The thesis consists of the following papers: (1) Tre ortnamn på Spöl-. (Tre Kulturer. 2. Medlemsbokför Johan Nordlander-sällskapet tillägnad minnet av Roland Otterbjörk 1925-1984. Umeå 1985. ISSN 0281-9546.) (2) Ortnamnen i Västerbottens län. Del 14, Vännäs kommun, A Bebyggelsenamn. Umeå 1986. ISBN 91-86372-10-6. (Övre Norrlands ortnamn. ISSN 0348-7237.) (3) Studier över yngre nybyggesnamn i Västerbottens län, särskilt i Vännäs socken. Umeå 1986. ISBN 91-7174-237-9. (Nordsvenska. 2. Skrifter utgivna av Institutionen för nordiska språk vid Umeå uni­versitet. ISSN 0282-7182.) The chief aim of the thesis is to describe and etymologize the habitative names in the parish of Vännäs in the county of Västerbotten, northern Sweden. The material used consists of place-name forms recorded in the local dialects. The material forms the basis of the author's hypotheses concerning sound changes and morphological changes and the original significance of the various place-names. The hypotheses have been tested by confronting them with historical data concerning the settlement of the area, with linguistic material, with parallel place-names and with topographical data. The purpose of the third paper is to draw further conclusions about the naming of the younger settlements (i.e. settlements from the 18th and the 19th centuries) in the county of Västerbotten as a whole. To shed light on this problem a large number of similar younger habitative names in the area have been examined. The main result of this study is that a number of the second elements of these names can be considered topographically non-motivated and suffixlike. Another result is that the interference from the authorities concerning the direct naming of the young settlements is pro­bably insignificant. / digitalisering@umu

This thesis is an investigation of smara. Smara is a Sanskrit word and means memory and desire. It has no equivalent in the English language and so the attempt to understand smara becomes both a linguistic and an ontological task. / The reader is introduced to the similarities and idiosyncrasies between Western and Indian notions of memory and desire and then invited into the search for the junction between memory and desire in Indian thought. / Analysis of anthropological and philosophical texts as well as a semantic mapping of Kalidasa's masterpiece entitled Sakuntala: The Ring of Recollection, reveals not only the co-existence of memory and desire in smara but also the notion of smara as a process.

This thesis traces the etymology of 'materialism' using a Foucauldian discourse analysis to bring to the fore the word's use as discursive mode of power. Through examining over 5000 texts, spanning across 400 years, I trace a line from the origins of materialism in philosophical thought of the Renaissance and Enlightenment eras to its uptake in American rhetoric and integration into the consumer behaviour literature. This approach leads to a reconceptualization of materialism. Commonly viewed in consumer studies as a measurable value, trait, or motive inherent in the consumer, I situate materialism as external to the consumer. The word's history, especially in consumer studies, demonstrates that it embodies moral condemnations. I find that accusations of materialism rise in discourses during moments of intense social dislocations. It is wielded by social groups as part of a play for status. In this analysis, concepts of power as per Foucault and social distinctions as per Bourdieu, are used to explain the motives residing behind the use of the word. These motives, which reflect sociocultural dynamics and geo-political agendas, manifest in the meanings attributed to 'materialism', and the directionality of the allegation. Thus I argue that 'materialism', at its essence, is an epithet used to advance or demobilise a set of interests. This is what I term, delegitimizing discourse - words used to debase other social groups. Studying 'materialism' as a case in point, I note that groups use delegitimizing discourse either an assimilative measure - rhetoric geared towards indoctrination - or as a defensive mechanism - rhetoric used to debase threatening elements and behaviours. It is hoped that this new perspective will encourage academics to be rethink their approach to studying materialism, or in the least, to be aware of what is being measured, and what moral judgements and interests they are perpetuating through their continued studies.

Title: French architectural terminology Supervisor: PhDr. Ondřej Pešek, Ph.D. Author: Petra Machová The diploma thesis is based on a list of vocabulary that are contained in French architectural dictionary Dictionnaire d'Architecture published by Editions Jean-Paul Gisserot. The theoretical part deals with a term in general and describes how the terms are taken over from ordinary vocabulary and back. Furthermore, it describes other ways of vocabulary origin. The practical part is focused on analysis of vocabulary from the dictionary. It studies ways of terms origin. The vocabulary is divided into three parts: loan words in French or words that are part of French lexical substrate, morphologically and semantically developped terms. The objective of the practical part is analysis of each specialised term regarding to its origin. By the end, the thesis contains the comparision of Czech and French architectural terms.

