Relatively Speaking: Language, Thought, and Kinship among the Mopan Maya

by Eve Danziger

Overview

Based upon 14 months of ethnographic fieldwork among the Mopan Maya in Belize, Eve Danziger examines the semantic complexity of particular kinship terms used among Mopan women and children and shows that a culture-specific analysis of their terms is superior to other non-ethnographically-based methods. In doing so she contributes not only to theoretical semantics and the ethnography of that area, but to the cross-cultural study of child development and language acquisition.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780195099102
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	04/12/2001
Series:	Oxford Studies in Anthropological Linguistics
Pages:	144
Product dimensions:	6.10(w) x 9.10(h) x 0.60(d)

Table of Contents

	Guide to Abbreviations and Orthography	ix
Chapter 1.	Kinship, Semantics, and Linguistic Relativity	3
	Mopan Kinship	3
	Kinship Theory: Universal and Relative	4
	Linguistic Relativity	7
	Psychological Reality	12
	Abstract of Method	14
Chapter 2.	The Mopan Setting	18
	Ethnographic Setting	18
	The Ethnographer's Expectations and Experiences	23
Chapter 3.	The Meanings of Kinship Terms	25
	The Piagetian Definition Task	25
	The Question of Kinship	28
	The Tzik Relationship Terms of Mopan	30
Chapter 4.	Tzik and Kinship	38
	The Native Speaker's View	38
	Mopan Life Ich Naj ('in the House')	43
	Tzik Relationships and Their Socialization	47
Chapter 5.	Creating Tzik Relationships	53
	Ritually Established Relationships	53
	Acquiring Relationships through Marriage	56
	Performative Aspects of Tzik Appellation	61
	What Does Generation Mean?	64
Chapter 6.	Three Semantic Analyses and Their Consequences	68
	Semantic Analyses	68
	Acquisition Outcomes and Linguistic Relativity	77
Chapter 7.	Formal Findings	79
	Putting the Question	79
	Data Tabulation	83
	Data Analysis	87
Chapter 8.	Language, Thought, and Reality	93
	Review	93
	Some Explanatory Explorations	99
	Conclusion	103
	Notes	105
	References	113
	Index	123