Akten des 7. internationalen Semitohamitistenkongresses, Berlin 2004.

• Author: Huehnergard, John
• Position: Book review

Akten des 7. interruttionalen Semitohamitistenkongresses, Berlin 2004. Edited by RAINER VOLGT. Semitica et Semitohamitica Berolinensia, vol. 5. Aachen: SHAKER VERLAG, 2007. Pp. 572. (paper).

This volume contains papers presented at a conference on Afro-Asiatic (Semitio-Hamitic) held in Berlin in 2004. The volume begins with welcoming remarks by the editor, Rainer Voigt, who also organized the conference; his remarks include a brief overview of the history of Afro-Asiatic studies. There follow thirty-two contributions, distributed across most of the main branches of the family. Despite the German title of the volume, all but. five of the papers are in English (four are in German, one is in Italian). The volume is arranged in four parts, the lead essay in each part providing a more programmatic review of the relationship of the individual branch(es) to Afro-Asiatic as a whole.

Part I, "Comparative Afro-Asiatic (Hamito-Semitic)," contains seven papers. Several of these papers demonstrate that "comparative Afro-Asiatic" remains in its infancy; we are unfortunately still a long way from establishing regular sound correspondences across the branches, without which most comparison is little more than inspired guesswork. Hermann Jungraithmayer, "Chadic and Semitohamitic" (pp. 15-21; the only paper in the volume with a Chadic focus); Vaclav BlaIek, "Semitic Prepositions and Their Afroasiatic Cognates" (pp. 23-42); Christopher Ehret, "Applying the Comparative Method in Afroasiatic (Afrasan, Afrasisch)" (pp. 43-70); Alexander Militarev, "Towards a Complete Etymology-Based Hundred Word List of Semitic--Items 1-34 (First Third)" (pp. 71-102); Olga Stolbova, "Hamito-Semitic Comparative Phonology--Problems and Perspective" (pp. 103-14); Gabor Takacs, "Consonantal and Lexical Reconstruction--State of the Art" (pp. 115-49); Andrzej Zaborski, "Apophony in Hamito-Semitic" (pp. 151-61).

Part II, "Cushitic," offers eight papers, most on individual languages, although a couple are comparative. Klaus Wedekind, "Update on Deja" (pp. 165-83); Teferra Anbessa, "The Structure of Sidaama Nouns" (pp. 185-95); Amha Azeb, "Questioning Forms in Zargulla" (pp. 197-210); Gene Gragg, "What Kind of Speech Community is Represented by the 'Cushitic' Node? Introduction to the Lexical Evidence" (pp. 211-35); Georgi Kapchits, "Paremias without Sentence Particles" (pp. 237-44); Moges Yigezu, "The Vowel System of Kara from a Historical-Comparative Perspective" (pp. 245-51); Mulugeta...