"
Polysynthetic certainly," said Challenger, indulgently.
Among the topics are a typology of argument-determined constructions, word-class changing derivations in typological perspective, the multiple marking of syntactic function and
polysynthetic nouns in Tariana, and the Australian Aboriginal word in dictionaries--a history.
For example, the Cherokee word for good-bye, [phrase omitted] (which transliterates as donadogohvi) (12) is a sentence that means "until you and I meet again." (13) The word for lawyer, [phrase omitted] (dityohihi), is a sentence that means "he argues repeatedly with purpose." (14) As Ellen Cushman writes, Sequoyan is therefore "
polysynthetic," (15) which makes Sequoyah's system, in some ways, more efficient than English.
(5) For example, Old English vocabulary favors short mono- or disyllabic words, whereas the Iroquoian languages are
polysynthetic, meaning that they use words composed of many different morphemes.
There exists a continuum between the isolating and the
polysynthetic strategy which we could label 'phonomorphosyntactic' since phonological, morphological and syntactic factors play a relevant role, as regards the semantic value of the concerned sound string.
Aimed first of all at the Utkuhiksalingmiut speakers and their descendants, many of whom do not speak the language anymore, the dictionary can also be useful to students of Inuktitut and Western Canadian Arctic Inuktun, as well as to linguists interested in Aboriginal and, more generally,
polysynthetic tongues.
Like all Totonacan languages, Upper Necaxa can be characterized as
polysynthetic and primarily head-marking in the sense of Nichols (1986).
These parallel lines are attributed to
polysynthetic twin planes corresponding to the rhombohedral {1011} faces of corundum.