Introduction to the History of the Slavic Languages
Instructor: Katarzyna Dziwirek Telephone: 543-7691
Office: Smith Hall M260 e-mail: email@example.com
Office Hours: Tue, Thu 2:30-3:20 and by appointment
Class website: http://faculty.washington.edu/dziwirek/slavic351/slavic351.shtml
The scope of the course:
1. Language evolution, Indo-Europeans: evidence for the Indo-European language family and its subgroups, what were the Indo-Europeans like, what was their language like, where did they come from, etc.
2. The place of Slavic within Indo-European (relationships to other subgroups)
3. The development of today's Slavic languages from the ancestral Common Slavic
4. The development of writing systems, national languages, and literatures
5. Principles of historical linguistics: sound change, analogy, semantic change, etc.
6. The relevance of historical linguistics: how linguistic evidence furthers our knowledge of human cognitive development, the culture of our ancestors, etc.
What you should know after this course:
· basic principles of language change
· main features of Slavic languages (e.g. be able to tell that English flow and Russian плaвaть, Polish pływać and Serbo-Croatian plivati are related, and why they are different)
· main features of the three groups and individual Slavic languages, so that you can look at a text from a Slavic language and be able to tell which language it is (for example, know why in Russian "star" is zvezda, while in Polish it is gwiazda, etc.)
Readings on electronic reserves, a class packet (available at Professional Copy, 4200 University Ave).
Requirements for Slavic 351:
Readings and Class Participation: Follow the reading schedule closely and be prepared to discuss assigned texts in class. See handout on Reading and Class Discussion on the class website.
Presentation on Indo-Europeans on 4/22. Please pick your topic by 4/15= 25 points
Exercises: In class and take-home = 175 points total
Exams: 3 tests 3 x 100 = 300 points.
Requirements for Slavic 551:
A final paper (7 or > pages) (= 50 points). You should discuss your topic with the instructor and by 5/13 send an email to the instructor with your topic and three references you plan to use. See the class website for hints on How to write a research paper, consult the Selected References file, and check out Past student paper topics. Total points=550
Slavic 351/551 Materials
There are no textbooks for this class, but we use chapters from several key books:
Aitchison, Jean. 1996. The Seeds of Speech: Language Origin and Evolution. Cambridge University Press.
Aitchison, Jean. 2001. Language Change: Progress or Decay? Cambridge University Press.
Campbell, Lyle. 2004. Historical Linguistics: An Introduction. Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press.
Carlton, Terence R. 1990. Introduction to the Phonological History of the Slavic Languages. Columbus, OH: Slavica.
Hock, Hans Heinrich. 1986. Principles of Historical Linguistics. New York: Mouton de Gruyter.
Mallory, J. P. and D. Q. Adams. 2006. The Oxford Introduction to Proto-Indo-European and the Proto-Indo-European World. Oxford University Press.
Townsend, Charles E. and Laura A. Janda. 1996. Common and comparative Slavic. Columbus, OH: Slavica.
