American Association of Teachers of Slavic and East European Languages

The Indigenous Languages of the Caucasus, Volume 3: The North East Caucasian Languages,Part 1 by Michael JobReview by: Victor A. FriedmanThe Slavic and East European Journal, Vol. 49, No. 3 (Fall, 2005), pp. 537-539Published by: American Association of Teachers of Slavic and East European LanguagesStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20058337 .

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Reviews 537

differences among the languages of the Balkans and the Caucasus in the gnomic use of the past tense (124).

Chapter 6, "The Aspectual Opposition Aorist/Imperfect in Balkan Slavic, Turkish, and Alban

ian," another major contribution to the study of Balkan verbal categories, presents material

comparing markedness oppositions between aorist and imperfect use in Balkan languages. The final three chapters of the volume move into different areas of research. Chapter 7, "Per

sistence and Change in Ottoman Patterns of Codeswitching in the Republic of Macedonia: Nos

talgia, Duress and Language Shift in Contemporary Southeastern Europe," represents Fried

man's ongoing research in socio-political linguistics, exploring the interplay of language,

identity, and politics. In this relatively short article, he examines "who codeswitches and why"

(145) among multilingual speakers in Macedonia from the nineteenth century to 1994. This ar

ticle, drawing on theoretical studies of codeswitching by Gal, Heller, and others, provides a

glimpse at how changing linguistic complexities go hand in hand with changing power politics.

Friedman, employing data from a variety of sources including songs, proverbs, jokes, tales, po litical debate, and print media, provides a solid framework for diachronic analysis of

codeswitching in a complex multilingual society that has undergone periods of dramatic politi cal shift and proposes directions for future research.

Chapter 8 returns to a Romani topic, here "The Earliest Text in Balkan (Rumelian) Romani," a chapter written with Robert Dankoff in 1991. The final chapter, "Lak Poetry in Turkey: A

Transnational Phenomenon," presents a Lak poem, unusual due to its publication in Turkey. The

book thus concludes on the eastern edge of the languages and regions under study. Friedman and his publisher have done a tremendous job compiling this volume of some of

his seminal works on Balkan and Caucasian linguistics, articles noted for their wide-ranging contribution to multi-faceted aspects of areal linguistics. This volume will be of significance to

scholars interested in language contact, language typology, codeswitching, and other phenom ena related to multilingual societies. Friedman's writing is always engaging, clear, and inform

ative. Those familiar with Friedman's work, and those who will become acquainted with his

work through this volume, will draw inspiration from the breadth and depth of his interests, in

sights, and detailed analyses.

Christina E. Kramer, University of Toronto

Michael Job, ed. The Indigenous Languages of the Caucasus, Volume 3: The North East Cau

casian Languages, Part 1. Ann Arbor, MI: Caravan Books, 2004. 420 pp. Cloth.

Of all the indigenous languages in the Caucasus, the Daghestanian branch of the Northeast Cau

casian family is the most diverse. Such descriptions as exist are mostly in Russian or Georgian,

although this situation is gradually changing. The current volume makes a significant contribu

tion to bringing the facts on these languages to a wider audience.

There are about twenty-six languages in this branch, depending on what counts as a dialect

and what as a separate language. They are divided into three groups: Avar-Andic-Tsezic, Lak

Dargwa, and Lezgic. Of these, Avar, Lak, Dargwa, Lezgian, and Tabasaran (Lezgic group) have

official status as literary languages in Daghestan, although Rutul, Tsakhur, and Agul (all Lezgic) have some history of official written usage, and other languages (e.g. Tsez) have also made

moves in the direction of becoming literary. Volumes 1 (1991) and 2 (1989) in the series covered the Kartvelian and Northwest Caucasian

languages, respectively, and Volume 3, Part 2 (1994) described the Nakh branch of Northeast

Caucasian (Chechen, Ingush, and Tsova-Tush [Batsbi]) and six minor Lezgic languages (Rutul,

Budukh, Archi, Khinalug, Kryts, and Udi). The present volume adds two of the eight Andic Ian

