|
Description:
|
This book is first and foremost a grammatical description of Baure, a
seriously endangered language from Bolivian Amazonia. Baure belongs to the
Southern Arawak language family and it forms part of the Guaporé-Mamoré
linguistic area. This book is the first detailed and comprehensive
grammatical description of Baure, covering its phonology, morphology,
syntax, and discourse structure.
Special attention is given to the complex (morpho)phonological processes
within a phonological phrase, the rich noun classification system, the
distinction of verbal and non-verbal predicates with respect to the
argument marking pattern, the three-level distinction of verbal morphology,
and specific clause types based on different nominalization strategies,
which also play an important role in clause subordination. This book is
aimed at linguists from all backgrounds and is of special interest to
typologists, historical linguists, Arawakanists, Americanists, and
anthropologists. It is also an important record of a dying language for its
speech community and their descendants.
|