threw out. He
succeeded in getting one leg across the angle of the roof, but in
doing so he slipped back at least two feet.
A shriek of horror burst from the crowd, and rose up in the air like
a death-wail.
The youth did not yet despair, but with desperate exertion he
arrested his descent with his knees.
He paused but a moment, and renewed his efforts to ascend,
using his knees now to enable him to maintain his position on the
roof, while he elevated his body so as to extend his reach until he
obtained a hold higher than before, that he might thus ultimately
gain a place of comparative safety.
It was Hal Vivian who was with Flora Wilton in this frightful
situation. He had crawled in search of her into an adjoining
apartment to that which he had entered from the street. She had
hurried thither to save something to which she knew her father
attached great importance, but, overpowered by the smoke, she
had, after securing it, fallen senseless.
Hal fortunately found her as soon as he got into the room, and the
reflection from the fire below enabled him just to see the window.
He tore it open, and saw that the parapet adjoined the roof of the
next house.
He sprang on to it, and commenced the perilous task of
endeavouring to escape a horrible death, and of saving, with his
own, a life he esteemed far more valuable.
The falling roof of the house he had just quitted, when it sank
with its dreadful crash, was within an ace of taking him with it. It
was a fearful moment, but he surmounted it, and attempted to
proceed at the instant the crowd caught sight of him. He heard not
their cry, saw nothing, thought not of aught but the endeavour to
reach a place of safety with her. He strained every nerve and sinew
to accomplish his object, but human endurance, though backed by
the urgings and influence of a strong will, has its limits.
He now reached that point when, with sickening dismay, he found
his strength failing him, and although his firmness and determination
were unshaken, his power to go on was departing. To slacken his
tenacious hold was to be hurled into the yawning gulph of fire
behind him. He knew this well; that knowledge had as yet sustained
him, and he clung to the roof still with desperation, resolved,
notwithstanding the quivering of his fingers, the agonising aching of
the arm which supported Flora, and the trembling of his knees, to
continue to the last his exertions to save the maiden, or to pass out
of life with her.
Slowly rising up, as before, he made a clutch at the top of the
roof, and caught it, but he found that, beyond drawing himself and
the form of the senseless girl a little higher, he could do no more. It
required an effort of unusual strength to reach the summit, where
he believed he could remain safe until rescued, and that effort
exhausted nature was incapable of making. Nay, he felt that he
could but a few minutes longer cling there, and if some Heaven-sent
aid did not reach him, his almost superhuman exertions would have
been made in vain.
He remained motionless, trying to recover his spent breath, and,
while in this position, the hoarse cries of the people thronging in the
streets reached his ears, and seemed to rouse him from his slowly
approaching listless inanition. He breathed a prayer; a thought what
Flora yet might be to him, and what that great world, of which he
had yet seen so little, might have in store for him, flashed through
his brain. The effect upon him was like the sound of a trumpet to the
soldier at the moment of some fearful charge, in which death is the
alternative of glory.
He drew himself upwards, struggling with the obstacles which
seemed to try and force him backwards, and, almost with a scream
upon his lips, he found himself oscillating upon the spot he had with
such trying exertion sought to reach, exhausted, and unable to make
another effort.
A shadow fell upon him; he turned his feeble eyes upon the
occasion of it, and saw one of the fire brigade, who, having laid a
short ladder against the side of the roof, had mounted it and
reached him.
Behind this man rose up the helmet of a second fireman, closely
following his comrade in his work of mercy.
Hal knew at a glance that Flora and himself were saved. He no
longer strove to continue the battle with fate, and did not attempt to
resist the embrace of insensibility as he felt the grip of the fireman
upon his collar, and heard undistinguishable words fall from him
greeting him.
CHAPTER VI.—THE NOBLE GUESTS.
“You have deserted me; where am I now?
Not in your heart, while care weighs on your
brow;
No, no! you have dismissed me, and I go
From your breast houseless; ay, ay, it must be
so,”
He answered.
—John Keats.
M
r. Grahame, though greatly agitated at the sudden
appearance and abrupt disappearance of Nathan Gomer,
at a moment of such dread importance, did not make any
comment upon it to Mr. Chewkle. He felt unequal to such a task, and
perhaps, too, he thought that it would be better not to suppose that
the strange little moneyed man had either observed or suspected
any foul play in the act he must have seen in commission. So he
folded his arms, and remained silent, assuming the aspect of
profound meditation.
Mr. Chewkle, finding the coast clear of the small enemy, would
have given free vent to the feelings which were turbulent and in
turmoil within him, but Mr. Grahame repressed the very first
outbreak.
