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Papers by Annette R Harrison
Resume This study of Fulfulde varieties spoken in eastern Niger took place in 1998 and 1999. SIL ... more Resume This study of Fulfulde varieties spoken in eastern Niger took place in 1998 and 1999. SIL Niger requested the study in order to determine if an existing languagedevelopment project in the Fulfulde of western Niger, eastern Niger, or central Nigeria would serve Fulfulde speakers in eastern Niger. Preliminary information indicated uncertainty as to the extent of intercomprehension between Fulfulde speakers, as well as a question of tensions between sedentary and nomadic speakers that could potentially prevent the two groups from using the same written materials. Various methods were used to study intelligibility between Fulfulde varieties, including a lexical and grammatical item elicitation list and recorded text testing. In addition, a language attitude assessment instrument was designed to explore language attitudes among eastern Niger Fulfulde speakers. Lexical and grammatical differences between the dialects indicated that speakers best understood those dialects closest to...
Corbett and Fikkert are knowledgeable and experienced guides explaining complex realities and car... more Corbett and Fikkert are knowledgeable and experienced guides explaining complex realities and carefully reviewing relevant details of the terrain ahead. Straight-forward, balanced, kind, and humble, their writing demonstrates that these men have the best in mind for all parties involved – short term teams, sending churches, donors, long term workers, receiving communities, and most importantly God and His honor and glory. Though Helping Without Hurting resources were specifically developed for short-term teams in poverty alleviation contexts, the authors’ descriptions of paternalism and typical cultural misunderstandings of short term visitors, along with the questions provided for reflection and discussion are valuable for any short term team.
This article presents an exploration of Biblical metaphors of sin, the associated implications fo... more This article presents an exploration of Biblical metaphors of sin, the associated implications for responses to sin, and what this entails for clear communication of the Gospel. First, it is necessary to introduce conceptual metaphors and why they matter in translation. Next, I will review conceptual metaphors of sin familiar to Christians, and then consider how our non-believing friends and neighbors may be thinking and talking about sin using examples drawn from media sources. In the end, it is my hope that we will all become better translators, equipped to bridge cultural and conceptual divides as we faithfully communicate the Good News of Jesus Christ.
Forum for Modern Language Studies, Oct 2003
SIL Electronic Survey Reports, 2012
SIL Electronic Book Reviews, 2012
When the late Austronesian linguist Terry Crowley published a version of the historical comparati... more When the late Austronesian linguist Terry Crowley published a version of the historical comparative linguistics course he had been teaching at the University of Papua New Guinea and the University of the South Pacific, he stated that one motivation for his introductory textbook was to demonstrate that the comparative method could be applied universally (1992:10). Gerrit J. Dimmendaal has done the same-and much more-for students of African languages, generously pouring more than thirty years of scholarship into a careful, thorough, insightful, and rich description of the historical lives of African languages. Ultimately, this is more than the "advanced textbook" in historical comparative linguistics described on the publisher's website, but a synergistic exposition on the nature of language and of language change with a special focus on Africa. Dimmendaal systematically works through a comprehensive explanation of the comparative method and related methods of analysis in the first seven chapters. The next five chapters he devotes to an exposition of language contact phenomena and areal influences, and in the final four chapters he discusses language change and its relationships to typology, cultural-historical studies, and the view of language as a species in an ecology. African languages provide the examples and illustrations for each topic, and in this way Dimmendaal substantiates the claim he makes in his preface: "African languages have a story to tell." Resonances throughout the book include an appreciation of scholarly work and discoveries leading to our current understanding of African languages and their genetic relationships. I especially appreciated the insights into the actors and historical development of the scholarly disciplines related to historical comparative linguistics specifically, as well as to other sub-disciplines within the linguistic field. Moreover, Dimmendaal does not shy away from disagreements over theory, but presents relevant arguments from various perspectives and then makes his own position clear. The author continually insists that historical and comparative studies of languages must be thorough and methodical, and deep as well as broad. Dimmendaal does this more by example than through direct admonition. He cites himself so often that it becomes obvious that he speaks from years of field experience, careful data collection, deep analysis and reflection, and searches for explanations. He demonstrates seemingly encyclopedic knowledge of the histories of people
Pragmatics, Jun 2011
This study applies the concepts of frames and performance roles to represented speech in personal... more This study applies the concepts of frames and performance roles to represented speech in personal narratives of speakers of Fulfulde, a Niger-Congo language of the (West) Atlantic group. Contextualization cues such as verbal suffixes indicating voice and aspect, person reference and references to states of knowledge index the frame of interaction between storyteller and audience, the frame of the narrated story, and an enacted frame that recontextualizes events within the story world. These cues also signal performance roles within the frame, such as the addressing self, the principal and the animator. The multiple frames and performance roles indexed by represented speech allow the speaker to represent past and present selves, and more importantly, to make an implicit comparison between the states of knowledge at various points in time in the performance of the narrative. In this way, the speaker distributes responsibility, blame and praise across multiple depictions of the self such that the one most accessible to the audience is portrayed as a superior representation of cultural ideals.
