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LING3003 Linguistics Field Trip. Hawaii Field trip 2009 Introduction: the Hawaiian islands. Aims . Islands as natural laboratories Study language situation 1. The Hawaiian language: Polynesian language, in danger of extinction, revitalization in progress
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LING3003 Linguistics Field Trip Hawaii Field trip 2009 Introduction: the Hawaiian islands
Aims • Islands as natural laboratories • Study language situation 1. The Hawaiian language: Polynesian language, in danger of extinction, revitalization in progress 2. Hawaiian Creole English (aka Pidgin)- as featured in LING2040 Languages in Contact 3. Other immigrant languages: Okinawan, Japanese, Korean, Cantonese/Hakka, Philippine languages
The Hawaiian Islands • Most isolated archipelago on earth • Series of volcanoes created successively by “hot spot”, latest island 500,000 years ago • Settled by Polynesian seafarers from Marquesas between 300-600 AD • ‘discovered’ by Captain Cook in 1778
The Hawaiian Islands 7 inhabited islands: • Oahu: Honolulu, Pearl Harbor • Hawai’i: “The Big Island” • Maui • Moloka’i • Lana’i • Kaua’i • Ni’ihau: privately owned, beyond Kaua’i; Hawaiian spoken natively
The Austronesian languages • Austro-nesian: “southern island” language family • Aboriginal languages of Taiwan: Amis, Zhou, Seediq - diversity of these languages suggests Taiwan as Austronesian homeland • Major languages: Malay, Bahasa Indonesia, Tagalog, Samoan, etc
Settlement of Hawaii • Evidence for two waves of settlement: 1. From Marquesas -- the legendary menehune “little people” of Kaua’i 2. From Tahiti (South Pacific) • Navigation by stars and natural signs: clouds, migrating birds • The Pacific golden plover or kolea
Typological features of Austronesian languages • (Apparently) simple phonological systems, as in Hawaiian: 8 consonants including the okina (glottal stop) as in Hawai’i 5 vowels with phonemic length distinction = 10 vowel phonemes (‘aina “meal” vs ‘āina “land”) • Disyllabic roots: Malay mata “eye”, Hawaiian manu “bird” • Verb-initial constituent order: VSO (Hawaiian), VOS (Malagasy) or VSO/VOS (Samoan, Seediq)
Hawaiian today • Revitalization in progress • Pūnana Leo (“Language nest”) schools http://www.ahapunanaleo.org/ • Media: newspaper columns, new radio bulletins in Hawaiian • http://news.iciba.com/a/20081212/546281.shtml