Dr. Ewa Czaykowska-Higgins

SSHRCC Research Grant

OBJECTIVES

The purpose of this grant was twofold: 1) to contribute to the store of information about the prosodic (syllable and stress) structure of languages of the Salish family by providing careful and theoretically-informed descriptions of the prosodic systems of a number of understudied languages within the family; and 2) to consider the relationships between patterns of syllabification, stress, and types of segments found in Salish words, focusing in particular on how the properties of the schwa-vowel and differences in the sonority of different categories of consonants play a role in both syllabification and stress assignment.

PAPERS / PUBLICATIONS/ PRESENTATIONS

Ewa Czaykowska-Higgins (PI)
Publications:

2001 (with Suzanne Urbanczyk) Maintaining Contrast in Nxa'amxcín Reduplication. WCCFL 20 Proceedings, ed. K. Megerdoomian and L.A. Bar-el, 101-114, Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Press.

(In proofs) The Phonological and Morphological Status of Nxa’amxcin Lexical Suffixes. In Donna B. Gerdts and Lisa Matthewson (eds.) A Festschrift for M. Dale Kinkade. (28 pages in proofs). University of Montana Press.

Presentations:

2001 (With Suzanne Urbanczyk) Root Reduplications in Nxa’amxcín: A Working Paper Puzzle. Workshop on Grammatical Structure in Indigenous Languages of the North/West, University of Victoria, January 2001.

2001 (With Suzanne Urbanczyk) Maintaining Contrast in Nxa’amxcin Root Reduplications. West Coast Conference on Formal Linguistics (WCCFL), University of Southern California, Los Angeles, February 2001.

2002 The Role of the Linguist in Fieldwork and Archiving: Ethical Issues.
Canadian Linguistics Association Conference, University of Toronto. May 2002.

2002 Prefixes, Roots and Domains in Nxa’amxcín. Canadian Linguistics Association Conference, University of Toronto. May 2002.

2002 Clusters in Nxa’amxcín. Invited seminar. University of British Columbia. November 21, 2002.

2003 The Phonology of Nxa’amxcín “Compounds.” Workshop on the Grammatical Structure of Indigenous Languages of the North/West. University of Victoria, February 15, 2003.

2004 Edges and Domains in Nxa’amxcín Words. Workshop on the Structure and Constituency of the Languages of the Americas (WSCLA) 9. Victoria, B.C., February 6,
2004.

In Preparation:

Word Internal Structure: Edges and Domains

Fieldwork in First Nations Communities: Towards an Ethical Foundation

Suzanne Urbanczyk (Postdoctoral Research Assistant)

Publications

1998 Echo Vowels in Coast Salish. In Marion Caldicott, Suzanne Gessner, and Eun-Sook Kim (eds.), Proceedings of the Workshop on Structure and Constituency in the Languages of the Americas IV, pp. 165-184. UBC Working Papers in Linguistics.

1999 A-Templatic Reduplication in Halq'eméylem. In Kimary Shahin, Susan Blake, and Eun Sook Kim (eds.), Proceedings of West Coast Conference in Formal Linguistics XVII, pp. 655-669. Stanford: CSLI Publications.

2001 (with Ewa Czaykowska-Higgins). Maintaining Contrast in Nxa'amxcin Reduplication. In K. Megerdoomian and L. A. Bar-el (eds.), Proceedings of WCCFL 20: 101-114. Somerville MA: Cascadilla Press.

to appear Enhancing Contrast in Reduplication. In Hurch, B. (ed) Papers from the Graz Conference on Reduplication. Mouton de Gruyter.

Reports and Lessons

2000 Report on Continuative Verb Stems in Upriver Halq'eméylem. Manuscript, Stó:lo Shwelí (Presented at 35th International Conference on Salish and Neighbouring Languages)

2001 Stó:lo Halq’eméylem Continuative Verb Forms: Lessons, Exercises, and Word List. 20 pp. + word list (for Stó:lo Shxwelí language programs).

