Juha Janhunen - Böcker

The Mongolic Languages represents the first comprehensive treatment of the Mongolic language family in English. The Mongolic languages form a linguistically well defined but geographically widely dispersed family of more than a dozen separate languages, distributed from East and North Asia (Mongolia, Manchuria and Southern Siberia) to Central and West Asia (Northern Tibet, Gansu, Sinkiang, Northern Afghanistan and the Caspian Region). Written by a team of international specialists, this in-depth volume is divided into twenty chapters. The first three chapters focus on reconstructed and historical forms of Mongolic. These are followed by fourteen chapters each containing synchronic and diachronic descriptions of a modern Mongolic language or dialect group, including Khalkha, Buryat, Dagur, Ordos, Kalmuck and Moghol. The final three chapters deal with areal and taxonomic issues.This unique resource is the ideal companion for advanced undergraduate and postgraduate students of linguistics. It will also be of interest to researchers or anyone with an interest in Mongolian Studies or Central Eurasian history and cultural studies.

Once the rulers of the largest land empire that has ever existed on earth, the historical Mongols of Chinggis Khan left a linguistic heritage which today survives in the form of more than a dozen different languages, collectively termed Mongolic. For general linguistic theory, the Mongolic languages offer interesting insights to problems of areal typology and structural change. An understanding of the Mongolic language family is also a prerequisite for the study of Mongolian and Central Eurasian history and culture. This volume is the first comprehensive treatment of the Mongolic languages in English, written by an international team of specialists.

The Tungusic Languages is a survey of Tungusic, a language family which is seriously endangered today, but which at the time of its maximum spread was present all over Northeast Asia.This volume offers a systematic succession of separate chapters on all the individual Tungusic languages, as well as a number of additional chapters containing contextual information on the language family as a whole, its background and current state, as well as its history of research and documentation. Manchu and its mediaeval ancestor Jurchen are important historical literary languages discussed in this volume, while the other Tungusic languages, around a dozen altogether, have always been spoken by small, local, though in some cases territorially widespread, populations engaged in traditional subsistence activities of the Eurasian taiga and steppe zones and the North Pacific coast.All contributors to this volume are well-known specialists on their specific topics, and, importantly, all the authors of the chapters dealing with modern languages have personal experience of linguistic field work among Tungusic speakers.This volume will be informative for scholars and students specialising in the languages and peoples of Northeast Asia, and will also be of interest to those engaged with linguistic typology, cultural anthropology, and ethnic history who wish to obtain information on the Tungusic languages.

The Tungusic Languages is a survey of Tungusic, a language family which is seriously endangered today, but which at the time of its maximum spread was present all over Northeast Asia.This volume offers a systematic succession of separate chapters on all the individual Tungusic languages, as well as a number of additional chapters containing contextual information on the language family as a whole, its background and current state, as well as its history of research and documentation. Manchu and its mediaeval ancestor Jurchen are important historical literary languages discussed in this volume, while the other Tungusic languages, around a dozen altogether, have always been spoken by small, local, though in some cases territorially widespread, populations engaged in traditional subsistence activities of the Eurasian taiga and steppe zones and the North Pacific coast.All contributors to this volume are well-known specialists on their specific topics, and, importantly, all the authors of the chapters dealing with modern languages have personal experience of linguistic field work among Tungusic speakers.This volume will be informative for scholars and students specialising in the languages and peoples of Northeast Asia, and will also be of interest to those engaged with linguistic typology, cultural anthropology, and ethnic history who wish to obtain information on the Tungusic languages.