Jakob Halfmann: Spatial Orientation in the Katë Language (Nuristani)
Complex systems of spatial orientation are a characteristic areal feature of the languages of lower Chitral and Nuristan (Heegård & Liljegren 2018: 155). Within this region, the most intricate systems have been found in languages of the Nuristani group. Detailed studies are now available on the spatial systems of Nuristani Kalasha (Degener 1998: 95-102) and Prasun (Buddruss & Degener 2017: 449-481). A new analysis of the spatial system of the Katë language, the largest Nuristani language by number of speakers, based on data gathered over a period of five years, both via original fieldwork and by re-examination of archival materials, has recently been published in Halfmann (2024), expanding on – and at times diverging from – the earlier analyses of Grjunberg (1980: 265-281) and Strand (1997).
This talk first gives a general introduction to the Katë language, covering genealogy, geography, dialectology, and phonology, and subsequently offers a synthesis of the structure of the Katë spatial system, focusing on its semantic and morphological characteristics and its culturally embedded usage.
References
Buddruss, Georg & Almuth Degener. 2017. Materialien zur Prasun-Sprache des afghanischen Hindukusch. Vol. II: Grammatik (Harvard Oriental Series 84). Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Degener, Almuth. 1998. Die Sprache von Nisheygram im afghanischen Hindukusch (Neuindische Studien 14). Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz.
Grjunberg, Aleksandr Leonovič. 1980. Jazyk Kati. Teksty, Grammatičeskij Očerk (Jazyki Vostočnogo Gindukuša). Moscow: Nauka.
Halfmann, Jakob. 2024. A Grammatical Description of the Katë Language (Nuristani). Cologne: University of Cologne dissertation. https://kups.ub.uni-koeln.de/73732/.
Heegård, Jan & Henrik Liljegren. 2018. Geomorphic coding in Palula and Kalasha. Acta Linguistica Hafniensia 50(2). 129–160. https://doi.org/10.1080/03740463.2018.1432210.
Strand, Richard. 1997. Direction and location in the Nuristâni languages. Conference abstract for the 3rd Himalayan Languages Symposium, University of California at Santa Barbara, 18 July 1997. https://nuristan.info/Nuristani/Kamkata/Kom/KomLanguage/kamdirec.html.
Jakob Halfmann completed his PhD at the University of Cologne in 2023 with a dissertation titled "A Grammatical Description of the Katë Language (Nuristani)." Currently, he is a project staff member at the Chair of Comparative Philology at the University of Würzburg. His research interests include language change, comparative reconstruction, and the historical and descriptive linguistics of Nuristani and Middle Iranian languages.