Romani: A Linguistic Introduction

Description

In his book, "Romani: A Linguistic Introduction," Yaron Matras thoroughly covers the Romani ("Gypsy") language to the finest detail: Its origin, grammar, morphology, phonology, along with current dialects and their distributions. Well-written and close to 300 pages (including many carefully made charts and hundreds of references), this book is a perfect companion for a university course on Romani Linguistics.

The purchaser of this book should know the linguistic terms that are commonly used in academic analysis on language. They should also know that this is not a "Teach Yourself" guide to Romani. There is no glossary or dictionary. There are no dialogs or narratives. Furthermore, Matras' book does not cover anything about the culture of the people who speak Romani, or their history (except when addressing historical language change.) This book is intended as a reference for linguists; as such, it is scholarly and complete. It does not pretend to be anything else.

Yaron Matras did a superb job in compiling this book, considering how difficult it is to get information on this exotic and very under-represented language. The prose is sometimes a little dry, but this is customary in academia.

Half-title......Page 3 Title......Page 5 Copyright......Page 6 Contents......Page 7 Figures......Page 10 Tables......Page 11 Acknowledgements......Page 13 Abbreviations......Page 14 Dialect name abbreviations:......Page 15 1 Introduction......Page 17 2 Romani dialects: a brief overview......Page 21 3.1 Theories on the origins of the Romani population......Page 30 3.2 Proto-Romani and Early Romani......Page 34 3.3.1 Core and inherited lexicon......Page 36 3.3.2 Loan components in the inherited lexicon......Page 38 3.3.3 Semantic domains of the inherited lexicon......Page 41 3.4.1 Changes shared with subcontinental MIA and NIA......Page 46 3.4.2 Conservative features of Romani......Page 49 3.4.3 Romani innovations......Page 50 3.5.1 Direct continuation of OIA/MIA productive morphology......Page 58 3.5.2 Innovations shared with other NIA languages......Page 59 3.6 The position of Romani, Domari, and Lomavren......Page 61 4.1.1 Stop positions and articulation......Page 65 4.1.2 Sonorants......Page 66 4.1.3 Fricatives and semi-vowels......Page 67 4.1.4 Affricates......Page 68 4.1.5 Voicing......Page 69 4.1.7 Geminates......Page 70 4.1.8 Consonant clusters......Page 71 4.1.9 Types of consonant systems......Page 72 4.2.1 Vowel quality......Page 74 4.2.2 Vowel length......Page 75 4.2.3 Other processes affecting vowels......Page 76 4.2.5 Types of vowel systems......Page 77 4.2.6 Stress......Page 78 4.3.1 Historical nd......Page 80 4.3.2 Prothesis and truncation......Page 81 4.3.3 Jotation......Page 83 4.3.4 s/h alternation in grammatical paradigms......Page 84 4.3.5 Final -s......Page 86 5.1 Inherent properties of the noun......Page 88 5.2.1 Nominal derivation affixes......Page 90 5.2.2 Nominal compounding and genitive derivations......Page 92 5.2.3 Adjectival derivation......Page 93 5.3.1 Case layers......Page 94 5.3.2 Layer I declension classes......Page 96 5.3.3 The independent oblique......Page 101 5.3.4 Forms and functions of Layer II markers......Page 103 5.3.5 Layer III adpositions......Page 107 5.3.6 The stability of synthetic case markers......Page 108 5.4 Adjective inflection......Page 110 5.5.1 Definiteness and indefiniteness......Page 112 5.5.2 Personal pronouns......Page 114 5.5.3 Clitic pronouns......Page 117 5.5.4 Demonstratives......Page 119 5.5.5 The historical development of deictic and anaphoric expressions......Page 122 5.5.6 Other pronouns......Page 128 6.1 The basic blueprint for the Romani verb......Page 133 6.2.2 Transitivity and intransitivity......Page 135 6.2.3 The historical development of valency-alteration markers......Page 138 6.3 Loan-verb adaptation......Page 144 6.4 Stem formation and inflection class......Page 151 6.4.1 Present stems......Page 152 6.4.2 Perfective stems......Page 154 6.5 Person concord......Page 159 6.6.1 Inherited categories......Page 167 6.6.2 Innovations and restructuring......Page 171 6.7 Non-finite forms......Page 175 6.8 Modal expressions......Page 178 7.1 The noun phrase......Page 181 7.2 Constituent order in the verb phrase......Page 183 7.3 Possession and external possession......Page 190 7.4.2 Relative clauses......Page 192 7.4.3 Complementation and purpose clauses......Page 195 7.4.4 Adverbial subordination......Page 201 7.5 Negation......Page 205 7.6 The areal position of Romani......Page 206 8.1 General considerations......Page 207 8.1.1 Structural borrowing......Page 208 8.1.2 Borrowing hierarchies......Page 209 8.1.3 L2 stratification......Page 210 8.2.1 The pre-European and Greek component......Page 212 8.2.2 Widespread patterns of borrowing following the Early Romani period......Page 215 8.2.3 Rare instances of borrowing......Page 223 8.3 An assessment of grammatical borrowing......Page 225 9.1 Methodological considerations......Page 230 9.2 A history of classification schemes......Page 234 9.3.1 Innovations......Page 241 9.3.2 Option selection......Page 245 9.3.3 Simplification......Page 247 9.3.4 Archaisms......Page 250 9.4 Implications of the geographical diffusion model......Page 251 10.1 Aspects of language use......Page 254 10.2 Para-Romani......Page 258 10.3 Romani influence on other languages......Page 265 11.1 Models of language planning......Page 267 11.2 Codification contexts and strategies......Page 270 11.3 Issues of status......Page 273 References......Page 276 Index of dialects......Page 295 Index of names......Page 298 Index of subjects......Page 302