“LANGUAGES of the WORLD”:

Ongoing projects

Olga Romanova●Institute of Linguistics, Russian Academy of

Sciences (Moscow)

CML-12Croatia, September 2010

http://iling-ran.ru/langworld

“Languages of the World”: basic information

➲Initiated in mid-1970s by Victoria N. Yartseva➲Purpose: to present comprehensive descriptions of natural languages in a uniform format that allows for comparability of linguistic data➲Aiming to overcome: inconsistent terminology in different descriptive traditions, insufficient depth of analysis of certain aspects of language structure, gaps in traditional descriptions➲Format: encyclopaedia➲Languaqe: Russian

Preliminary publications

PRINCIPLES OF DESCRIBING LANGUAGES OF THE WORLD. MOSCOW : NAUKA, 1976.

THEORETICAL FOUNDATIONS OF LINGUISTIC CLASSIFICATION. MOSCOW : NAUKA, 1980, vol. 1; 1982, vol. 2.

LANGUAGES AND DIALECTS OF THE WORLD . MOSCOW : NAUKA, 1982.

ZHURINSKAYA M., NOVIKOV А., YAROSLAVTSEVA Е. ENCYCLOPAEDIC DESCRIPTION OF LANGUAGES. THEORETICAL AND APPLIED ASPECTS. М.: NAUKA 1986.

PROJECT MANAGEMENT➲Editorial group “Languages of the World”,➲Institute of Linguistics, Russian Academy of Sciences (Moscow)

● 6 staff members

➲Each project is managed by:● Editor from the group “LW”● Genealogical editor(s)● Group of authors

➲Experts on particular field of linguistics

Subdivision into series

Geographical principle of subdivision

I. Languages of Euro-Asia

II. Languages of Africa, America, Australia and Oceania

16 volumes published so far➲Uralic 1993➲Turkic 1997➲Mongolic, Tungusic, Japanese, and Korean 1997➲Paleoasiatic 1997➲South-Western Iranian 1997➲North-Western Iranian 1999➲Eastern Iranian 1999➲Dardic and Nuristani 1999➲Caucasian 1999➲Germanic and Celtic 2000➲Romance 2001➲Old and Middle Indo-Aryan 2004➲Slavic 2005➲Baltic 2006➲Semitic: Akkadian. Northwest Semitic 2010➲Ancient Relict Languages of the Near East 2010

c o v e r e d s o f a r

I. At the final stage of preparation

17. Semitic: Ethio-Semitic

18. Semitic: Arabic. Epigraphic Old South Arabian. Modern South Arabian

19. Relict Indo-European languages of Western and Central Asia

Future Projects

➲I. At the final stage of preparation➲II. In the making➲III. Incipient stage➲IV. Planned

II. In the making20. Relict non-Indo-European languages of Europe

(provisional title)

21. Modern Indo-Aryan

22. Dravidian

23. Austroasiatic

24. Mande

III. Incipient stage

25. Relict Indo-European languages of Europe

26. Sino-Tibetan

IV. Planned

➲27. Tai-Kadai➲28. Miao-Yao

c o v e r e d s o f a rf o

rthcoming

1990s up till the present time

➲Since 1993 – 16 volumes on genealogical and areal language groupings➲Since early 2000s the project has become international; some articles are being written in English and then translated into Russian➲Project of the Database “Languages of the World” was developing on the basis on our project, but largely in parallel, and it is only now that some integration began

Template

➲Tool: typologically-oriented template, including information on:●external aspects of language:●history●geography●sociolinguistics●dialects●writing system●.●internal features:●phonetics and phonology●morphonology●formal morphology● representation of semantic categories●syntactic constructions●lexicon

4 TEMPLATE VARIANTS

Applied to describe

1. A linguistic family or genetically related group of languages/dialects

2. A well-described language of a (relatively) high sociolinguistic status with numerous speakers

3. A dialect4. A scantily described language or a language with

a (relatively) small number of speakers.

For describing dead languages either Template 2 or Template 4 are applied, depending on the availability of data.