Cette thèse est consacrée à l’étude du suffixe protoroman */-'ur-a/ et, par ce biais, à l’étude de la morphologie dérivationnelle du protoroman. D’une part, nous fournissons un examen approfondi et détaillé des unités lexicales protoromanes présentant le suffixe */-'ur-a/ et, d’autre part, nous offrons une analyse pointue des propriétés phonologiques, morphologiques et sémantiques du suffixe */-'ur-a/. La première partie de ce travail consiste en une brève introduction et en la présentation de la méthodologie dont nous nous sommes servie pour nos recherches : celle de la reconstruction comparée et celle de la reconstruction interne. Ensuite, nous jetons un coup de projecteur sur les deux domaines qui sont particulièrement intéressants dans le cadre de l’étude d’un suffixe protoroman : la reconstruction en domaine roman et la reconstruction morphologique. Cette première partie se conclut par l’explication de notre choix de nomenclature – avec une brève analyse des lexèmes rejetés –, par l’explicitation de nos processus de recherche et par la présentation de la microstructure utilisée pour les articles étymologiques. Dans la deuxième partie de cette thèse figurent les articles étymologiques des 45 étymons protoromans portant le suffixe */-'ur-a/ que nous avons pu reconstruire. Chaque article étymologique est accompagné d’une carte linguistique qui donne une vue globale sur la distribution aréologie de l’étymon en question.Enfin, la troisième partie de notre travail se veut une analyse approfondie et détaillée des propriétés phonologiques, morphologiques et sémantiques du suffixe */-'ur-a/ ainsi qu’une analyse de la variation diasystémique de la protolangue. / This thesis is dedicated to studying the Protoromance suffix */-'ur-a/ and, hence, to studying derivational morphology of Protoromance. On the one hand, we provide an extensive and detailed exam of Protoromance lexical units presenting the suffix */-'ur-a/ and, on the other hand, we produce a thorough analysis of the phonological, morphological and semantic properties of the suffix */-'ur-a/.The first part of this work consists of a short introduction and of the presentation of the methodology that we used in our research : the methodology of compared reconstruction and of internal reconstruction. Then, we focus on the two fields that are particularly interesting in the context of studying a Protoromance suffix : reconstruction in Romance studies and morphological reconstruction. This first part closes up with an explanation of our nomenclature – including a short analysis of the rejected words –, a specification of our research process and a presentation of the microstructure used for our etymological articles.In the second part of our thesis appear the etymological articles of all 45 Protoromance etymons with the suffix */-'ur-a/ that we were able to reconstruct. Each etymological article comes with a linguistic map that provides a global view of the geographical distribution of the concerned etymon.Finally, the third part of our work is a thorough and detailed analysis of the phonological, morphological and semantic properties of the Protoromance suffix */-'ur-a/ and of the diasystemic variation of the Protoromance language.

This dissertation examines the uses, functions, and meaningfulness of traditional personal names and naming practices in Niitsitapi (Blackfoot Indian) culture. The current study indicates that Niitsitapi personal names appear to play a major role in capturing and conveying various aspects of traditional Niitsitapi sociocultural knowledge. Niitsitapi personal names thus appear to form an integral part of Niitsitapi oral tradition, and also seem to play a powerful role in establishing and maintaining Niitsitapi conceptualisations of individual, as well as social and cultural, identity. This dissertation supports the position that, in addition to their nominative function, names contain and communicate sociocultural meaning, based on their associations with a wide range of non-linguistic factors which form part of the sociocultural environment within which they are used. The methodological approach stresses the importance of studying personal names in cultural context and strongly emphasises the use of indigenous knowledge as a means of explaining personal naming phenomena from a native cultural perspective. / Linguistics and Modern Languages / M. A. (Sociolinguistics)

The Vhavenḓa are a conservative society and although they admire and follow other people’s cultures, they do not do this at the expense of their own traditions. Most Vhavenḓa are found in the far north of South Africa. The second largest group of Vhavenḓa is found in Gauteng Province. Vhavenḓa first met with the Europeans in the 19th century. The greatest influence on Tshivenḓa culture was brought about by the missionaries, who came with the aim of colonizing Africa and discouraging Africans from following their own culture and traditions, which the missionaries regarded as paganism. They forced Africans to change their African personal names and replace them with European ones, especially if they wanted to attend mission schools or when they sought employment. Traditionally, Tshivenḓa personal names were chosen by the male grandparent or another senior male person, or the role was played by the father of the child. The mother of the child did not have any say in the selection or bestowal of a personal name (Herbert, 1986; Moyo, 1996; Nkumane, 1999; Ndimande, 1998). Whenever Africans choose a personal name, it bears a particular meaning or it is the name of a deceased member of the family (Raper, 1983; Stayt, 1931; Thipa, 1986; Yanga, 1978). They do this in order to pacify the deceased. Africans believe that there are always connections between the living and the dead and that the dead have great influence on the lives of the living. Vhavenḓa practice teknonymy. The parents and the grandparents are addressed by the personal names of their children and grandchildren respectively. The name that is commonly used in this instance is the name of the firstborn. It happens that at times the personal names of the parents and grandparents are never used: some members of the community might never know these people by their real names (Arensen, 1988; Thipa, 1987). African personal names should all have meanings. They are used as a short history of the family or the community. Whenever personal names are used in communication, friction between people is minimized. Morphologically, Tshivenḓa personal names are derived from various Tshivenḓa word categories. They are formed using different morphemes that are available in the language. These morphemes assign meaning to the personal name. / African languages / D. Litt. et Phil. (African languages)

