Pamela Munro (b. May 23, 1947) is an American
linguist
Linguistics is the scientific study of human language. It is called a scientific study because it entails a comprehensive, systematic, objective, and precise analysis of all aspects of language, particularly its nature and structure. Linguis ...
who specializes in
Native American languages
Language is a structured system of communication. The structure of a language is its grammar and the free components are its vocabulary. Languages are the primary means by which humans communicate, and may be conveyed through a variety of met ...
. She is a distinguished research professor emeritus of linguistics at the
University of California, Los Angeles
The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a teachers college then known as the southern branch of the California St ...
, where she has held a position since 1974.
She earned her PhD in 1974 from the
University of California, San Diego
The University of California, San Diego (UC San Diego or colloquially, UCSD) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in San Diego, California. Established in 1960 near the pre-existing Scripps Insti ...
, where her graduate adviser was
Margaret Langdon
Margaret Langdon (c. 1926 in Louvain, Belgium – October 25, 2005) was a US linguist who studied and documented many languages of the American Southwest and California, including Kumeyaay, Northern Diegueño (Ipai), and Luiseño.
Academic care ...
. Her dissertation, entitled ''Topics in
Mojave Syntax,'' was published by Garland in 1976.
Her research has concentrated on all aspects of the grammars of indigenous languages of the Americas, most recently focusing on the
Chickasaw
The Chickasaw ( ) are an indigenous people of the Southeastern Woodlands. Their traditional territory was in the Southeastern United States of Mississippi, Alabama, and Tennessee as well in southwestern Kentucky. Their language is classified as ...
(
Muskogean
Muskogean (also Muskhogean, Muskogee) is a Native American language family spoken in different areas of the Southeastern United States. Though the debate concerning their interrelationships is ongoing, the Muskogean languages are generally div ...
; Oklahoma),
Garifuna
The Garifuna people ( or ; pl. Garínagu in Garifuna) are a people of mixed free African and indigenous American ancestry that originated in the Caribbean island of Saint Vincent and speak Garifuna, an Arawakan language, and Vincentian ...
(
Arawakan
Arawakan (''Arahuacan, Maipuran Arawakan, "mainstream" Arawakan, Arawakan proper''), also known as Maipurean (also ''Maipuran, Maipureano, Maipúre''), is a language family that developed among ancient indigenous peoples in South America. Branch ...
; Central America), Imbabura
Quichua
Kichwa (, , also Spanish ) is a Quechuan language that includes all Quechua varieties of Ecuador and Colombia (''Inga''), as well as extensions into Peru. It has an estimated half million speakers.
The most widely spoken dialects are Chimborazo ...
(
Quechuan
Quechua (, ; ), usually called ("people's language") in Quechuan languages, is an indigenous language family spoken by the Quechua peoples, primarily living in the Peruvian Andes. Derived from a common ancestral language, it is the most widely ...
; Ecuador),
Tongva
The Tongva ( ) are an Indigenous people of California from the Los Angeles Basin and the Southern Channel Islands, an area covering approximately . Some descendants of the people prefer Kizh as an endonym that, they argue, is more historically ...
(
Uto-Aztecan
Uto-Aztecan, Uto-Aztekan or (rarely in English) Uto-Nahuatl is a family of indigenous languages of the Americas, consisting of over thirty languages. Uto-Aztecan languages are found almost entirely in the Western United States and Mexico. The na ...
; Los Angeles Basin), and Tlacolula Valley
Zapotec (Zapotecan; Central Oaxaca, Mexico) languages. She has published numerous articles and books, and was instrumental in the creation of
dictionaries
A dictionary is a listing of lexemes from the lexicon of one or more specific languages, often arranged alphabetically (or by radical and stroke for ideographic languages), which may include information on definitions, usage, etymologies, p ...
for
San Lucas Quiaviní Zapotec,
Chickasaw
The Chickasaw ( ) are an indigenous people of the Southeastern Woodlands. Their traditional territory was in the Southeastern United States of Mississippi, Alabama, and Tennessee as well in southwestern Kentucky. Their language is classified as ...
and
Wolof
Wolof or Wollof may refer to:
* Wolof people, an ethnic group found in Senegal, Gambia, and Mauritania
* Wolof language, a language spoken in Senegal, Gambia, and Mauritania
* The Wolof or Jolof Empire, a medieval West African successor of the Mal ...
. She is also the compiler of a series of books on college
slang
Slang is vocabulary (words, phrases, and linguistic usages) of an informal register, common in spoken conversation but avoided in formal writing. It also sometimes refers to the language generally exclusive to the members of particular in-gro ...
, ''Slang U''.
Munro was named to be the
Ken Hale Professor at the 2019
LSA Linguistic Institute held at
UC-Davis
The University of California, Davis (UC Davis, UCD, or Davis) is a public land-grant research university near Davis, California. Named a Public Ivy, it is the northernmost of the ten campuses of the University of California system. The institu ...
.
