LINGUIST List 9.224

Sat Feb 14 1998

Qs: Arabic, Fiji Lang., Icelandic, Russian-English

Editor for this issue: Anita Huang <anitalinguistlist.org>

Directory

1. Craig McL. Wallace, Arabic Sociolinguistics Contents
2. Mari Broman Olsen, Fiji Correspondence Course
3. Antony Dubach Green, Icelandic phonology
4. Kamneva, Natalia, Comparison of Russian and English vocabulary

Can anyone please send me the contents of the following volume, which 
I am told is now out-of-print. (If it is still available for purchase 
anywhere, please advise too).
Yasir Suleiman "Arabic Sociolinguistics: Issues and perspectives"
Many thanks

Craig McL Wallace
Craig McL. Wallace
M. Ed Admin (ELT)(Adelaide), Dip SLT(ESOL), Dip. Tchg 
LTCL(TEFL)(Lond), B.A. 

Are any Fiji language courses offered (for continuing education
credit) by correspondence or on the internet? My cousin and his
family are contemplating a move and his wife (a teacher) would like to
take a language course in advance. The University of the South Pacific
lists correspondence courses (including linguistics) among those at
http://www-icdl.open.ac.uk/icdl/database/australa/fiji/usthpac/cour/index.htm
but not in Fijian.

You may respond to me and cc him (eromwi-net.com). I'll post a
summary if there is interest.

Thank you.

********
Mari Broman Olsen
Research Associate

University of Maryland Institute for Advanced Computer Studies
3141 A.V. Williams Building
University of Maryland
College Park, MD 20742

PHONE: (301) 405-6754	 FAX: (301) 314-9658
WEB: http://www.umiacs.umd.edu/~molsen
*********

I have a series of questions about Icelandic phonology.

(1) Am I correct in assuming that the orthographic <d~t> contrast is
word-initially one of aspiration rather than voicing? I.e. <d> in <dag>
'day' represents a voiceless unaspirated stop; while <t> in <tala> 'to
speak' a voiceless aspirated stop.

(2) Am I correct in assuming that intervocalic <t> is actually UNaspirated?
E.g. in a word like <gata> 'street', the <t> represents the same sound as is
found at the beginning of <dag>, NOT the same as is found at the beginning
of <tala>.

(3) Are there any words in Icelandic with intervocalic orthographic <d>
(not counting morpheme-initial d after a prefix or in a compound)? A quick
glance through an Icelandic dictionary reveals lots of <d-> (edh) in this
position, but I couldn't find any <d>. If <d> does occur in this position,
how is it pronounced? Does it merge with the <t> of <gata>?

(4) I have found a word-internal orthographic <d~t> contrast in the context
l_r: <heldri> 'notable' vs. <haltra> 'to hang'. Is there still a phonetic
difference between the d and the t? If so, what is it?

(5) Are there any other relevant examples, e.g. -Vdr- vs. -Vtr-?

As usual, all the descriptive grammars I can find spend two pages on
phonology and 200 on morphology and syntax...

Thanks in advance,
Antony D. Green
- --------------------------------------------------------------------
Antony Dubach Green greenzas.gwz-berlin.de
Zentrum fuer Allgemeine Sprachwissenschaft
Jaegerstr. 10/11 Tel (+49 30) 20 192 574
10117 Berlin
Deutschland Fax (+49 30) 20 192 402

 GO MAIRE NA TEANGACHA CEILTEACHA! BYWIO YR IEITHOEDD CELTAIDD!
- --------------------------------------------------------------------

I heard two opposite point of view:
English vocabulary is twice bigger than Russian
and opposite.

Could anybody give me a clear answer ? 
I am not only curious, I have to use it in my work on machine
translation and information retrieval.

Thank you very much.

Natalia Kamneva