PPLS Linguistics Reader secures ERC grant

The ERC was set up by the European Union in 2007 and is the premier research funding organisation in Europe. The Synergy Grant is one of four different grant schemes run by the ERC and is specifically designed to support projects carried out by small groups of researchers.

The grant was awarded for NILOMORPH, a collaborative project with the University of Surrey and the National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS).

The NILOMORPH project investigates an unusual linguistic evolution in East African languages, specifically within the West Nilotic family, languages such as ‘Dinka’ express multiple grammatical categories in a single syllable by altering features such as the vowel length, tone and breathiness. For instance, the Dinka word tèm (meaning "to cut") can shift meaning to "she cuts it for someone" This phenomenon of monosyllabic words containing highly dense information coding, dependant on how they are vocalised is a largely unique feature not typically found in other languages.

Historically, East African languages used suffixes to indicate grammatical categories, but over time, these suffixes transformed into phonological changes in sound, which are now pronounced alongside the word stem (the base of a word to which prefixes and suffixes can be added). NILOMORPH seeks to trace this transformation, not only documenting how it happened but also exploring why this development is unique to these languages. The project combines fieldwork, acoustic and experimental analysis, computational simulations, and historical comparison to uncover both the evolutionary history and cognitive motivations behind this morphological shift.

Three specialised teams will collaborate to reconstruct both the linguistic forms and cognitive factors that drove this unique linguistic evolution.

• Dr Bert Remijsen
• A Collection of Thuri Narratives