Nepalese Linguistics
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Nepalese Linguistics Volume 32 November 2017 Editor-in-Chief Mr. Bhim Lal Gautam Editor Dr. Narayan Prasad Sharma Office bearers for 2016-2018 President Mr. Kamal Poudel Vice President Mr. Bhim Narayan Regmi General Secretary Mr. Krishna Prasad Chalise Secretary (Office) Mr. Prem Prasad Poudel Secretary (General) Mr. Kedar Bilash Nagila Treasurer Dr. Ambika Regmi Member Dr. Omkareshwor Shrestha Member Mr. Amrit Yonjan-Tamang Member Mr. Indresh Thakur Member Dr. Tara Mani Rai Member Ms. Ekku Maya Pun Editorial Board Editor-in-Chief Mr. Bhim Lal Gautam Editor Dr. Narayan Prasad Sharma Nepalese Linguistics is a journal published by Linguistic Society of Nepal (LSN). LSN publishes articles related to the scientific study of languages, especially from Nepal. The views expressed therein are not necessarily shared by the committee on publications. Published by: Linguistic Society of Nepal Kirtipur, Kathmandu Nepal Copies: 300 © Linguistic Society of Nepal ISSN 0259-1006 Price: NC 400/- (Nepal) IC 350/- (India) US$ 10/- Life membership fee includes subscription for the journal. The publication of this issue was supported by Nepal Academy. CONTENTS Morphological analysis of scientific terms used in Nepali Bal Ram Adhikari 1-5 science books Some aspects of the Baram vowels Krishna Prasad Chalise 6-10 Rana Tharu case markers in areal-typological perspective Dubi Nanda Dhakal 11-20 Language policy in Bangladeshi education: Bengali and Tania Hossain 21-27 English languages as a medium of instruction Exploring phonological analysis in Tamang (Risiangku) Jessie Johnson 28-32 Bold documentation of the Langtang language (Rasuwa) Radka Kvicalova, Rebekah 33-39 Slade, Lauren Gawne It’s time to understand and teach: Critical language awareness Shaty Kumar Mahato 40-44 (CLA) The nature of language endangerment: A case study of Albina Narzary 45-51 Hajong Mass noun classifiers in Nepali Madhav P. Pokharel 52-56 Functions of language: a historical overview and the Nepalese Kamal Kumar Poudel 57-66 context Inclusivity and exclusivity in Dumi Netra Mani Dumi Rai 67-73 Agreement patterns in the Koyee verb Tara Mani Rai 74-79 Role of MTBMLE in achieving some of the major SDGS in Ambika Regmi 80-83 the ethno-linguistic communities in Nepal Orthography in Nepal: Issues and orientation Bhim Narayan Regmi 84-93 Integrating ICT into MTBE in developing countries: Dan Raj Regmi 94-101 Prospects, barriers and some strategies Thangmi surnames Pratigya Regmi 102-109 Passive and antipassive in the typology of voice systems Peter Sells 110-119 Nominalisation strategy in Puma Narayan P. Sharma 120-129 Unification of fonts encoding system of Devanagari writing in Trishna Singh and Santa 130-136 Nepali B. Basnet Social status of women in India: How Hindi accounts for it? Sweta Sinha 137-141 Language for power and pedagogy: Redefining Nepal’s Lava D. Awasthi 142-148 linguistic architecture Presidential address Kamal Poudel 149-151 List of Life Members 152-158 MORPHOLOGICAL ANALYSIS OF SCIENTIFIC TERMS USED IN NEPALI SCIENCE BOOKS BAL RAM ADHIKARI This article opens with a brief survey of some one hand scientific concepts are absent from the initiatives taken in order to expand the lexicon of language itself on the other hand those concepts science in Nepali. It mainly presents the analysis which have entered the language are not of the morphological structures of scientific terms. sufficiently and systematically lexicalized. The terms included in the study are collected from Pertaining to the former, scientific concepts do the secondary level science books published in not have their origin in the Nepali language. Since Nepali. such concepts are 'born' in the language like English, they are foreign by birth. Such concepts Keywords: scientific terms, monomorphemic are to be borrowed and lexicalized in the Nepali terms, polymorphemic terms, multiple affixation language. As to the latter, those concepts which 1. INTRODUCTION have entered the language are not sufficiently lexicalized yet. As promulgated by the Constitution of Nepal (2015), Nepali is the official language of the Providing that scientific concepts are the 'content' nation. The term 'official language' needs to be to be communicated among the users of the field, treated with a caution, for it is a loaded term. It terms are 'lexical containers'. In the absence of implies that the language is internally rich enough containers, content cannot be carried over. Such to carry out the communication, both spoken and containers should be sufficient in quantity and written, in diverse domains of life such as solid, specific and precise in quality to hold the education, administration, law, and international concepts and carry them to the target users. relations. By implication, Nepali as a dominant As presented elsewhere, the lexicon of science in medium of communication can meet the demands Nepali is not so rich and is in process of of different fields of