Gaagudju is a previously undescribed and now nearly extinct language
of northern Australia. This grammar provides an overall description of
the language. Australian languages generally show a high degree of
structural similarity to one another. Gaagudju conforms to some of the
common Australian patterns, yet diverges significantly from others.
Thus while it has a standard Australian phonological inventory, its
prosodic systems differ from those of most Australian languages, with
stressed and unstressed syllables showing marked differences in
realisation. Like many northern languages, it has complex systems of
both prefixation and suffixation to nominals and verbs. Prefixation
provides information about nominal classification (4 classes), mood,
and pronominal cross-reference (Subjects, Objects, and Indirect
Objects). Suffixation provides information about case, tense, and
aspect. As in many languages, there is a clear distinction between
productive and unproductive morphology. Gaagudju differs from most
Australian languages in that a considerable amount of its morphology
is unproductive, showing complex and irregular allomorphic variation.
Gaagudju is like most Australian languages in that it may be described
as a free word order language. However, word order is not totally free
and strictly ordered phrasal compounding structures are significant
(e.g. in the formation of denominal verbs).
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ISBN
9783110871289
Publisert
2015
Utgave
1. utgave
Utgiver
Vendor
De Gruyter Mouton
Språk
Product language
Engelsk
Format
Product format
Digital bok
Forfatter