Kanza and Osage: Language Materials, Revival and the Necessity for Phonetic Analysis

Sear, Victoria

Kanza and Osage: Language Materials, Revival and the Necessity for Phonetic Analysis

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Sear_amended_release_2013.pdf(31.21 KB)

Date

2013

Authors

Sear, Victoria

Advisor

Sanders, Nathan

Department

Swarthmore College. Dept. of Linguistics

Type

Thesis (B.A.)

Language

en_US

Terms of Use

Full copyright to this work is retained by the student author. It may only be used for non-commercial, research, and educational purposes. All other uses are restricted.

Abstract

In this thesis I explore the possibility, and practicality, of revival of Kanza, a dead Siouan language from Oklahoma. In particular, I examine the pedagogical language materials that have been created via existing documentation of the language by focusing on the three most comprehensive materials created to date: a reader, a board game and a dictionary. This project, inspired by my internship at the Kaw Nation Language Department (KNLD), was conducted by examining these materials, interviewing individuals involved in their creation and referencing existing literature on language revitalization. In addition to examining pedagogical materials produced by the KNLD I address whether they can appeal to both a community- and academia- focused audience at the same time; to do this I reference Carolyn Quintero's Osage Grammar (2004) and Osage Dictionary (2009) that tries to tread this line. I then segue into an explanation of how phonetic analysiswhich Quintero was never able to conduct-will add to the corpus of Osage documentation, the creation of further pedagogical materials and new modes of classroom instruction. I then conclude with my own preliminary phonetic analysis of the vowels /0 i 0 u e/ that occur in Osage.

Permanent URL

http://hdl.handle.net/10066/11093

Collections

Linguistics

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