LINGUIST List 6.161

Mon 06 Feb 1995

Qs: Cree, New Guinea language, Karcevskij, Dick Armey

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1. , Q: Standardisation in Cree
2. Shana Walton, New Guinea language?
3. Heinrich Pfandl, German translation of Karcevskij
4. , Congressman Dick Armey's slip of the tongue

For a class about "norm and variation" I am currently seeking for material
about the dialects in Cree. The questions I have are:
- what dialects are there in the Cree language?
- is there a dialect or a variant of Cree, that can be called "Standard
 Cree"?
- if yes, when did this standard arise ?

Unfortunately there are no books available at my local
University about Cree. So it would be fine, if you could email me a short
statement about the topic, or point me to online sources, databases etc.
Personal opinions are welcome!
Thanks in advance!

Thomas Schoeneborn
student at the Linguistic Dept., University of Muenster, Germany
Email: schonebuni-muenster.de

In his oral history, a World War II veteran says while he was
stationed in Fall River, New Guinea, that the American soldiers
would recive advance warning of attacks from the locals [please no comments on
the political correctness of what he says]:

 "Well, see those natives could smell Japs five miles from you. And those
 natives run from the mountains down there to warn us a lot of times.
 They'd holler, 'Japa, naba'dako 'gIli 'gIli.' Translated: that the
 Japanese is coming to 'gIli gIli' today."

The /a/ is the low central vowel, except for the first /a/ in "Japa,"
which is a front low vowel. /I/ is the lax, /i/ is the tense. /'/ preceeds
the stressed syllable. Regular sorts of consonants.

Does anybody have any idea what this is?

He said it twice, so he was very clear about what he thought he heard. Now,
the man retelling this is an African American, a Mississippi native with a
fairly heavy rural Southern Black English Dialect, so take into account any
appropriate phonological processing due to that.

If you've got any ideas or who I might email who'd know, please drop a
message to swaltonwhale.st.usm.edu Thanks!
 --
Shana Walton
Mississippi Oral History Program
University of Southern Mississippi
swaltonwhale.st.usm.edu
(601) 266-5606

Does anybody know a german translation of Sergej Karcevskij's article

"Du dualisme asym=E9trique du signe linguistique", in: M=E9langes linguistiq=
ues
d=E9di=E9s au permier congres des philologues slaves, Prague 1929, 88-93.
(=3DTraveaux du cercle linguistique de Prague, I).

I would appreciate relevant information, since a new translation is beeing
prepared at present. I'm well aware of the English and Russian
translations. Thanks - H.Pfandl.

Dr. Heinrich PFANDL, Institut fuer Slawistik,
Universit=E4t Graz, Merang.70, A-8010 GRAZ, Austria.
Tel. +43-316-380-2525, Fax: +43-316-327036;
E-Mail-Adresse: pfandlbalu.kfunigraz.ac.at

Content-Length: 1374

In his letter to the New York Times (Monday, January 30, 1995),
Congressman Dick Armey writes:

"I understand people may find it hard to believe that a `professionsl
politician,' as you put it, is capable of stumbling over words or names,
but that is exactly what happened to me Friday morning. In saying that
I did not want to `listen to Barney Frank haranguing' me, I
blended the two words (Frank and harangue, which I pronounce with a
hard "g") in a way that made it sound as if I was using a slur."

Could any phonologist comment on the plausibility of such a slip
of the tongue?

Annette Herskovits
Wellesley College