170 pp. July 2001
paper, ISBN 978-0-8248-2375-7, $27.00
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Keywords: |
Pacific
language
linguistics |
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Nhanda: An Aboriginal Language of Western Australia
by Juliette Blevins
Oceanic Linguistics Special Publication No. 30
"Nhanda is an exciting because it displays a number of odd behaviors, especially when compared with other [Pama-Nyungan] languages.... There is much of value to be mined in this monograph." --Oceanic Linguistics 42 (2003)
This book presents the first detailed sketch grammar of Nhanda, a Pama-Nyungan language of the central coast of Western Australia presently on the verge of extinction. This language was once spoken along the lower Murchison River, from Kalbarri inland, and south to present-day Northampton and Geraldton, but has remained largely unknown until recent years. Nhanda is based on the author's fieldwork in Western Australia from 1993 to 1998 with one of the last speakers of the language, and also incorporates notes of early explorers and linguists who passed through the area. The grammar presents the general features of the language within the Australian context, followed by a comprehensive study of Nhanda sound patterns, major sections on nominal and verbal morphology, and descriptions of simple sentences and constituent order. Each chapter is rich in data and provides comparative evidence with important implications for historical relationships between the languages of Australia. The volume also includes Nhanda-English and English-Nhanda alphabetical vocabularies and an alphabetical list of Nhanda affixes.
Juliette Blevins is professor of linguistics at the University of Luton, England.
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