Lithuanian is an Indo-European language and belongs with Latvian to
the Baltic branch of those languages. It is a very young standardized
language, dating from the turn of the nineteenth-twentieth centuries
and made the official language of Lithuania in 1918. Its youth
largely accounts for the tendency to support its norms as
established. The focus here is on a concise exposition of a number of
aspects of the standard language. It is not meant to be
comprehensive, but points up important research areas, aims to
provide practical help in mastering above all questions of morphology
and accent, and complements Mathiassen 1996 and Ambrazas 1997. After
a presentation of linguistic and sociolinguistic background
information, spelling and phonology are examined, after which the
focus is on morphology and syntax, with the role of accent fully
borne in mind. A concise but detailed exploration of nouns,
adjectives, pronouns, numerals, and verbs is made, in the case of the
last in particular characterizing the various moods, aspect and
aktionsart, and verbal classification. Adverbs, prepositions,
conjunctions, interjections and onomatopoeic words are considered,
and word order and particles are examined. A short, up-to-date
bibliography is appended.
Linguistic Field(s): Language Description
Subject Language(s): Lithuanian (Language Code: LIT)
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