Book reviews in JALL 42

Joseph Lovestrand has sent the following message:

The latest JALL has two reviews of works on Chadic languages:

• Allison, Sean. 2020. A grammar of Makary Kotoko. (Grammars and Sketches of the World’s Languages, Africa 12). Leiden/Boston: Brill. XVIII+502 pages. ISBN: 978-90-04-42251-3. EUR 149. (Reviewed by: Abdoulaye, Mahamane L.). In: Journal of African Languages and Linguistics 42(2). 279–285. https://doi.org/10.1515/jall-2021-2022
• Newman, Paul & Roxana Ma Newman. 2020. Hausa Dictionary: Hausa-English/English-Hausa, Ƙamusun Hausa: Hausa-Ingilishi/Ingilishi-Hausa. Kano: Bayero University Press, Kano, Nigeria. (Reviewed by: Leben, William R.). In: Journal of African Languages and Linguistics 42(2). 287–290. https://doi.org/10.1515/jall-2021-2023

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Skype talk on an NLP project on the Zaar and Hausa languages

Joseph Lovestrand has sent us the following message:

The Chadic Languages & Cultures group, run by Cameroonian linguists, is meeting online again this Saturday April 24, 9 AM, Cameroon time (GMT+1). All are welcome to join the discussion (in French and English)!

Chadic Languages & Cultures
Saturday, April 24, 2021
9-10 am (Cameroon time, GMT+1)
Join via Skype: https://join.skype.com/YTdz8ale1BIF

Bernard Caron will present his upcoming work on treebanks and automated descriptive grammars for an NLP project (CNRS) on the Zaar and Hausa languages.

New Publication: A Grammar of Makary Kotoko

A Grammar of Makary Kotoko by Sean Allison has been published by Brill in their series Grammars and Sketches of the World’s Languages, Africa, Volume: 12

The following description is found on the Brill website (Link)

In A Grammar of Makary Kotoko, Sean Allison provides a thorough description and analysis of Makary Kotoko – a Central Chadic language of Cameroon, framing the discussion within R.M.W. Dixon’s (2010a, 2010b, 2012) Basic Linguistic Theory. Working with an extensive corpus of recorded texts supplemented by interactions with native speakers of the language, the author provides the first full grammar of a Kotoko language. The detailed analysis of the phonology, morphology, syntax, and discourse features of Makary Kotoko is from a functional/typological perspective. Being based on a large number of oral texts, the analysis provides an example-rich description showing the range of variation of the constructions presented while giving insights into Kotoko culture.

The publication has more than 500 pages and is available in print and as E-Book (PDF).

 

New publications in Central Chadic

Two important publications in Central Chadic have appeared at Rüdiger Köppe Verlag:

• A Dictionary of Hdi by Zygmunt Frajzyngier et al. (195 pp., € 34,80)
• A large book containing two volumes: The Lamang Language and Dictionary by H. Ekkehard Wolff (1110 pp., € 128,00). It can also be ordered as two separate volumes: Lamang Language (501 pp., € 68,00 ) and Lamang Dictionary (609 pp, € 78,00)

Follow the above links to find out more about these publications.

New publication on Ngas

Book cover: Reimer

A new publication (in English) on Ngas has just appeared at Reimer Verlag: Herrmann Jungraithmayr und Miroslava Holubová: The Ngas Language (Shik Ngas). Fundamentals of Grammar • Texts • Dictionary (Sprache und Oralität in Afrika, Vol. 28), 280 pp., 30 col. ill. and 1 b+w ill., 17 x 24 cm, hard cover, ISBN 978-3-496-01555-0, Price: 79,00 €.

The book presents a detailed outline of the grammar and a Ngas-English dictionary of some 2.000 lexical entries.

More info on the book can be found on the publisher’s website.

 

Grammatical Description of Buwal

A PhD dissertation (700+  pages) on Buwal (Central Chadic) completed by Melanie Viljeon is available online at the SIL Cameroon website: A GRAMMATICAL DESCRIPTION OF THE BUWAL LANGUAGE (PDF, 9,1 MB)

More on Buwal on the SIL Cameroon website

New publication on Mubi

Book Cover: Reimer

A new volume (in French) on Mubi has been published at Reimer Verlag:

Herrmann Jungraithmayr. La langue mubi (République du Tchad). Précis de Grammaire – Textes – Lexique (Sprache und Oralität in Afrika, Volume 27).  226 p. + 1 Ill.; 17 × 24 cm, ISBN 978-3-496-02852-9, Price: 69,00 € [D] | 88,80 SFR [CH]

The book comprises a  sketch of the grammar (80 pages), a text collection (50 pages) and a lexicon (60 pages).

The following short description can be found at the website of Reimer Verlag:

“Le mubi (moubi) ou Monjul est une langue tchadique parlée par environ 35000 locuteurs dans l’est de la République Tchad. Il s’agit d’un membre particulièrement innovateur de la famille tchadique et qui représente la branche tchadique la plus éloignée du sud-ouest du phylum hamito-sémitique. Parmi ses traits caractéristiques, il y a l’apophonie allant dans le lexique et la morphologie, surtout dans la formation du système aspectuel binaire. En ce qui concerne le lexique, l’influence de l’arabe est forte. Ceci n’est pas surprenant dans le sens où l’islam et les dialectes arabes jouent un grand rôle dans la société mubi. Cependant, cette expansion de l’arabe pourrait mettre en danger les langues locales.”

A table of contents can also be downloaded at the website of Reimer Verlag.

Sketch grammars for dictionaries: SIL workshop in Cameroon

(via SIL) Linguists representing 16 African languages are attending a workshop this month conducted by SIL Cameroon in Yaoundé to produce sketch grammars suitable to introduce bilingual or trilingual dictionaries. The UK Kay Williamson Educational Fund (KWEF) will eventually publish several of the dictionaries in which these sketch grammars appear. (continue reading at SIL website)