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19 - Primitivism in Hunter and Gatherer Languages

The Case of Eskimo Words for Snow

from Part VI - North America

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 February 2020

Tom Güldemann
Affiliation:
Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
Patrick McConvell
Affiliation:
Australian National University, Canberra
Richard A. Rhodes
Affiliation:
University of California, Berkeley
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Summary

The Eskimo branch of the Eskimo-Aleut language family can be divided into three subgroups: Inuit-Inupiaq, Yupik, and Sirenikski. Inuit-Inupiaq is a group of closely related varieties that form a dialect chain, extending from eastern Greenland over the Canadian Arctic to northern Alaska, and southward to the northern and eastern shores of Norton Sound. Four mutually unintelligible languages can be distinguished within the Yupik subgroup of Eskimo: Naukanski, spoken exclusively on the Russian mainland; Central Siberian Yupik (henceforth CSY), the language I will take my examples from, spoken on some points of the Chukotka peninsula and on St.

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Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2020

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