Volume 06, Spring 1980

Permanent URI for this collection

https://prism.ucalgary.ca/handle/1880/100066

Browse

Browsing Volume 06, Spring 1980 by Date Accessioned

Filter results by year or month
Now showing 1 - 8 of 8
  • Thumbnail Image
    ItemOpen Access
    Vowel harmony in Yamba
    (University of Calgary, 1980-05) Scruggs, Terri R
    Traditionally, when one speaks of Vowel Harmony, one thinks of, for example, Hungarian or Turkish. In such 'traditional' languages, all suffixes harmonize to the root of the word; that is, the vowels of one morpheme are more important than those of the other morphemes and they affect one (or all) of the features of all the other vowels in the word. But in Yamba, the process is somewhat different. Two clitics, one that occurs in noun phrases and one in verb phrases, undergo harmony based on the stem vowel of the head of the phrase. No other clitics or affixes follow this pattern of harmony.
  • Thumbnail Image
    ItemOpen Access
    Basic spelling competence in adults
    (University of Calgary, 1980-05) O'Grady, William D; Gibbons, Diana E
    There is virtually complete agreement among competent researchers that the development of linguistic knowledge in human beings is dependent upon the complex interplay of two factors: the learner's inborn capacities and the linguistic environment. Because it is not possible to directly observe the nature of the learner's mental capacities, there has been a great deal of controversy over the exact role that they play in the language acquisition process. Forced as we are to make complicated inferences about the type of language acquisition mechanisms that a child needs for success in the linguistic environment, there will probably always remain serious disagreements over the precise contribution which properties of human nature make to the acquisition of language.
  • Thumbnail Image
    ItemOpen Access
    Particle t'a in Snowdrift Chipewyan
    (University of Calgary, 1980-05) Jehn, Richard Douglas
    Some problem has arisen in accurately characterizing the general nature, the morphosyntactic description, and, in particular, the function of the putative relative clause marking particle t'a in Chipewyan. This paper attempts to provide a preliminary account of t'a. expanding on work which has preceded.
  • Thumbnail Image
    ItemOpen Access
    Aspects of current phonological change in Snowdrift Chipewyan
    (University of Calgary, 1980-05) Jehn, Richard Douglas
    Dramatic sound shifts are presently occurring in Snowdrift, North West Territories Chipewyan which may provide some clues to the nature of normal phonological change in language. This paper deals with the complete shift of /t/ to /k/, the loss (or voicing) of /ɬ/, the loss of morphemes which contain /ɣ/, and the reanalysis of nasalized vowels into vowel plus nasal consonant, all of which are illustrations of the type of sound change that the linguist in the field rarely expects to witness.
  • Thumbnail Image
    ItemOpen Access
    Word shortening in Snowdrift Chipewyan
    (University of Calgary, 1980-05) Henry, Dave
    In my fieldwork on Chipewyan in Snowdrift, N.W.T. in 1979 it became immediately apparent that variations between speakers were often extensive and that, in particular, younger speakers (roughly, under 30 years old) consistently differed from older speakers and that the variation was greatest between the youngest and the oldest speakers.
  • Thumbnail Image
    ItemOpen Access
    The semantics of "Tu" and "Vous" diachronic and synchronic considerations
    (University of Calgary, 1980-05) Duff, Patricia A
    One of the functions of language is to reveal the role relations that exist between speakers. Roles are perceived by individuals, then evaluated in order that information provided by speech acts may be appropriately interpreted by speakers. Part of each speaker's communicative competence is a sophisticated set of rules, specific to one's cultural membership, which determine one's verbal behaviour. It has been observed by various linguists that social structure and grammatical patterns are profoundly linked. With regard to personal pronouns in particular, Friedrich (1963) claims that second person pronouns link abstract properties of a basic grammatical paradigm to a second matrix of culturally specific components of major emotional and social significance. Obligatory address forms are part of a speaker's communicative competence which fuse grammar and social categories in a very interesting way.
  • Thumbnail Image
    ItemOpen Access
    Questions in natural speech: problems of recognition, usage and analysis*
    (University of Calgary, 1980-05) Doran, Christopher J
    This paper concerns itself with certain problems in naturally occurring speech, with our intuitive knowledge of what questions are. The problems that I want to discuss are not exclusively limited to 'questions' and could be applied to other types of utterance. However in this paper 'questions' will serve as a focus for the discussion, although I may draw on other types of examples to illustrate more general points.
  • Thumbnail Image
    ItemOpen Access
    Calgary Working Papers in Linguistics, Volume 6, Spring 1980
    (University of Calgary, 1980-05) Doran, Christopher J.; Gibbons, Diana E.; Jehn, Richard Douglas
    This issue is the sixth in the series of working papers published by LOGOS, the Student Linguistics Society at The University of Calgary. The series provides a vehicle for faculty members and students to publish current research. These papers represent research in progress and are not to be considered final statements by the authors. The appearance of these articles in the current issue does not preclude their publication in altered form elsewhere.