351/551 Slavic Reading Schedule
All readings are on electronic reserves
Week 1: Introduction to historical linguistics, language evolution, classification of sounds
Introduction to course themes and goals
Video: Human Language Series, Part 3: Human Language Evolves
Lyle Campbell Historical Linguistics: An Introduction: Ch. 1 Introduction
H. Hock Principles of Historical Linguistics: Ch. 1 Introduction
Week 2: Language evolution and dispersion
Jean Aitchison The Seeds of Speech: Ch. 5 The family tree, Ch. 6 A devious mind, Ch. 8 Small
Video: Nova: In Search of the First Language
Jean Aitchison The Seeds of Speech: Ch. 13 The widening circle
Merritt Ruhlen The Origin of Language: Ch. 1 Language and History, Ch. 3 Controversy
Week 3: Indo-Europeans: people and language
J. P. Mallory and D. Q. Adams The Oxford Introduction: Ch. 1 Discovery, Ch. 5 Relationships,
Ch. 26 Origins
Philip Baldi Indo-European languages
J. P. Mallory and D. Q. Adams The Oxford Introduction: Ch. 3 Reconstructing PIE
Week 4: Indo-Europeans continued, sound change and the comparative method
PRESENTATIONS on Indo-European Language and Culture, please choose one of the sections below (Watkins and Fortson are on electronic reserves):
Calvert Watkins Indo-European and the Indo-Europeans
General Terms + Nature xxiii-xxvii
People and Society xxvii-xxix
Economic Life xxix-xxxi
B. Fortson Indo-European Language and Culture
Economy and Law 19-22
Personal Names 34-35
Archeology and Material Culture 35-39
Location of the Homeland 39-44
Mallory and Adams The Oxford Introduction to Proto-Indo-European and The Proto-Indo-European World
Chapter 8 The Physical Word 120-131
Chapter 9: Indo-European Fauna 132-155
Chapter 10: Indo-European Flora 156-172
Chapter 11: Anatomy 173-201
Chapter 12: Family and Kinship 203-218
Chapter 13: Hearth and Home 219-229
Chapter 14: Clothing and Textiles 230-238
Chapter 15: Material Culture 239-253
Chapter 16: Food and Drink 254-266
Chapter 17: Proto-Indo-European Society 266-286
Chapter 18: Space and Time 287-306
Chapter 19: Number and Quantity 307-320
Chapter 20: Mind, Emotions and Sense Perception 321-351
Chapter 21: Speech and Sound 352-367
Chapter 22: Activities 368-408
Chapter 23: Religion 408-414
Chapter 24: Grammatical Elements 415-422
Chapter 25: Comparative Mythology 423-441
H. Hock: Ch. 3 Sound Change: the regularity hypothesis
Jean Aitchison Language Change Ch. 11 Doing what comes naturally and Ch. 13 The Mad Hatters
Week 5: The Comparative Method continued, Early Slavs, Common Slavic: relationship to PIE
J. P. Maher Common Slavic *slověne
Review for TEST 1
Townsend and Janda: Ch. II Proto-Indo-European to Early Proto-Slavic
TEST 1: Indo-European, phonetics, the comparative method, basic sound changes
Week 6: Common Slavic phonological developments: rising sonority and synharmony
Townsend and Janda: Ch. III Proto-Slavic to Late Common Slavic: Rising Sonority
Townsend and Janda: Ch. IV Proto-Slavic to Late Common Slavic: Synharmony
Week 7: Analogy, semantic change, morphology
H. Hock: Ch. 9 p. 167-179 on analogy
Jean Aitchison Language Change Ch. 12 Repairing the patterns
Lyle Campbell Historical Linguistics: An Introduction: Ch. 9 Semantic Change and Lexical Change
(up to p. 265)
Jean Aitchison Words in the Mind Ch. 13 Drifting Words: Layering and Meaning Change
Geoffrey Nunberg Going Nucular Caucasian Talk Circles
Townsend and Janda: Ch. VIII Evolution of Slavic Declension
Week 8: Development of separate Slavic languages, writing systems
Carlton: Ch. I The Slavic Languages Past and Present
Bernard Comrie Slavonic Languages
Townsend and Janda: Ch. X Surveys of Five Modern Slavic Languages
Review for TEST 2
Denise Schmandt-Besserat The Earliest Precursor of Writing
H.H. Hock and Brian Joseph Language History, Ch. 3 Writing: Its history and its decipherment
TEST 2: sound change, reconstruction, main sound changes in Common Slavic
Week 9: Slavic literacy and alphabets
Carlton: Ch. III The Beginning of Slavic Literacy
Paul Cubberley The Slavic Alphabets
Review for TEST 3
Week 10: Reasons for language change, summary of course themes
Video: Do you speak American?
H. Hock: Ch. 20 Linguistic change: Its nature and causes
Jean Aitchison Language Change Ch. 10 The reason why
Jean Aitchison Psycholinguistic Perspectives on Language Change
TEST 3: features of the 3 Slavic groups and Slavic alphabets