Template

I. Family of languages, group of languages/dialects1. Name2. Localisation and major representatives3. Approximate number of speakers4. Principles of genealogical classification; existing

classifications5. Chronology of divergence (for the large families of

languages)6. Typical phonetic and grammatical characteristics7. Bibliography

II. Language

1.1.0. General facts1.1.1. Variants of names1.1.2. Genealogical affiliation1.1.3. Localisation and number of speakers1.2.0. Geographical distribution1.2.1. Overview of the dialects1.3.0. Socio-linguistic situation1.3.1. Communicative and functional status of

the language1.3.2. Degree of standardization1.3.3. Pedagogical status1.4.0. Writing system1.5.0. History1.6.0. Structural changes due to contacts

2.0.0. Linguistic characteristics2.1.0. Phonology2.1.1. Vowels and consonants2.1.2. Prosody2.1.3. Positional realization of the phonemes

and supra-segmental features2.1.4. Syllable; status of length-based

oppositions (long vs. short vowel, simple vs. geminated consonant etc.)

2.2.0. Morphonology2.2.1. Phonological structure of morpheme

and/or word, syllable/morpheme relationship2.2.2. oppositions of the morphological units

and categories on the phonological level2.2.3. Types of alternations

2.3.0. Grammatical semantics2.3.1. Criteria of parts of speech classification;

categorial means of expressing the universal meanings (general characteristics)

2.3.2. Type of nominal classification2.3.3. Category of number: structure and the means of

expression2.3.4. Case semantics and the means of its

expression; possessivity2.3.5. Verbal categories and the means of their

expression: voice, aspect, tense, mood, transitivity, verb pattern groups.

2.3.6. Deixis and the means of its expression; category of person as expressed in the noun and in the verb, definiteness/indefiniteness, indication and spacial orientation, anaphora, negation

2.3.7. Parts of speech2.4.0. Paradigms

2.5.0. Morphosyntax2.5.1. Typical word structure (for the

languages with full-fledged morphology); suffixation/infixation as the predominant means of word-formation; morphologically anomalous groups of words

2.5.2. Word formation2.5.3. Typical word order; subject/object

marking; syntactic positions; types of clause2.5.4. Sentence structure2.6.0. Loan words; their source, volume and

relative weight in a language2.7.0. Dialects/regional variants

Bibliography

Properties of the template

➲Positive●Very general●Easily applicable to any language

●Flexible● Allows to fit in as much information as possible● Numbered positions allow for efficient cross-referencing

● Negative●There's a certain degree of overlapping between the positions

●CONTENTS

About the publication “Languages of the World” 7

Preface 9

L.E. Kogan. The Semitic languages 15●AkkadianL.E. Kogan, S.V. Loesov. Akkadian 113E.V. Markina. Old Akkadian (Sargonic) 178L.E. Kogan. Old Assyrian 195●Northwest SemiticL.E. Kogan. Ugaritic 205●The Canaanite languagesL.E. Kogan. The Canaanite languages 239A.K. Lyavdansky. Phoenician 278L.E. Kogan, S.V. Loesov. Ancient Hebrew 296L.M. Dreyer. Modern Hebrew375

The Aramaic languagesS.V. Loesov. The Aramaic languages 414S.V. Loesov. Imperial Aramaic 496A.V. Nemirovskaya. Jewish Palestinian Aramaic 531S.V. Loesov. Classical Syriac 562A.V. Nemirovskaya. Classical Mandaic 626A.K. Lyavdansky. The Neo-Aramaic languages 660A.K. Lyavdansky. Neo-Mandaic 693L.E. Kogan, S.V. Loesov. Neo-Aramaic of Maalula705L.E. Kogan, S.V. Loesov. Turoyo751

Glossary of linguistic terms 806Notation and abbreviations 806

Appendix I: A.K. Lyavdansky. The origin and early development of the West Semitic alphabets 811Samples of the West Semitic alphabets 818Appendix II: Templates 822Maps of the Semitic languages 824

Linguistic maps

➲Authored by Yuri Koryakov➲Each volume is accompanied by a series of maps

Some are quite general, such as this map of Tibeto-Burman

Or this map of Semitic in the 2nd millennium B.C.

While some are very focused, such as this map of Jewish-Aramaic languages

Or this map of Old Hebrew

inscriptions

Some maps reflect diachronic situation, like this map of Turoyo (Neo-Aramaic)