Author: Rebecca Hasselbach Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA ISBN: 019967180X Category : Foreign Language Study Languages : en Pages : 370
Book Description
This book reconstructs the Semitic case system, based on a detailed analysis of the expression of grammatical roles and relations in the attested Semitic languages. It brings typological methods to bear on the study of comparative Semitics and includes detailed analyses of a wide range of data. The book will interest Semiticists and typologists.
Author: Bruce K. Waltke Publisher: Eisenbrauns ISBN: 9780931464317 Category : Foreign Language Study Languages : en Pages : 792
Book Description
Meeting the need for a textbook for classroom use after first year Hebrew grammar, Waltke and O'Connor integrate the results of modern linguistic study of Hebrew and years of experience teaching the subject in this book. In addition to functioning as a teaching grammar, this work will also be widely used for reference and self-guided instruction in Hebrew beyond the first formal year. Extensive discussion and explanation of grammatical points help to sort out points blurred in introductory books. More than 3,500 Biblical Hebrew examples illustrate the points of grammar under discussion. Four indexes (Scripture, Authorities cited, Hebrew words, and Topics) provide ready access to the vast array of information found in the 40 chapters. Destined to become a classic work, this long-awaited book fills a major gap among modern publications on Biblical Hebrew.
Author: Robert R. Ratcliffe Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing ISBN: 9027236739 Category : Language Arts & Disciplines Languages : en Pages : 274
Book Description
The formal aspects of non-concatenative morphology have received considerable attention in recent years, but the diachronic dimensions of such systems have been little explored. The current work applies a modern methodological and theoretical framework to a classic problem in Arabic and Semitic historical linguistics: the highly allomorphic system of 'stem-internal' or 'broken' plurals. It shows that widely-accepted views regarding the historical development of this system are untenable and offers a new hypothesis. The first chapter lays out a methodology for comparative-historical research in morphology. The next two chapters present an analysis of Arabic morphology based on contemporary formal linguistic approaches, and applies this analysis to the noun plural system. Chapter Four shows that neither semantic shift nor ablaut-type sound change account adequately for the data. The fifth chapter offers a systematic comparison of the plural systems of Semitic languages, incorporating much new research on the languages of South Arabia and Ethiopia. Chapter Six proposes a new reconstruction.
Author: Jürgen van Oorschot Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG ISBN: 3110447118 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 375
Book Description
This compendium examines the origins of the God Yahweh, his place in the Syrian-Palestinian and Northern Arabian pantheon during the bronze and iron ages, and the beginnings of the cultic veneration of Yahweh. Contributors analyze the epigraphic and archeological evidence, apply fundamental considerations from the cultural and religious sciences, and analyze the relevant Old Testament texts.
Author: Saul Levin Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing ISBN: 902724734X Category : Language Arts & Disciplines Languages : en Pages : 611
Book Description
This is a sequel to the author's Semitic and Indo-European: The Principal Etymologies (1995). That volume provided the key examples of morphological correspondences between the Semitic and the Indo-European languages. In this sequel, the author analyzes correspondences of structure, either within a certain group of languages or belonging to a distantly related group, by looking at inflectional morphology, case, grammar, and phonology. Thus are uncovered the prehistoric means of oral communication, linking the forerunners of ancient societies in Asia, Africa, and Europe, as they talked about livestock or revealed some inner sentiment.
Author: Lutz Edzard Publisher: Harrassowitz ISBN: 9783447110938 Category : FOREIGN LANGUAGE STUDY Languages : en Pages : 218
Book Description
In the context of Arabic and Semitic, it is only natural to treat case and mood under one umbrella: Arab grammarians ingenuously devised the same terms for the independent case and the independent mood on the one hand, and for the dependent case and the dependent mood, respectively. Still, the main focus of these proceedings lies on case in Semitic and Afroasiatic, wherever relevant. Thereby, taking up controversial data, issues, arguments and discussion is indispensable. The volume contains contributions covering data mainly from Akkadian, Hebrew, Arabic, Ethio-Semitic, Berber, and selected Cushitic and Omotic languages. One paper investigates the diachronic development of case and the mimation in Akkadian, another discusses a number of accepted as well as a number of controversial residues of case in Biblical Hebrew and proposes suggestions of reanalysis in this context. A critical reading of chapter 17 of al-Zaggagi's 'Idah is offered as well as a summary and further development of recent discussion on the scenario of case in historical varieties of Arabic. The discussion about "The Case for Proto-Semitic and Proto-Arabic Case" is followed up. Furthermore, the intricacies of delimitating the concepts of case and state in Berber are discussed as well as the meaningfulness of applying the opposition "nominative" vs. "absolutive", which is widely acknowledged to be valid in a broader Afroasiatic perspective, to Semitic. The final paper rounds up the volume with some more general deliberations on the verbal system in Semitic, thereby proposing a four-stage model.
Author: John Huehnergard Publisher: Routledge ISBN: 1136115889 Category : Language Arts & Disciplines Languages : en Pages : 527
Book Description
The Semitic Languages presents a unique, comprehensive survey of individual languages or language clusters from their origins in antiquity to their present-day forms. The Semitic family occupies a position of great historical and linguistic significance: the spoken and written languages of the Phoenicians, Hebrews and Arabs spread throughout Asia and northern and central Africa; the Old Semitic civilizations in turn contributed significantly to European culture; and modern Hebrew, modern literary Arabic, Amharic, and Tigrinya have become their nations' official languages. The book is divided into three parts and each chapter presents a self-contained article, written by a recognized expert in the field. * I. General Issues: providing an introduction to the grammatical traditions, subgrouping and writing systems of this language family. * II. Old Semitic Languages * III. Modern Semitic Languages Parts II and III contain structured chapters, which enable the reader to access and compare information easily. These individual descriptions of each language or cluster include phonology, morphology, syntax, lexis and dialects. Suggestions are made for the most useful sources of further reading and the work is comprehensively indexed.