A frequent assumption in the elicitation of linguistic data is that the data can somehow be isola... more A frequent assumption in the elicitation of linguistic data is that the data can somehow be isolated from emergent and contextual elements inherent in human interaction. Using Fulfulde personal narratives collected in three countries in West Africa, I demonstrate that speakers continue to follow the rules and structure of talk in interaction, including turntaking, recipient design, and attention to relevance, in spite of methodological guidelines designed to limit evidence of the interactional context. The fact that even "unnatural" discourse such as elicited narratives is shaped by interactional considerations indicates the fundamental role of interaction in all forms of language use.
Thesis Chapters by Annette R Harrison
M.A. Thesis, University of California, Santa Barbara, 2004
There is a recognizable tension in the discipline of linguistics between a focus on the referenti... more There is a recognizable tension in the discipline of linguistics between a focus on the referential use of language and its extra-propositional symbolic nature (Briggs 1986, Silverstein 1977). Proper nouns have been included in studies on reference and referent tracking in narrative and in conversation (cf. Halliday and Hasan 1976; Longacre 1983; Polanyi 1985; Scollon and Scollon 1981). However, as scholars such as Basso (1984, 1986) and Pagliai (2000) have demonstrated, proper nouns are more than referential; they are also resources for indexing shared knowledge, cultural practices and identities.
Using as my data a corpus of Fulfulde narratives which were experimentally elicited, I argue that the use of proper nouns in these narratives is indexical of the relationship between the narrator and the researcher. The concept of the Community of Practice (Eckert and McConnell-Ginet 1992) is useful in deciphering how much shared knowledge and practice the narrator and researcher may have in common, while the concept of Pathways of Identifiability (Du Bois and Thompson 1991) allows an analysis of how the participants in the context of the narration may be identifying the referents.
The use of most of the proper nouns is consistent with a model of discourse between interlocutors who hold only very general types of knowledge in common. The Pathways of Identifiability chosen by the narrators included Situation, Anchored, Mention, and Repair. These Pathways are directly linked to the discourse itself and the circumstances surrounding it. Local, Areal and Conventional Frames chosen as Pathways include knowledge which can be shared by people who happen to be in the same geographic areas and wider society, but may not belong to the same Communities of Practice. The Pathways which the narrators seem to have chosen indicate that their assessment of the audience's identity was as those who did not share membership in the same specific Community of Practice.
Resume This study of Fulfulde varieties spoken in eastern Niger took place in 1998 and 1999. SIL ... more Resume This study of Fulfulde varieties spoken in eastern Niger took place in 1998 and 1999. SIL Niger requested the study in order to determine if an existing languagedevelopment project in the Fulfulde of western Niger, eastern Niger, or central Nigeria would serve Fulfulde speakers in eastern Niger. Preliminary information indicated uncertainty as to the extent of intercomprehension between Fulfulde speakers, as well as a question of tensions between sedentary and nomadic speakers that could potentially prevent the two groups from using the same written materials. Various methods were used to study intelligibility between Fulfulde varieties, including a lexical and grammatical item elicitation list and recorded text testing. In addition, a language attitude assessment instrument was designed to explore language attitudes among eastern Niger Fulfulde speakers. Lexical and grammatical differences between the dialects indicated that speakers best understood those dialects closest to...
Corbett and Fikkert are knowledgeable and experienced guides explaining complex realities and car... more Corbett and Fikkert are knowledgeable and experienced guides explaining complex realities and carefully reviewing relevant details of the terrain ahead. Straight-forward, balanced, kind, and humble, their writing demonstrates that these men have the best in mind for all parties involved – short term teams, sending churches, donors, long term workers, receiving communities, and most importantly God and His honor and glory. Though Helping Without Hurting resources were specifically developed for short-term teams in poverty alleviation contexts, the authors’ descriptions of paternalism and typical cultural misunderstandings of short term visitors, along with the questions provided for reflection and discussion are valuable for any short term team.
This article presents an exploration of Biblical metaphors of sin, the associated implications fo... more This article presents an exploration of Biblical metaphors of sin, the associated implications for responses to sin, and what this entails for clear communication of the Gospel. First, it is necessary to introduce conceptual metaphors and why they matter in translation. Next, I will review conceptual metaphors of sin familiar to Christians, and then consider how our non-believing friends and neighbors may be thinking and talking about sin using examples drawn from media sources. In the end, it is my hope that we will all become better translators, equipped to bridge cultural and conceptual divides as we faithfully communicate the Good News of Jesus Christ.
