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Vol. 57, no. 3 (Fall 2015)

Contents

Abstracts

Matries and Subsections: Bodies and Social Personae in Northern Australia

Mark Harvey
University of Newcastle

Murray Garde
Australian National University

Abstract. There is extensive research on the range of ways in which kinship is constituted, but little research on the coherence between the various domains which are grouped together as “kinship.” Understanding the linkages and differences between domains is central to advancing analysis of kinship. This article examines the domains of “matry” and “subsection” in northern Australia. These share principles of descent-based recruitment, but differ in their classificatory bases. Matries are classifications of the body, whereas subsections are classifications of social personae. The two domains group as kinship only from a recruitment perspective. From other perspectives, they do not group together.

A “Presence” Paradigm in Plains Cree: Context, Form, and Content

Jeffrey Muehlbauer
Thunder Bay, Ontario

Abstract. This article considers how speakers of Plains Cree (Algonquian, western Canada) use obviation, independent vs. conjunct verb inflection, and evidentials in their speech performances, in the light of a grammatical paradigm constructed by elders from the Hobbema area. Borrowing insights from anthropological work on Cree ways of speaking, I adapt Dell Hymes’s ideas so as to better understand how Plains Cree cultural practices are embedded and expressed in the language. Recent linguistic generalizations about these Cree grammatical categories are integrated with previous work on the concept of “presence” and Cree genres; this is exemplified through detailed examination of a Plains Cree text.

Numeric Codes in the Arabian Peninsula: An Onomastic Device for the Digital Age

Amin Almuhanna
Kuwait University

Jean-François Prunet
Kuwait University

Abstract. Increasingly since around the year 2000, Kuwaiti youths of Badu (Bedouin) ancestry use three-digit numeric codes, coined and popularized by the language users themselves, to refer to their tribes in computer-mediated communication and public areas. These digital nicknames are more functional in Internet-based searches than the polymorphous names of tribes, although tribes and numeric codes do not always match one-to-one. These codes evidently represent an attempt by urbanized Badu youths to redefine their social identity. The fact that these codes apply to large groups, such as tribes, but not to smaller groups, such as families, shows the importance of demographic factors in coining ethnonymic nicknames. While we focus primarily on Kuwait, it seems that a whole youth subculture of three-digit codes referring to groups of people is developing in the Arabian Peninsula.

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