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538 Slavic and East European Journal

guages?Chamalal (P. T. Magomedova 3-68) and Ghodoberi (P. A. Saidova 69-112); three of

the five Tsezic languages?Tsez (or Dido, M. E. Alekseev and R. N. Radzabov 115-63), Hinukh

(I. A. Isakov and M. ?. Xalilov 169-214), and Bezhta (or Kapucha, A. E. Kibrik and Ja. G

Testelets 217-95); as well as Dargwa (M.-?. A. Isaev 299-343), and Tsakhur (B. B. Talibov

347-419), which is closely related to Rutul. This leaves Avar, Lak, Lezgian, Tabasaran, as well

as Andi, Botlikh, Bagwalal, Tindi, Akhwakh, Karata (all Andic languages) and also Khwarshi

and Hunzib (both Tsezic) still to be covered. Of these, Lezgian and Hunzib have received thor

ough treatments in English by M. Haspelmath (A Grammar of Lezgian, Mouton de Gruyter,

1993) and the late H. van den Berg {A Grammar of Hunzib, Lincom Europa, 1995), respectively. Of the seven languages in the volume under consideration, Ghodoberi, Tsakhur and the Itsari

dialect of Dargwa have been treated in English in monographs by A. Kibrik [ed.] (1998), W

Schulze (1997), and N. R. Sumbatova and R. O. Mutalov (1993), respectively, all published by Lincom Europa. Each of the descriptions in the present volume is divided into three sections:

phonology, morphology, and syntax. Only the outline of Bezhta begins with the dialects and

numbers of speakers, although the descriptions of Tsez and Chamalal also give numbers of

speakers. The remaining descriptions plunge right into phonology. This is especially unfortunate

in the case of Dargwa, which has a strong division between the central and the peripheral dialects.

Of these latter, Kubachi, Chirag, Megeb, and Kaytag have been treated as separate languages, while Itsari has received treatment in an independent monograph. It would also be interesting to

note that Hinukh, which used to be considered a dialect of Tsez, is spoken indigenously only in

the village of Hinukh. Also, while the outline of Ghodoberi mentions the phonology of the

Zibirkhali dialect, which is its main distinguishing feature from the dialect of Ghodoberi, it is

worth noting that those are the only two villages where the language is indigenous. Each phonological section has tables of consonants and vowels and some tabular presenta

tion of nominal inflection. However, only the chapter on Tsez gives a synoptic overview of ver

bal inflection, although that on Bezhta has a table for analytic tenses. The three-page descrip tion of substantival morphology in Dargwa seems inadequate and is difficult to follow.

Transcriptions are consistent across the languages, except the Tsezic chapters use a superscript dot rather than a hachek over uvular fricatives, and the symbols for velar fricatives in the

Tsakhur table (348) appear to be from an Arabic or some other font by mistake.

Labialization, palatalization, and pharyngealization of consonants play complex roles in Dagh estanian languages, and questions of whether these should be treated as phonemic or allophonic co-articulations or sequences of consonant plus glide (or, in the case of pharyngealization, as a

vocalic quality or suprasegmental element), is sometimes difficult to determine. The outlines ad

dress these questions in different ways. In Chamalal, for example, sequences of the type /Cw/ in

word-final and pre-consonantal position argue for labialization as a coarticulation, whereas in

Tsez, the fact that /Cw/ occurs only before /a/ seems to argue for a biphonemic interpretation, ex

cept that it would then violate the otherwise regular exclusion of consonant clusters from initial

position. In the description of Ghodoberi, palatalization of velars is mentioned, but the rules for

its occurrence are not given (allophonic except with Ik/ before /a/ in verbal roots, albeit only at

the surface level). These phenomena are especially difficult in Tsakhur, with considerable dis

agreement over their status. The outline here dismisses them all as non-phonemic. A Daghestanian category that often receives inadequate attention is the numeral, and the treat

ments here are varied. In Chamalal we are told: "The numerals (except 90, 100, and 1000) are

based on the decimal system" (52), but '90' (ac'unna), '100' (behanna) and '1,000' (azalda) are

not given. In Ghodoberi, where numerals are treated as part of word formation (a section that

receives barely a page in each of the outlines), there are no examples of how to form compound numerals with decades, although this can be deduced from other examples. In Tsez no com

pounds or numerals above 100 are given. Hinukh gives only ordinal numerals. The treatment in

