<Grammar> A Grammatical Manual for the Kinnauri Language (Pangi Dialect)

Abstract

This study provides a brief description of the grammar of Kinnauri —a member of the West Himalayish group of the Tibeto-Burman languages. Kinnauri is important in that it shares linguistic features with languages that do not historically belong to the same subgroups. NISHIDA Tatsuo referred to this type of language as a "link language" (繋聯言語). Although Kinnauri has been considered as an important language, it has not been described comprehensively. Sharma (1988) conducted a detailed study of Kinnauri grammar. Unfortunately, its analysis was not so satisfactory, particularly in terms of phonology and morphosyntax. Although we find several errors in his phonological interpretation, which leads to an incomplete morphological analysis, his adequate analysis of example sentences that follows makes up for those infelicities. This study outlines the grammar of Kinnauri (Pangi dialect). The phonological system is introduced first, followed by a detailed explanation of morphological and syntactic features, particularly the morphological analysis of nouns and verbs. Finally, the structures of sentences are demonstrated.