Languages of Mainland Southeast Asia : the state of the art

The studies in this book represent the rich, diverse and substantial research being conducted today in the linguistics of Mainland Southeast Asia. The chapters cover a broad scope. Several studies address questions of language relatedness, often challenging conventional assumptions about the status of language contact as an explanatory factor in accounting for linguistic similarities. Several address the question of Mainland Southeast Asia as a linguistic area, exploring new ways to imagine and define the boundaries, and indeed the boundedness, of a Mainland Southeast Asia area. Two contributions rethink the received notion of the 'sesquisyllable' with new empirical and theoretical angles. And a set of chapters explores topics in the morphology and syntax of the region's languages, sometimes challenging orthodox assumptions and claims about what a typical language of Mainland Southeast Asia is like. Written by leading researchers in the field, and with a substantial overview of current knowledge and new directions by the volume editors N. J. Enfield and Bernard Comrie, this book will serve as an authoritative source on where the linguistics of Mainland Southeast Asia is at, and where it is heading. N. J. Enfield and Bernard Comrie Mainland Southeast Asian languages: State of the art and new directions | 1 Part 1: Language relatedness in MSEA Martha Ratliff Word-initial prenasalization in Southeast Asia: A historical perspective | 31 Paul Sidwell Local drift and areal convergence in the restructuring of Mainland Southeast Asian languages | 51 Marc Brunelle and James Kirby Re-assessing tonal diversity and geographical convergence in Mainland Southeast Asia | 82 James A. Matisoff Re-examining the genetic position of Jingpho: Putting flesh on the bones of the Jingpho/Luish relationship | 111 Part 2: Boundaries of the MSEA area Mathias Jenny The far West of Southeast Asia: ‘Give’ and ‘get’ in the languages of Myanmar | 155 Mark W. Post Morphosyntactic reconstruction in an areal-historical context: A pre-historical relationship between North East India and Mainland Southeast Asia? | 209 David Gil The Mekong-Mamberamo linguistic area | Hilário de Sousa The Far Southern Sinitic languages as part of Mainland Southeast Asia | 356 Part 3: Defining the sesquisyllable Becky Butler Approaching a phonological understanding of the sesquisyllable with phonetic evidence from Khmer and Bunong | 443 Pittayawat Pittayaporn Typologizing sesquisyllabicity: The role of structural analysis in the study of linguistic diversity in Mainland Southeast Asia | 500 Part 4: Explorations in MSEA morphosyntax Mark J. Alves Morphological functions among Mon-Khmer languages: Beyond the basics | 531 Roger Blench The origins of nominal classification markers in MSEA languages: Convergence, contact and some African parallels | 558 Alice Vittrant Expressing motion: The contribution of Southeast Asian languages with reference to East Asian languages | 586 Indexes Subject index | 633 Author index | 641 Place index | 643 Language index | 646 Mainland Southeast Asia (hereafter: MSEA) can be broadly defined as the area occupied by present day Cambodia, Laos, Peninsular Malaysia, Thailand, Myanmar, and Vietnam, along with areas of China south of the Yangtze River. Also sometimes included are the seven states of Northeast India, and—although here the term ‘mainland’ no longer applies—the islands from Indonesia and Malaysia running southeast to Australia and West Papua (see Map 1). There are no exact borders around the MSEA area. Different scholars draw lines in different places. But there is nevertheless a core (Comrie 2007: 45). MSEA is always taken to include Indochina—Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia—together with Thailand, and, usually, Peninsular Malaysia and part or all of Myanmar (see Map 2). This book covers the broader scope of Greater MSEA, with several chapters moving beyond the core area of Indochina and Thailand, in all directions; see chapters in this book by Vittrant and by Jenny on Myanmar (cf. Bradley 1995; Watkins 2005), by Post on Northeast India (cf. Morey and Post 2008, 2010; Hyslop, Morey, and Post 2011, 2012, 2013), by Gil on Insular Southeast Asia (cf. Adelaar and Himmelmann 2005; Blust 2013a, b), and by de Sousa on Southern China (cf. Bauer 1996; Ansaldo and Matthews 2001; Chappell 2001).