knowledge. Apart from being development. In this regard, various institutional a dominant language of the nation, Nepali, as initiatives have been taken to elaborate the identified by Pokharel, is also "a lingua franca of scientific lexicon of the Nepali language. Of them the Nepalis scattered all over the world" (2009: Gorkhali (1978), Bandhu (1995), and Paudel and 334). It means, Nepali has outgrown its native Gautam (2003) deserve a special mention. These land and has spread over the geo-political are the commendable initiatives taken by the then boundaries. Royal Nepal Academy. The common reality Diversity of domains of use and the size of shared by these three projects is that Nepali as a lexicon in each domain are two of the defining developing language needs to elaborate its lexicon criteria for a language to claim itself to be official of science. In the absence of rich lexicon, it as well as international. Regmi (2017) identifies cannot be used as a medium of teaching and six different domains of the Nepali language and learning, and researching of science in Nepali. science and research is one of the domains. The Normally "scientific concepts, innovations and use of Nepali in the field of science, Regmi inventions are 'baptized' in the English language" explains in the parenthesis, is limited. In order (Adhikari 2004:16) and later they either words, science is the least codified and hence least transferred to or translated into the developing expressed domain of the Nepali language. In this languages and Nepali is one of them. Such article, I have used the term 'science' to refer to concepts in Nepali manifest themselves in a natural sciences such as physics, chemistry, number of ways. Some are directly borrowed and biology and geology. The main reason for being transliterated in the Devanagari script (e.g. these areas less expressed in Nepali is inadequate aksijan: oxygen), translated literally (e.g. beg: lexicalization of scientific concepts. There are speed), coined based on the concepts in English mainly two reasons for this in adequacy. On the (e.g. gurutwākarsan: gravity), or hybridized (e.g. Nepalese Linguistics, vol. 32. pp. 1-5. 2 / Morphological… aseik amla: acetic acid). There are some monomorphemic terms is not so conspicuous in scientific terms in Nepali formed by extending the the lexicon of science. Of the 200 collected semantic range of common words (e.g. pina: words, only six terms (3%) are monomorphemic. mass) to embrace the concepts expressed by the 3.2 POLYMORPHEMIC TERMS English terms. By implication, scientific terms are distinct on the grounds of their sources and A term with more than one morpheme is treated formation process. What follows is the analysis of as a polymorphemic term. It is the term that morphological structure of Nepali scientific terms. involves the complex morphological structure (Nida 1949: 97). Polymorphemic terms are found 2. METHODOLOGY to be of two types, namely the complex and the The secondary-level school science text books compound, each having its own types. A huge were used as a source of the data. A total of 200 majority of the scientific terms in Nepali belong terms were purposively collected, fifty terms each to the polymorphemic category. from physics, chemistry, biology, and geology 3.2.1 COMPLEX TERMS and astronomy (Adhikari 2003). The terms which are directly borrowed and transliterated in Nepali A polymorhemic term has a root with one or more than derivational affix. Complex polymorphemic such as aksijan and hāirojan are not included in the study for their morphological analysis. terms have the following structures: i) prefix (±) root (±) suffix derived word 3. ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSION ii) prefix root suffix derived word To write with Nida (1949: 97), "morphological The sign (±) indicates that the application of the structure may be simple or complex. Simple prefix or suffix to the root is optional. However, structures consist of a single morpheme, free or the application of one of them is obligatory. That bound. The complex structure consists of more is to say, either prefix or suffix is applied to the than one morpheme". According to Nida, the given root, but not the both. It is the case of single words with simple structures are monomorphemic affixation. The application of both the affixes to and those with complex structures the same root results in multiple affixation. polymorphemic. 3.2.1.1 SINGLE AFFIXATION Morphological analysis shows that there are two types of scientific terms used in the Nepali Some of the terms comprise a root and one science textbook. They are the monomorphemic derivational affix. The affix can be a prefix or a and the polymorphemic. suffix; the root can be free or bound. The sing (-) next to the root indicates that the root is bound. 3.1 MONOMORPHEMIC TERMS The structures of the complex terms formed through the process of single affixation are as A term with only one morpheme is taken as a follows: monomorphemic term.