Bezhta is comprehensive. The treatment in Dargwa is compressed to the point of inadequacy: the reader is expected to deduce the system on the basis of concrete examples for 2, 3, 4, 5, 10,

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Reviews 539

11, 12, 15, 20, 30, 40, 50, 90, 100, 101, 200, 300, 400, 1,100, and 1,120 (not in that order). Tsakhur does not give compounds above the level of '100.'

Particularly puzzling is the treatment of local cases in Ghodoberi. Like T. E. Gudava (Jazyki narodov SSSR, Vol. 5, 1967, AN SSSR, p. 313), Saidova (82-83) describes two series of seven

local cases for Ghodoberi, a locative (essive/lative) series, where each ending has the shape

(C)V, and an elative series, which adds /-ru/ to the locative. According to S. Tatevosov's outline

in Kibrik (1998:17), however, Ghodoberi also has an allative and a translative series, the former

adding /-xu/ the latter adding /-ruxu, -ridi, -rudi, -rif'i/ (apparently in free variation) to the loca

tive. Moreover, where Gudava and Saidova identify a subessive affix in -f'i, Tatevosov instead

adduces a locational ('in the same place as') affix in /-aida/. According to Tatevosov, the affix

/-f'i/, found elsewhere in Andic, is obsolete in Ghodoberi, having been replaced by the contac

tive case affix /-c'u/ plus the postposition hil'i 'under.'

A strong point of the outlines is the material on syntax, which is usually absent or skimpy in

older and traditional descriptions. The lack of interlinear glosses in all the outlines except Bezhta and Tsez, however, makes these sections difficult to use, and explanations can be inad

equate. Thus, the section on word order in Dargwa (330) demonstrates that agent (A), patient

(P), and finite verb (V) can occur in the orders APV, VAP, or PVA, but we are not told whether

other orders can also occur, nor are the communicative differences among the given word or

ders defined. The discussion of causatives (338) has only one short example plus an entire page of verbiage describing it. In Tsakhur, amma 'but' is treated as a subordinating conjunction, but

it is not clear why. The bibliographies are limited to works in Russian, but the chapter on Bezhta lacks a bibli

ography altogether. The number of typographical errors is not too great, and usually transpar

ent, e.g. s'ic'i should be s'lec'i (31), '40' should be ' 140' (53), jggna should bejugna (383), jazy

should be jazyk (418). Despite these and other problems, there is much of value here. This volume makes a signi

ficant contribution to the advancement of our understanding of Daghestanian, and it will be re

quired reading for any Caucasologist, a useful reference for any typologist, and a work of inter

est to any linguist.

Victor A. Friedman, University of Chicago

Snjezana Kordic. Rijeci na granici punoznacnosti. Zagreb: Hrvatska sveucilisna naklada, 2002.

Bibliographies. Summaries. Indices. 227 pp. 28 (paper).

Snjezana Kordic has presented a handbook of selected words in Croatian and Serbian in this lin

guistic study of lexicon and its usage. In her introduction the author says that the work is in

tended to augment existing handbooks of lexicon and grammar. She explains that it provides new information on the syntax, semantics and pragmatics of the usage of selected pronouns,

nouns, particles, conjunctions and verbs that can each have either a lexical or a grammatical function. These, she says, are words that have not been completely defined or described either

in other handbooks or in dictionaries that give definitions or usage. Her title (Rijeci na granici

punoznacnosti, 'Words on the boundary of their full meaning') indicates that the work is an at

tempt to give the full meaning of these terms.

The author indicates that the results of her research had to "serve a practical purpose and to

find application in grammars and dictionaries" (9). This intention determined the author's

choice of four methods. First, using corpus linguistics, the author took corpora from different

styles of spoken and written language "to obtain information about usage and about the fre

quency of the words that were researched" (ibid.). Second, using a modified structural approach,

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