Vocabulary and what we can learn from it

This lecture goes into more detail about the current state of languages in SEA.

Important concepts:

• calque
• cultural key word
• ethnocentrism
• indigenization
• lexical stratum (strata)
• loan word
• phonological adaptation
• polysemy
• semantic specialization

Let's have a go with this data from the Tokyo University of Foreign Studies basic vocabulary.

• Copy the spreadsheet so you can manipulate it
• Pick a language, e.g. Japanese
• Keep the languages you think will be relevant, e.g. English, Chinese, Portuguese
• Move them together (delete the others or move to another sheet if things are slow)
• Make a new column called source
• Go through the words and guess the source.
  e.g. Japanese ギター "guitar", is probably from Portuguese guitarra or English guitar, ...
  So write: en, pt in the source column
  e.g. Japanese 銀行 is probably from Chinese 银行 (but could be the other way round)
  So write: zh in the source column

Readings and Resources

Slides: Words: origins, structures, meanings

The reading is Goddard, Chapter 3.

• Cliff Goddard (2005). The Languages of East and Southeast Asia: An Introduction. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. ISBN: 9780199248605