Selected publications
*Chickasaw Language Committee, Joshua D. Hinson, John P. Dyson, and Pamela Munro, 2012. Anompilbashsha' Asilhha' Holisso: Chickasaw Prayer Book. Ada, OK: Chickasaw Press.
*Langacker, Ronald W. and Pamela Munro. 1975. "Passives and their meaning", Language 51: 789-830.
*Lopez, Felipe H., and Pamela Munro. 1998
The United Nations' Universal Declaration of Human Rights translated into San Lucas Quiaviní Zapotec
*Lopez, Felipe H., and Pamela Munro. 1999. "Zapotec Immigration: The San Lucas Quiaviní Experience". Aztlan. 24, 1: 129-149.
*Munro, Pamela. 1976. ''Mojave Syntax''. New York: Garland Publishing, Inc.
*Munro, Pamela and Lynn Gordon. 1982. "Syntactic relations in Western Muskogean: A typological perspective", Language 58: 81-115.
*Munro, Pamela. 1990. "Stress and vowel length in Cupan absolute nominals", IJAL 56: 217-50.
*Munro, Pamela. 1991. ''Slang'' ''U''. Penguin Random House.
*Munro, Pamela. 1993. "The Muskogean II prefixes and their significance for classification", IJAL 59: 374-404.
*Munro, Pamela. 1996. "Making a Zapotec Dictionary". Dictionaries 17: 131-55.
*Munro, Pamela and Dieynaba Gaye. 1997. Ay Baati Wolof: A Wolof Dictionary.] UCLA Occasional Papers in Linguistics.
*Munro, Pamela. 1999. 'Chickasaw Subjecthood' in External Possession, Doris L. Payne and Immanuel Barshi (eds), Amsterdam: John Benjamins. 251-289.
*Munro, Pamela. 2002. "Hierarchical Pronouns in Discourse: Third Person Pronouns in San Lucas Quiaviní Zapotec Narratives". Southwest Journal of Linguistics 21: 37-66.
*Munro, Pamela. 2003.
Preserving the Language of the Valley Zapotecs: The Orthography Question" Presented at Language and Immigration in France and the United States: Sociolinguistic Perspectives. University of Texas.
*Munro, Pamela, et al. 2008. "Yaara' Shiraaw'ax 'Eyooshiraaw'a. Now You're Speaking Our Language: Gabrielino/Tongva/Fernandeño." Lulu.com.
*Munro, Pamela (editor); Susan E. Becker, Gina Laura Bozajian, Deborah S. Creighton, Lori E. Dennis, Lisa Renée Ellzey, Michelle L. Futterman, Ari B. Goldstein, Sharon M. Kaye, Elaine Kealer, Irene Susanne Veli Lehman, Lauren Mendelsohn, Joseph M. Mendoza, Lorna Profant, and Katherine A. Sarafian. 1991. ''Slang U.'' New York: Harmony Books. Excerpted as Pamela Munro, with Susan E. Becker, et al. "Party hats and pirates' dreams", Rolling Stone 600 (March 21, 1991): 67-69.
*Munro, Pamela and Dieynaba Gaye. 1997. ''Ay Baati Wolof: A Wolof Dictionary'' (Revised Edition), UCLA Occasional Papers in Linguistics 19.
*Munro, Pamela, Brook Danielle Lillehaugen and Felipe H. Lopez. 2007 Cali Chiu? A Course in Valley Zapotec.
*Munro, Pamela and Felipe H. Lopez, with Olivia V. Méndez, Rodrigo Garcia, and Michael R. Galant. 1999. ''Di'csyonaary X:tèe'n Dìi'zh Sah Sann Lu'uc (San Lucas Quiaviní Zapotec Dictionary/ Diccionario Zapoteco de San Lucas Quiaviní)''. Chicano Studies Research Center Publications, UCLA.
*Munro, Pamela and Catherine Willmond. 1994. ''Chickasaw: An Analytical Dictionary''. Norman - London: University of Oklahoma Press.
*
Katherine Siva Saubel, Saubel, Katherine Siva and Pamela Munro. 1981. ''Chem'ivillu' (Let's Speak Cahuilla)''. Los Angeles and Banning, CA: UCLA American Indian Studies Center and Malki Museum Press.
*Zigmond, Maurice L., Curtis G. Booth, and Pamela Munro. 1990. ''Kawaiisu: Grammar and Dictionary, with Texts''. University of California Publications in Linguistics 119.
References
External links
*
Homepageat linguistics.ucla.edu
{{DEFAULTSORT:Munro, Pamela
1947 births
Linguists from the United States
American Mesoamericanists
Women Mesoamericanists
Living people
Linguists of Mesoamerican languages
Native American language revitalization
University of California, Los Angeles faculty
Women lexicographers
Linguists of Hokan languages
Linguists of Muskogean languages
Linguists of Uto-Aztecan languages
Paleolinguists
Linguists of Oto-Manguean languages
Linguists of Atlantic–Congo languages
Women linguists
20th-century linguists
21st-century linguists
20th-century Mesoamericanists
21st-century Mesoamericanists
20th-century American women writers
21st-century American women writers
Linguists of indigenous languages of North America