Deixis and Alignment: Inverse systems in indigenous languages of the Americas(70 Typological Studies in Language)

This book proposes a notion of inverse that differs from two widespread positions found in descriptive and typological studies (one of them restrictive and structure-oriented, the other broad and function-centered). This third stance put forward here takes both grammar and pragmatic functions into account, but it also relates the opposition between direct and inverse verbs and clauses to an opposition between deictic values, thereby achieving two advantageous goals: it meaningfully circumvents one of the usual analytic dilemmas, namely whether a given construction is passive or inverse, and it refines our understanding of the cross-linguistic typology of inversion. This framework is applied to the description of the morphosyntax of eleven Amerindian languages (Algonquian: Plains Cree, Miami-Illinois, Ojibwa; Kutenai; Sahaptian: Sahaptin, Nez Perce; Kiowa-Tanoan: Arizona Tewa, Picurís, Southern Tiwa, Kiowa; Mapudungun).

Table of Contents:
1. Foreword; 2. List of abbreviations; 3. Introduction; 4. I. Alignment and direction; 5. II. A theory of direction; 6. III. Algonquian languages; 7. IV. Kutenai; 8. V. Sahaptian languages; 9. VI. Kiowa-Tanoan languages; 10. VII. Mapudungun; 11. VIII. Conclusions; 12. Appendix 1: Algonquian paradigms; 13. Appendix 2: Analysis of Kiowa personal prefixes; 14. Appendix 3: Optimality-theoretic syntax of inverses; 15. References; 16. Language index; 17. Author index; 18. Subject index

Review :
This book constitutes a major contribution to the study of an extremely complex linguistic phenomenon. It can be recommended to anyone interested in typology in general, and in hierarchically based language systems in particular. The strongest part of the book is the description of the alignment systems of the individual languages (chapters III-VII). The accuracy with which the author presents and analyzes the data and the accounts given by other linguists is simply impressive. Zúñiga does not oversimplify anything, and he never jumps to conclusions. When the data do not allow a clear-cut conclusion, he leaves the question open for further discussion or for the eventual future availability of more data (which, as he stresses, is problematic in view of the fact that most of the languages under study are in danger of extinction). The same holds for Zúñiga's treatment of the different theoretical approaches to hierarchical or inverse systems, which he discusses and weighs carefully. In this way, the book presents an excellent comparative overview of the different ways in which inverse or hierarchical systems are dealt with. ...this book is a very important contribution to the study of an extremely complex linguistic phenomenon. It will be indispensable for anyone interested in indexability hierarchies and inverse systems. This well-written and thoughtful book is valuable as a one-stop source for information about direct-inverse and related hierachical-asymmetric transitive morphosyntax in native languages of the Western Hemisphere. [...] We owe the author our gratitude for undertaking the arduous philological task of gleaning the relevant facts from the often forbidding primary literature, for his presentation and intelligent commentary on it, and not least for writing with unpretentious clarity and with the occasional much welcomed outcropping of dry wit.