Habitat Gelao Language Reference Grammar

The dissertation aims to synchronically make a comprehensive and systematic study of Judu Gelao, a language of Geyang Branch, Kam-Tai languages, on the basis of reference grammar and the field work by the author. It consists of eleven chapters.Chapter one .Preface. It gives a brief introduction of the dissertation. It explains the significance of the research, the data sources, the theory and the methodology of this study, reviewing past linguistic researches on the language. The general information and the present situation of language use of the Gelao nationality are also given in this chapter.Chapter two describes the phonological system of the language, including consonants, vowels and tones. An analysis of sound changes is provided in the meantime.Chapter three makes a presentation of vocabulary of the language, such as the main characters of the vocabulary, the source language and the process of load words, an analysis of homophony, synonym and idiom.Chapter four concentrates on the basic types of word-building process of the Gelao language.Chapter five observes the word-class of the Gelao language. This study divides the vocabulary into ten word-classes, and describes the syntax of each word-class. Emphasizes are put on the gender and the number of nouns, the tense, aspect, voice and transitivity of verbs, and formative of adjectives.Chapter six describes eight main types of phrases of the language, and the relationships of different components within the same phrases.Chapter seven is a description of six syntactic constituents, including the subject, predicate, object, attributive , adverb modifier and complement. Special attention is paid to the relationship of different elements and the six syntactic constituents. Chapter eight is about the simple clause. Starting from the word order of the subject, verb , object, the dissertation studies a few types of constructions, including causative sentences, sentences with verbal constructions in series, passive sentences, comparative sentences, decisive sentences, sentences with topic structure, negative sentences and existential or possessive sentences.The complex clause is discussed in chapter nine. According to the logic and semantic, complex clauses can be divided into two types, namely coordinate sentences and subordinate sentences. This chapt makes an in-depth analysis on the various connective means.Chapter ten describes the format, the semantic and the mood of different patterns of sentences, including declarative sentences, imperative sentences,interrogative sentences, exclamatory sentences.Chapter eleven simultaneously draws a conclusion of the study, listing the main ideas of the dissertation and the progress made in the dissertation, as well as its possible errors and suggestions for further study.This dissertation makes important observations in for the study on Judu Gelao language. First, as an endangered language, the findings in the paper could be regarded as an initial effort to protect this language from distinction because this is the first serious study into Gelao reference grammar by now. Secondly, this study contributes a lot in the further study of the Gelao language, such as the dialect classification of the language, the historical syntactic changes under the influence of language contact. It is expected on the part of author that the present study will be helpful to the future study of the minority language research in China.