International Journal of Language and Culture - Volume 6, Issue 1, 2019

This contribution examines the metapragmatics of the ‘noisy’ voice: how voice performance that does not include the utterance of words is evaluated and discussed by different audiences and authors. Secrecy as being expressed through and by the transcendental voice is one aspect of these discussions, and notions of interiority of Self and Other are others. The paper thereby suggests that there are many options in conceptualizing language, and that secrecy and transcendentality may be crucial aspects of language as creative and social practice.

Play language practices are common around the globe and have been described for several parts of the world. While some contributions on play language focus on the structure, manipulative strategies, and rules, this paper ties in with approaches that seek to view play language practices in their respective sociolinguistic contexts (e.g. Sherzer 2002; Storch 2011). Chibende, the play language practice under study in this paper, is analyzed in its Zimbabwean context. By looking at Zimbabwean examples and by broadening the perspective on these creative linguistic phenomena, it becomes evident that play languages are not performed in isolation but are deeply entangled with other language practices, such as youth language, as part of complex repertoires and social practices as well as acts of identity. By focusing on creativity and also taking the aspect of fun into account, the agency of the speakers becomes a central feature which is also reflected by the metalinguistic knowledge of the practitioners of Zimbabwean play language. In this regard, the discussion in this paper centers on the speakers’ ideologies of play language.

While youth language constitutes a well-researched field of study, the linguistic manipulations of old people remain understudied. In an innovative approach, the present paper therefore looks at confusing and allegedly unintelligible narratives and conscious linguistic manipulations, silliness and concealing strategies in language as employed by elderly speakers of Kinyabwisha, Kinande, Kihunde and Kiswahili in Eastern DR Congo. A secret cursing register among Banyabwisha, often accompanied by practices of spitting, is analyzed; I also discuss elderly speakers’ confusing stories narrated to younger people, the use of secret modal particles that are restricted to people of old age, and finally I discuss the strategic inclusion of silliness in old speakers’ utterances. All these are analyzed in a theoretical framework of the secret agency and power in language use that mark the agency and wittiness of the elderly in Eastern Congo. With this first overview of elderly speakers’ language manipulations I aim to show that linguistic manipulation is not necessarily age-related, and that concealment strategies in language can occur as agentive and powerful means of social differentiation in later life as well. This preliminary introduction furthermore suggests a strong focus on silliness in linguistic analysis (as also found in Kuipers 2007; Storch 2015, 2017).

Secret rituals and a secret language are the core aspect of the seclusion and circumcision, which used to be an important part of the lives of men and women alike. They are meant to be secret, although descriptions of rituals can be found in academic texts as well as in the internet. This article aims at shedding light on the complexity of secrecy and the unveiling of secrets in the Kalenjin society of Kenya and explains the procedure of the unveiling and the various reactions of members of the society.

In Chini, a language of northeastern New Guinea, speakers rely on principles of semantic extension including metonymy, metaphor, and other types of association to create new terms using material from the vernacular. They do so in a special sociolinguistically marked register referred to here as ‘secret language’, a linguistic practice not unheard of in New Guinea. The same principles at work in secret language can also be seen in the creation of terms for new, modern concepts in the sociolinguistically unmarked register of the language. There is additionally some degree of overlap between the two registers, since what were originally secret language terms have entered into use in the unmarked register. This suggests that secret language has been a resource for resistance to borrowing and brings into focus the larger point that any understanding of borrowability should be rooted in the local sociolinguistic context, to the locally relevant ideologies at work and the particular creative principles of language use that speakers employ.

Across the multilingual area of the Vaupés River Basin in north-west Amazonia, women are considered a dangerous ‘other’. In accordance with the local marriage practices, men marry women from language groups different to their own. Women are denied access to important rituals, such as the Yurupary rite, and are not supposed to hear any words associated with this tradition. The paper addresses a special linguistic practice of a women-directed taboo, so far documented just for the Tariana (the only Arawak-speaking groups in the Vaupés River Basin area). All the paraphernalia associated with the Yurupary ritual and a number of place names which contain the name of the Yurupary flute are a taboo to women, and so their original names cannot be pronounced in the presence of women. If a woman is present, a tabooed form has to be used instead. The tradition is on the way out, since the Tariana language and culture are severely endangered. The ‘taboo against women’ in Tariana is compared with other systems of gender-based taboos across the world. How did the erstwhile secret knowledge become public? And how can one get access to ‘forbidden’ knowledge in the Amazonian context? These issues are addressed at the end of the paper.

Among Northern Kampas, the linguistically creative production of tsinampantsi by non-kin and affines intends – apart from having fun – to initiate an intimate relationship or affirm the intimacy of the existing interpersonal relationship. Northern Kampa participants of tsinampantsi ‘joking’ often resort to gender-switching strategies for jocular effects. Creatively playing with linguistic gender marking is characteristic of tsinampantsi-joking conduct. The study’s findings revealed that there are variable lexicogrammatical means for accomplishing the man > woman gender switch. Two basic gender-switching strategies are deployed: manipulation of person marking indexes and deployment of derivational morphology. The verbal person marking strategy is the most basic and most common means of indicating gender switches, whereas derivational morphology functions as a supplementary technique. In gender reversals, participation structure (production and reception roles) is predominantly coded by third person (other-role) markers on the verb. The woman > man direction of gender reversals is uncommon in joking sequences.

The western margin of the Amazon basin near the modern-day border between Ecuador and Peru is an area of notable linguistic and ethnic diversity, but the indigenous cultures also show considerable similarities, thanks to a long history of contact and mutual influence. One of the cultural traits of the area is a genre of “magic” songs used to ensure success in all kinds of activities, but especially romantic pursuits, hunting (for men), and gardening (for women). These songs are distinguished musically from other song types, the lyrics are rich in imagery and metaphor (especially relating to birds and animals) and allusions to mythology, and they use a lexicon that includes both archaisms and innovative loanwords from neighbouring languages. This paper focuses on the magic songs (called anɨn or anen) of the Aguaruna or Awajún, an indigenous group of north Peru. I describe the formal and poetic properties of these songs and their significance within the context of Aguaruna oral tradition and traditional culture, and then ask what these songs can tell us about the social and linguistic history of the region.

This paper aims at discussing some aspects of the secrecy characterizing sacred texts by the Ayoreo, a Zamucoan population of the Boreal Chaco in South America, from a linguistic perspective. The magic power exerted by words in Ayoreo traditional culture is the reason why holy texts are kept secret, and this makes it difficult to provide a complete linguistic documentation of Ayoreo ‘hidden’ narratives and ritual formulas. After having outlined etiological myths, I will show that language not only can exert a magic power, but that grammar itself, and specifically linguistic gender, has played a role in the development of these sacred narratives. Finally, I will compare some elements of Ayoreo culture with lexical data from extinct Old Zamuco, the most conservative language of the family, in order to show that the populations speaking these languages share the same cultural background.

The ‘Witoto’ people from Northwest Amazonia practised long distance drum communication, used for relaying messages among their villages. The messages were encoded on a pair of hollowed-out wooden drums, and appear to have been ‘drummed codes’, with only some iconic relation to the sound structure of the spoken language. The practice of drum communication appears to be easily diffusible in contact situations. The Caquetá-Putumayo (C-P) cultural area is a case in point, as the Witoto drums were shared with other C-P groups including the Ocaina, Nonuya, Bora, Muinane, Resígaro, and Andoque. Today, the practice of long distance drum communication among the Witoto has been long gone, with just a handful of elders who are still able to recall some of the (once extensive) drummed signal repertoire.