No description available.

Notre étude s'inscrit dans le cadre des études sur la zoonymie dialectale dans une perspective géolinguistique. Le travail que nous proposons s'inspire pour une grande partie des travaux effectués au sein des deux projets géolinguistiques, l'Atlas Linguarum Europae (ALE) et l'Atlas Linguistique Roman (ALiR), dont une des thématiques principales consiste dans l'étude des aspects motivationnels de la zoonymie dialectale. Les désignations animalières qui font l'objet de notre analyse sont issues d'une série d'enquêtes de terrain dans les variétés grecques modernes de l'île de Lesbos. L'analyse de ces données lexicales tient compte d'une approche théorique qui a à l'origine une proposition de Guiraud (1986 [1967]) selon laquelle la motivation sémantique constitue une composante fondamentale du processus de dénomination, son rôle ne cessant pas d'être essentiel au cours de l'évolution lexicale. Dans cette optique, nous considérons que le processus de dénomination rend compte, d'une part, de la nature des choses nommées – ou du moins, les représentations que les locuteurs s'en font – d'autre part, des aspects culturels auxquels celle-ci est liée. Notre propos est centré sur la variation dans l'espace : nous décrivons d'abord les faits lexicaux relevés dans les variétés de Lesbos. Nous tentons ensuite de révéler les aspects motivationnels sous-jacents aux désignations et, en adoptant une démarche comparative, nous mettons en relation les données de l'île de Lesbos avec celles d'autres aires du domaine grec mais également d'autres variétés dialectales d'Europe, le but étant de contribuer au développement d'une typologie des motivations dans le lexique zoonymique européen. / The present work draws on folk zoonymy studies in the framework of geolinguistics. It is mainly inspired by the results of two ongoing research projects, namely the Atlas Linguarum Europae (ALE) and the Atlas Linguistique Roman (ALiR), which focus on motivational aspects of folk zoonymy. All animal designations analysed here have been collected during fieldwork on Modern Greek varieties on the island of Lesbos. The analysis of these lexical data is based on the approach by Guiraud (1986 [1967]), according to whom semantic motivation plays a fundamental role in the denomination process, as well as in lexical evolution. We try to prove that the denomination process is influenced, on the one hand, by the nature of designated entities (or at least by their representation in speakers' mind), and on the other hand, by cultural aspects. We mainly address issues in diatopic lexical variation. In the first place, we describe lexical data collected in Lesbos; we then attempt to shade light on motivational aspects underlying designations; finally, we adopt a comparative approach to establish a relation between data from Lesbos and those of other Greek and European varieties with the aim of contributing to the development of a motivational typology of the European folk zoonyms.

En este artículo, reviso en primer lugar la bibliografía que resume la discusión sobre la etimología del vocablo che. En segunda instancia, analizo los usos de este término tanto en la diacronía como en la sincronía rioplatense, lo cual me permite proponer una clasificación de los usos de che en esta región. A partir de esta clasificación, en la tercera parte del trabajo, discuto la adscripción categorial de che. Finalmente, el análisis categorial de la evidencia empírica diacrónica y sincrónica me permite concluir que los usos vocativos son un préstamo de un determinante nominal de la lengua guaraní y no un cambio fónico en una interjección del español, resolviendo así la cuestión etimológica. / In the present work, I review, in the first place, the bibliography that summarizes the discussion surrounding the etymology of the word che. Then, I analyze the uses of this term in the diachrony as in the synchrony of the Río de la Plata Spanish, which allows me to propose a classification of the uses of the word che in this region. In the third part of the article, I discuss the categorial adscrption of the word che. Finally, the categorial analysis of the diachronic and synchronic empirical evidence allows me to conclude that the vocative uses of the term are a loan from the nominal determinant of the guaraní language, and not a phonic change in the Spanish interjection, thus resolving the etymological issues.