Topics: Speaker: Lev Nachman, Hou Family Fellow in Taiwan Studies, Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies, Harvard University Lev Nachman received his Ph.D. from the University of California, Irvine. His dissertation […]
Assistant Professor of Government, Smith College
Professor, Worcester Polytechnic Institute
T.T. and Wei Fong Chao Professor of Asian Civilizations, MIT
Visiting Assistant Professor, Swarthmore College
2021-22 Visiting Scholar, National Chengchi University
Professor Emerita of Chinese and World Literatures, Smith College
The Indigenous languages of Taiwan feature two patterns of morphological discrepancy. First, only some possess a symmetrical morphological paradigm associated with a phenomenon known as ‘noun-verb homophony’. Second, only a handful of the languages allow the Proto-Austronesian stative affix ma- to be used in a transitive clause. This talk addresses how these two foci of variation inform our understanding of the Austronesian diaspora and further explains how new comparative data on these phenomena offers a simpler answer to two ongoing debates in the field.
2021-2022 Visiting Scholar, Swiss National Science Foundation
