The aim of this project is to collect data on the Narpa language, data that will be used by the Principal Investigator to prepare for publication a grammar, dictionary, and a collection of texts. Narpa is a member of the Tamangic group within the Bodic branch of Tibeto-Burman. It is spoken in the Manang District of Nepal by about 800 people. While the language is still the principal medium of communication in two villages, the small size of the population, the relative poverty of the people, and their bilingualism in Nepali, the national language, all point to the fact that the language could cease to be spoken rather quickly. A couple of short word lists apart, there currently is no published documentation on the Narpa language. The grammar will be produced in a relatively non-theoretical, descriptive framework so as to be of maximum utility to Sino-Tibetanists, anthropologists, and general linguists of various theoretical persuasions. The grammar and dictionary will contain copious illustrations from both elicited and textual material. The texts will be chosen to exemplify several discourse types and a variety of cultural situations, and will be accompanied by morpheme-by-morpheme glosses as well as translations into idiomatic English. All three components grammar, dictionary, texts will be keyed to each other.