“Pray be silent on the matter,” he observed, hastily, as if aroused
suddenly from a fit of abstraction, “our speculations upon the
situation are worth nothing, and may lead us astray if suffered to
have the rein. Keep what you know safely locked within your own
breast. Trust the key in my keeping alone. Your reward shall not
certainly be less than your expectations. Mr. Gomer doubtless saw
me affixing a signature to a deed, and would presume it to be my
own; he could not imagine the truth; and therefore, though startled
at the moment, I do not, upon reflection, see any occasion for
alarm. Let me see you again in a few days, my good friend, and in
the meantime endeavour to suggest a mode of bringing that
wretchedly obstinate old man, Wilton, to reason.”
Mr. Grahame rang a hand-bell sharply, and Whelks instantly was in
the room. Mr. Chewkle “had a thing to say,” which had strong
reference to an immediate pecuniary supply; but Mr. Grahame did
not afford him the opportunity, for he addressed Whelks as he
entered, and bade him escort Mr. Chewkle to the door. He tendered
a finger to the commission agent as a parting salute, honoured him
with a stiff bow, and retired promptly to the further end of the
library.
“This way if you please!” exclaimed Whelks to Chewkle, as with
head erect and shoulders back, he, with the stateliness of a Tartar
soldier in an Astley’s drama, marched out of the room.
Mr. Chewkle glanced at Mr. Grahame and at Whelks; he had a
pressing occasion for a few pounds; but though he had quite made
up his mind to ask for and have a sum, and indeed in a private self-
communion on his way thither that morning, he had composed the
conversation which was to take place between himself and Mr.
Grahame, and which was to terminate in a princely act of
munificence towards him on the part of the latter personage, he
found himself sneaking out, treading tip-toe on the shadow of
Whelks, without having uttered a word or having obtained a penny.
The princely act of munificence did not come off upon this
occasion, but he promised himself that before long it should; and,
ere he was out of the house, he had flung his friendship for
Grahame to the winds, and had carved for himself an antagonistic
attitude, in which he played the part of one who, having in his
possession a dreadful secret, by which the safety of another is
compromised, makes money by it frequently.
As the door closed upon him, Mr. Grahame turned a fitful gaze in
that direction, and quickly, but silently, turned the key in the lock.
Then he paced up and down the library, almost convulsed by a
fierce, mental struggle. He pressed his burning palm upon his aching
forehead, and muttered rapidly and wildly—
“It must be done now; there is no escape—no escape—none—
retreat is utterly impossible, and the advance must be swift, or, in
spite of crime, utter crushing ruin must be the result. No; there is no
stopping now. That forgery is useless, worthless, while he lives to
prove it what it is. But how dispose of him without having any
apparent connection with his death? Let me see! I must have no
accomplice. I already have one too many; he will be a thorn in my
side, I can see that; but there is time enough to think of the plan by
which I shall get rid of him. But this Wilton; he must die, and that
immediately. Yes, he must die! he must die! or I perish! but how to
kill him—how? how?”
He threw himself in his chair, and racked his brain for a device by
which to accomplish his devilish purpose without compromising
himself. But as he did so, the magnitude of the crime he proposed to
effect was not lost upon him. He felt that his face was livid, his
hands cold and clammy, while drops of icy sweat trickled from his
temples on to his cheek bones. His teeth, too, chattered, and his
limbs trembled, as though he had been suddenly nipped by a frost.
Some hours elapsed before his torturing reverie terminated—even
then he had only an indistinct notion of the course which he
calculated upon, as the best to be adopted. The vulgar modes of
knife or poison, he foresaw could not be employed by him, because
he would have to be connected, however remotely, with the deed;
and how to accomplish his design without the aid of one or the
other, was a problem harder for him to work out than the most
difficult in the “first four books” to an indifferent mathematician.
He certainly hit upon a scheme, but he was not sure that it would
accomplish the object in view. There was not, however, time to
project a plan, requiring consummate skill in its details, and rare
ability to execute. Need was driving, and the ground was such as the
devil must cover without the option of a choice; and he made up his
mind to act at once, for he required immediately the funds which the
successful execution of his infamous purpose would place at his
disposal.
As if to sustain him in the resolution he had formed, he was
aroused by the arrival of Whelks at the library door, who, when it
was opened, informed him that his son had just returned home,
accompanied by the Duke of St. Allborne, and the Honorable Lester
Vane, and that they awaited him in the drawing-room.
Dismissing Whelks with a message to the effect that he would
immediately join them, he hastened to his dressing-room, to
obliterate all traces of the mental struggle he had for so many hours
endured, and, making a slight alteration in his attire, he descended,
A
sudden involuntary effort of the memory had nearly cost
Flora Wilton her life.
In that dreadful moment, when the house in which she
had for years resided was a prey to the raging flames, when her own
escape—owing to the fearful rapidity with which the fire gained
ascendancy—was a question of doubt, she had remembered a
packet of papers, which her father had given into her charge, with
injunctions to preserve it, even at the hazard of her life.
It had been placed by herself in a spot, which though secret, was
yet of easy access. To obtain it would be but the act of a minute; the
fire-escape conductor had yet to return to convey her from the
burning house, to the street below; and she made the attempt
simultaneously with the conception of the thought.