Linguistic diversity, language vitality and the advancement of Linguistics as a science

Abstract

The study of linguistic and cognitive strategies for spatial referencing has seen an increase in studies reported in the literature since the 1970s. This research has moved from formulating theories based on a handful of international languages to documenting and analyzing a growing sample of the world’s languages. This paper focuses precisely on the contributions that languages across a diversity of language families, sociocultural contexts, and geographic settings are making to the advancement of research on spatial referencing. A concrete example is illustrated by the Diidxazá language (Juchiteco, Isthmus Zapotec, Otomanguean) whose analysis has propelled significant explorations into spatial referencing in Mesoamerica and beyond. This paper explores the contributions made by Diidxazá and other lesser studied languages to the advancement of semantic typology, spatial referencing and language and cognition studies. This is placed in the context of current trends in the decline of the world’s linguistic diversity. Thus, this paper advocates for a sustained, and, ideally, increased engagement of the sciences in documenting and revitalizing the world’s languages.

Keywords:

• Spatial referencing
• theories of language
• linguistic diversity
• language endangerment

Acknowledgments

Any errors or omissions are my sole responsibility. I am deeply grateful to the speakers of Diidxazá who have shared their language with me and enthusiastically participated in the experimental tasks that have informed the research reported here. I am especially grateful to Rosaura López Cartas, Velma Orozco Trujillo, and Reyna López López. I dedicate this paper to the speakers of the many languages whose data has enabled the advancement of linguistic theories. At the time this paper was written, all the speakers of Diidxazá who contributed data to the analysis presented here were only starting to reconstruct their lives after the devastating 8.2 magnitude earthquake of 7 September 2017. It is my hope that just as they have contributed so heavily to the advancement of my work, that in turn my work can bring visibility to their lives and struggles.

Notes

¹ The symposium Geographic grounding: Place, direction and landscape in the grammars of the world was held at the University of Copenhagen, 30–31 May 2016. See http://inss.ku.dk/english/calendar/geogram/, last accessed on 25 January 2018.

² The terms ground and figure are used as per Talmy (2000).

³ Diidxazá is also known as Juchiteco, Isthmus Zapotec and zapoteco de la planicie costera. In this paper, the designation Diidxazá and its spelling is used in deference to the language community’s practice to refer to the language as such. See anonymous (1956). For a discussion on wordhood and orthographic representation as they relate to the spelling of the language designation, see Pérez Báez, Cata, and Bueno Holle (2015).

⁴ In order to be maximally informative in the orthographic representation of Diidxazá in this paper, the conventions used are those of the Project for the Documentation of the Languages of Mesoamerica. Some graphemes differ from the recommendations made by the Alfabeto Popular para la escritura del zapoteco del Istmo (anonymous 1956) and tone is systematically represented. Glossing follows the Leipzig Glossing Rules, supplemented with the following abbreviations; hab, habitual; i, inanimate; neg, negative particle; ntrg, interrogative particle; sta, stative.

⁵ The experimental tasks were developed by and carried out in the context of the Spatial Language and Cognition in Mesoamerica project (MesoSpace for short; NSF Award #BCS-0723694, PI J. Bohnemeyer, https://www.acsu.buffalo.edu/~jb77/MesoSpaceManual2008.pdf). The Ball and Chair and New Animals in a Row tasks were designed by the MesoSpace project after the Men and Tree and Animals in a Row tasks developed by the Cognitive Anthropology Research Group at the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics (Danziger 1992; Levinson and Schmitt 1993).

⁶ To be more explicit, the task opposes solutions based on a relative FoR or a geocentric FoR. The latter term encompasses several FoRs that rely on features of the environment to project the region within which the figure (the ball) is to be located. For the sake of simplicity, the discussion in this section only makes reference to the relative, intrinsic and absolute FoR. Further details on other types of FoRs can be consulted in O’Meara and Pérez Báez (2011).

⁷ The number of languages was consulted at http://glottolog.org/glottolog/language while the number of language families was consulted at http://glottolog.org/glottolog/family in the Glottolog 2.7 edition (Hammarström, Forkel, Haspelmath and Bank (eds.)). Both web pages were last accessed on 27 January 2018.

⁸ The number of languages was consulted at https://www.sil.org/resources/publications/entry/6133 in the 16th Edition of the Ethnologue (Lewis, Simons, and Fennig 2016) last accessed on 27 January 2018.

⁹ Unquachog is an Algonquian language of the Southern New England branch. It is referred to as Unkechaug by the Unkechaug Nation and is also referred to as Quiripi-Unquachog in Goddard (1998).

¹⁰ Based on Manuscript 28 of the National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution which is a handwritten copy made by A. S. Gatschet, from the original manuscript material in John Napoleon Brinton Hewitt’s office based on Jefferson’s original notes. Digital surrogates are available online at https://goo.gl/JwPPZX, last accessed on 25 January 2018.

¹¹ Lewis, Simons, and Fennig (2016), last accessed online at https://www.ethnologue.com/statistics/status on 27 January 2018.

¹² Lewis, Simons, and Fennig (2016), last accessed online at https://www.ethnologue.com/statistics/status on 27 January 2018.

¹³ Catalogue of Endangered Languages. 2015. The University of Hawaii at Manoa and Eastern Michigan University, last accessed at http://www.endangeredlanguages.com/lang/1061 on 27 January 2018.

¹⁴ Catalogue of Endangered Languages. 2015. The University of Hawaii at Manoa and Eastern Michigan University. http://www.endangeredlanguages.com/lang/search/#/?endangerment=U,S,AR,V,T,E,CE,SE,AW,D&sample_types=N,A,V,D,I,G,L&locations=known,unknown&q=Basque&type=code. Last accessed on 18 October 2017.

¹⁵ Neither of these two languages is listed by the Endangered Languages Project as of 18 October 2017.

¹⁶ Catalogue of Endangered Languages. 2015. The University of Hawaii at Manoa and Eastern Michigan University. http://www.endangeredlanguages.com. Last Accessed 27 January 2018.

¹⁷ https://elar.soas.ac.uk/Collection/MPI191249, last accessed 27 January 2018.

¹⁸ http://dobes.mpi.nl/dobesprogramme/, last accessed on 20 October 2017.

¹⁹ http://www.eldp.net/en/about+us/, last accessed on 20 October 2017.

²⁰ https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/advancedSearchResult?WT.si_n=ClickedAbstractsRecentAwards&WT.si_x=1&WT.si_cs=1&WT.z_pims_id=12816&ProgEleCode=7719&BooleanElement=Any&BooleanRef=Any&ActiveAwards=true&#results, last accessed on 20 October 2017.

²¹ The Global Survey of Language Revitalization Efforts is a collaboration between the Smithsonian Institutions’ Recovering Voices Initiative, the Auckland Institute of Technology and the Linguistics Department at The University of Hawaii at Manoa. Research and analysis has been carried out by a slew of research assistants, notably Rachel Vogel, John Uia Patolo and Sarah Johnson.

²² https://www.nsf.gov/pubs/2016/nsf16576/nsf16576.pdf, last accessed on 20 October 2017.

²³ http://www.eldp.net/application/, last accessed on 20 October 2017.