Small-scale Multilingalism and Language Mixing in the Lower Kolyma Tundra

Basic data for this project

Description

Most theories of language contact assume that the relationship of dominance of one group or one language over another is the decisive factor in determining the structural outcome of language contact. Recent research on multilingualism in indigenous societies casts doubt on this. A number of studies document fully egalitarian small-scale multilingual situations that result in a variety of language contact phenomena. The theoretical significance of this finding is still poorly understood, among other things due to scarcity of data and a small number of relevant case studies. This project will contribute to the discussion by focussing on the linguistic situation in a north-eastern Siberian community at the Lower Kolyma River. This is a multilingual environment in which several cultures have amalgamated to form a new mixed culture. The Lower Kolyma tundra is one of the ethnically most complex areas in the Sub-Arctic zone and is one of the last places in Siberia where the process of linguistic mixture is ongoing and there is still some living memory of the past multilingual structures. The purpose of the project is to document communicative events in this multilingual environment and to investigate the processes and the outcomes of linguistic intertwining. We will particularly focus on conversational exchanges in Tundra Yukaghir, Ėven and Yakut, the three indigenous languages spoken in the target area. The project will evaluate the effects prolonged multilingualism has on the linguistic behaviour of speakers, including the intricate conditions triggering code-switching, code-mixing and code-alternation, and explore what types of structural and non-structural changes are triggered by egalitarian language contacts. The scope of this work will not be limited to structural interference: we will also tackle communicative practices such as politeness strategies and speech act performance. With this it will extend the standard repertoire of language contact studies, which are often limited to the investigation of the grammatical and lexical consequences of multilingualism. The research questions the project will address promise to contribute to our general understanding of the typology of small-scale multilingualism, different types of language contact at a micro-level, and the structural impact of the phenomena of code-switching and language mixture. The research will take a holistic perspective and involve a multidisciplinary team which combines expertise in language documentation, descriptive linguistics, language variation and change, and anthropology. The project will rely both on the applicants' field data collected in the past decades and the new field data. Given the highly endangered state of the target languages and cultures, the urgency of this kind of research is self-evident.