Project description
New insights into Kiranti and Proto-Sino-Tibetan historical linguistics
The Kiranti languages of eastern Nepal, an under-studied and critically endangered family consisting of some 30 languages, have been almost completely ignored in current reconstructions of Proto-Sino-Tibetan, the common ancestor of all Sino-Tibetan languages including Chinese and Tibetan. Supported by the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions programme, the NeKST project aims to fill some of the major gaps in our understanding by documenting two Kiranti languages, reconstructing Proto-Sino-Tibetan using Kiranti, Tibetan, Burmese and Chinese languages, and re-evaluating the classification of the Kiranti family through identification of linguistic innovations. The project integrates historical linguistics, philology and language documentation. In addition, the project will increase awareness about language endangerment and the linguistic and cultural importance of the Kiranti languages.
Objective
Kiranti is a group of ca. 30 small and critically endangered languages spoken in eastern Nepal. Because of their distinct morphological profile, they have a paramount potential to shed new light on the history and diachronic dynamics of the Sino-Tibetan language family to which they belong. To date, however, this potential is untapped: Kiranti has so far not been included in reconstructions of Proto-Sino-Tibetan and the position of Kiranti within the Sino-Tibetan family tree and the exact extent of the group remain unclear. Additionally, some Kiranti languages are still essentially undocumented. NeKST (New Insights from Kiranti for Sino-Tibetan Historical Linguistics: Documentation, Reconstruction, Classification) tackles these deficits with three interconnected research objectives: 1) document two under-researched Kiranti languages by conducting fieldwork in Nepal, 2) craft a new reconstruction of Proto-Sino-Tibetan, based on a comparison of Kiranti with the three major literary languages of Sino-Tibetan, Tibetan, Burmese and Chinese, 3) advance our understanding of the classification of Kiranti by establishing and testing a set of new candidates for shared innovations. NeKST is hosted by the Trinity Centre for Asian Studies of Trinity College Dublin and supervised by Prof. Nathan W. Hill, one of the leading scholars on Sino-Tibetan historical linguistics. NeKST will bring together methods of historical linguistics, philology and language documentation to advance our understanding of Kiranti, but also of the important Sino-Tibetan family in general, and to make an empirical contribution to the methodological controversies surrounding the reconstruction of Proto-Sino-Tibetan. Importantly, the dissemination and communication activities of NeKST are hoped to create awareness for the endangerment situation of the Kiranti languages and the ethnolinguistic diversity of Nepal, and to have a positive effect on the self-esteem of the Kiranti themselves.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
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CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
- humanities languages and literature linguistics
- humanities history and archaeology history
- humanities languages and literature literature studies history of literature
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Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Programme(s)
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Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
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HORIZON.1.2 - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA)
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Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
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Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
HORIZON-TMA-MSCA-PF-EF - HORIZON TMA MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
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Call for proposal
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(opens in new window) HORIZON-MSCA-2025-PF
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D02 CX56 Dublin
Ireland
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