Presentations

1999 Why stressed schwa is marked: evidence from Ay7ajuthem. 75th Meeting of the Linguistic Society of America, Los Angeles, January 1999.

1999 Foot form in Coast Salish. Keynote speaker, Workshop on Structure and Constituency of the Languages of the Americas, University of British Columbia, March 1999.

1999 Stacking the deck: Sentence Rummy. 34th International Conference on Salish and Neighbouring Languages, Kamloops, August, 1999.

1999 Productivity and Salish double reduplications. The Linguistic Society of Alberta, Banff AB, October 1999.

2000 The bases of Salish double reduplications. Society for the Study of the Indigenous Languages of the Americas meeting, Chicago IL, January 2000.

2000 The bases of double reduplication. WCCFL 19, UCLA, February 2000.
Longer version presented at University of British Columbia, March 2000.

2000 Cues, clues, and issues in identifying underlying Schwa in Salish. University of Victoria, March 2000.
2000 A report on “continuative” verb stems in Upriver Halq'eméylem. 35th International Conference on Salish and Neighbouring Languages, Mt. Currie, BC, August 2000.

2001 (with Ewa Czaykowska-Higgins) Root reduplications in Nxa’amxcín: A Working Paper Puzzle. Workshop on Grammatical Structure in Indigenous Languages of the North/West, University of Victoria, January 2001.

2001 A prosodic asymmetry in reduplication. Workshop on Grammatical Structure in Indigenous Languages of the North/West. University of Victoria, January 2001.

2001 Some of the bases for the bases of reduplication: Adjacency and headedness. University of Victoria, February 2001 and University of Calgary, February 2001.

2001 (with Ewa Czaykowska-Higgins) Maintaining contrast in Nxa'amxcin reduplication. WCCFL20, UCLA, February 2001.

2001 A prosodic asymmetry in reduplication. The 2001 Asymmetry Conference, Université du Quebec, Montreal, Canada, May 2001.

2001 A bit about ablaut in Upriver Halkomelem. 36th International Conference on Salish and Neighbouring Languages, Chilliwack, BC, August 2001.

2002 Neutralization, phonotactic knowledge, and the recoverability of schwa in Coast Salish. Poster presentation at 2nd International Conference on Contrast, University of Toronto Linguistics Department, May 2002.

2003 The role of non-concatenative morphology in maintaining contrast. Invited talk; University of British Columbia, Oct. 2003.

2004 Form and Function in Salish Word Structure. Humanities Centre lecture, University of Victoria, January, 2004.

STUDENTS FUNDED

Kisa Bell (Undergrad)
2003 The Prosodic Properties of Nxa’amxcín Particles: database and report

Christel Bodenbender (MA)
2001 A database of Stolo Continuative Verbs

Megan Clayards (Undergrad)
2002 The Acoustics of Secondary Stress in Nxa’amxcín. ms.

Ruth Dyck (PhD Student)
2000 Schwa, sonority, stress, and the syllable in Squamish (Skwxwú7mesh). Paper presented at meeting of the Canadian Linguistic Association, May 26th - 29th, Edmonton, Alberta.

2001 Schwa, sonority, stress, and the syllable in Squamish (Skwxwú7mesh). (Revised version of CLA paper.) Presented at Grammatical Structures in Indigenous Languages of the North/West, January 27th - 28th, University of Victoria.

2004 Stress and Syllabification in Squamish (Skwxwú7mesh). University of Victoria, PhD dissertation (prefinal draft completed).

Aliki Marinakis (Undergrad)
1998 Stress and Reduplication in Upriver Halkomelem

Mark Riepl (MA Student)
2000 Echo Vowels in Upper Chehalis. University of Victoria Salish Phonology Workshop. February 2000.

2000 Report on Upper Chehalis Stress and Syllabification. University of Victoria. ms.

Mihoko Teshigawara (PhD)
2002 A Bibliography of Sonority, Stress, and Schwa