WOODBURY The aim of this project is to describe and analyze the grammatical structure of Sipakapense, a Mayan language spoken in the highlands of Guatemala. The project will be the first detailed study of Sipakapense, the only language in the K'ichean branch of the Mayan family that has yet to be described. The research will consist of twelve months of study in Guatemala, working with a native speaker consultant to determine the grammatical structure of the language. In addition, samples of naturally-occurring speech will be collected, translated, and analyzed in order to study discourse structure in Sipakapense and to enhance the elicitation data. The result of the project will be the student's University of Texas at Austin doctoral dissertation. In addition, a Spanish-language version of the results will be provided to the Academy of Mayan Languages of Guatemala for use in the process of language standardization.