Forum for Modern Language Studies, Oct 2003
SIL Electronic Survey Reports, 2012
SIL Electronic Book Reviews, 2012
When the late Austronesian linguist Terry Crowley published a version of the historical comparati... more When the late Austronesian linguist Terry Crowley published a version of the historical comparative linguistics course he had been teaching at the University of Papua New Guinea and the University of the South Pacific, he stated that one motivation for his introductory textbook was to demonstrate that the comparative method could be applied universally (1992:10). Gerrit J. Dimmendaal has done the same-and much more-for students of African languages, generously pouring more than thirty years of scholarship into a careful, thorough, insightful, and rich description of the historical lives of African languages. Ultimately, this is more than the "advanced textbook" in historical comparative linguistics described on the publisher's website, but a synergistic exposition on the nature of language and of language change with a special focus on Africa. Dimmendaal systematically works through a comprehensive explanation of the comparative method and related methods of analysis in the first seven chapters. The next five chapters he devotes to an exposition of language contact phenomena and areal influences, and in the final four chapters he discusses language change and its relationships to typology, cultural-historical studies, and the view of language as a species in an ecology. African languages provide the examples and illustrations for each topic, and in this way Dimmendaal substantiates the claim he makes in his preface: "African languages have a story to tell." Resonances throughout the book include an appreciation of scholarly work and discoveries leading to our current understanding of African languages and their genetic relationships. I especially appreciated the insights into the actors and historical development of the scholarly disciplines related to historical comparative linguistics specifically, as well as to other sub-disciplines within the linguistic field. Moreover, Dimmendaal does not shy away from disagreements over theory, but presents relevant arguments from various perspectives and then makes his own position clear. The author continually insists that historical and comparative studies of languages must be thorough and methodical, and deep as well as broad. Dimmendaal does this more by example than through direct admonition. He cites himself so often that it becomes obvious that he speaks from years of field experience, careful data collection, deep analysis and reflection, and searches for explanations. He demonstrates seemingly encyclopedic knowledge of the histories of people
Pragmatics, Jun 2011
This study applies the concepts of frames and performance roles to represented speech in personal... more This study applies the concepts of frames and performance roles to represented speech in personal narratives of speakers of Fulfulde, a Niger-Congo language of the (West) Atlantic group. Contextualization cues such as verbal suffixes indicating voice and aspect, person reference and references to states of knowledge index the frame of interaction between storyteller and audience, the frame of the narrated story, and an enacted frame that recontextualizes events within the story world. These cues also signal performance roles within the frame, such as the addressing self, the principal and the animator. The multiple frames and performance roles indexed by represented speech allow the speaker to represent past and present selves, and more importantly, to make an implicit comparison between the states of knowledge at various points in time in the performance of the narrative. In this way, the speaker distributes responsibility, blame and praise across multiple depictions of the self such that the one most accessible to the audience is portrayed as a superior representation of cultural ideals.
A frequent assumption in the elicitation of linguistic data is that the data can somehow be isola... more A frequent assumption in the elicitation of linguistic data is that the data can somehow be isolated from emergent and contextual elements inherent in human interaction. Using Fulfulde personal narratives collected in three countries in West Africa, I demonstrate that speakers continue to follow the rules and structure of talk in interaction, including turntaking, recipient design, and attention to relevance, in spite of methodological guidelines designed to limit evidence of the interactional context. The fact that even "unnatural" discourse such as elicited narratives is shaped by interactional considerations indicates the fundamental role of interaction in all forms of language use.
M.A. Thesis, University of California, Santa Barbara, 2004
There is a recognizable tension in the discipline of linguistics between a focus on the referenti... more There is a recognizable tension in the discipline of linguistics between a focus on the referential use of language and its extra-propositional symbolic nature (Briggs 1986, Silverstein 1977). Proper nouns have been included in studies on reference and referent tracking in narrative and in conversation (cf. Halliday and Hasan 1976; Longacre 1983; Polanyi 1985; Scollon and Scollon 1981). However, as scholars such as Basso (1984, 1986) and Pagliai (2000) have demonstrated, proper nouns are more than referential; they are also resources for indexing shared knowledge, cultural practices and identities.
Using as my data a corpus of Fulfulde narratives which were experimentally elicited, I argue that the use of proper nouns in these narratives is indexical of the relationship between the narrator and the researcher. The concept of the Community of Practice (Eckert and McConnell-Ginet 1992) is useful in deciphering how much shared knowledge and practice the narrator and researcher may have in common, while the concept of Pathways of Identifiability (Du Bois and Thompson 1991) allows an analysis of how the participants in the context of the narration may be identifying the referents.
The use of most of the proper nouns is consistent with a model of discourse between interlocutors who hold only very general types of knowledge in common. The Pathways of Identifiability chosen by the narrators included Situation, Anchored, Mention, and Repair. These Pathways are directly linked to the discourse itself and the circumstances surrounding it. Local, Areal and Conventional Frames chosen as Pathways include knowledge which can be shared by people who happen to be in the same geographic areas and wider society, but may not belong to the same Communities of Practice. The Pathways which the narrators seem to have chosen indicate that their assessment of the audience's identity was as those who did not share membership in the same specific Community of Practice.