LINGUIST List 5.47

Fri 14 Jan 1994

Qs: Sarcasm, Ganda law, C parsers, Etymology

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1. , sarcasm and ESL students
2. , Query: Ganda Law.
3. Edgar Gilchrist, Public domain English parsers written in C or C++
4. Arkady Borkovsky, profursetka : etymology ?

I want to send out the following message for a friend of mine who doesn't
have e-mail. Please respond to me directly instead of the list.


My friend is writing her thesis in Teaching English as a Second Language
(TESL). She is looking for information relating to sarcasm,
classifications of sarcasm, ability of non-native speakers of English to
understand sarcasm, the acquisition of sarcasm, etc. Anyone with any
information, or ideas of where she can find more information, please let me
know.

Thanks!

Echo

Echo Farrow
3060 JKHB Voice: (801) 378-6452
Brigham Young University e-mail: FarrowEyvax.byu.edu
Provo, UT 84602 USA Fax: (801) 378-4649

There are a number of references in the phonological
literature to the "Ganda Law". Steriade (1993:411) says it is
"a nasal assimilation process whereby an underlying sequence
NC V N ... becomes N V~ [nasal vowel] N". It seems to occur a
number of Bantu languages. Most of the texts I have seen give
a few examples which address only the particular theoretical
point the author wants to make, drawing mainly on primary
sources on the languages concerned. These primary sources
would be difficult or impossible to obtain in Australia. I
would therefore like a reference to a more accessible source,
if one exists, which gives a more comprehensive run-down on
the "Ganda law" - preferably one containing information such
as which languages it is found in and what varying conditions
apply to the rule in the different languages.

There are also apparently other "long distance" rules
involving nasality in other Bantu languages e.g. the
progressive 'nasal harmony' rule of Kikongo which converts an
oral stop to a nasal in some suffixes in the environment of a
nasal in the stem, discussed by Ao (1991). I'd like to know if
this kind of rule is more widespread, and if there is (in
anyone's opinion) a connection between this and the "Ganda
Law".

Patrick McConvell, Anthropology,
Northern Territory University
PO Box 40146, Casuarina NT 0811, Australia

References

Ao, B. (1991) Kikongo Nasal Harmony and Context-Sensitive
Underspecification. Linguistic Inquiry 193-198.

Steriade, D. (1993) Closure, Release and Nasal Contours. In M.
Huffman and R. Krakow eds. Phonetics and Phonology 5: Nasals,
Nasalization and the Velum. Academic Press. 401-470.

I would like to know what is available in the way of English
parsers written in C or C++. I realize that parsers can range
from simple grammatical category based ones up to full-blown
grammar developement systems like PATR, but nonetheless, I am
chiefly interested in something portable (from a C and C++ point of view).

Thanks,

Ted Gilchrist

Does anybody know the etymology of a Russian word "profursetka" ?
(Maybe, "proforsetka".)

 pro*furs*et*k*a
 | | |
 | | -------- Russian diminutive suffix
 | ----------- French diminutive suffix
 ------------------- ?? prefix

Please respond to arkadydnt.dialog.com

Arkady Borkovsky