David Mora-Marín's Linguistics Web Site


I'm from Costa Rica (Moravia, San José) but have lived in the United States since August of 1992 (Lawrence, Kansas; Albany, New York; Chapel Hill, North Carolina).  I am a husband to Heather, and a dad to Siubhan, Aodhfionn, and Taidhgin.

Contents

Academic Background

I'm a linguistic anthropologist specializing in Mesoamerican linguistics and epigraphy.  My position is supported jointly by the Linguistics Department and the Consortium for Latin American Studies at UNC/Duke.  I obtained my Ph.D. from SUNY-Albany in 2001, and my B.A. from KU-Lawrence in 1996.


Research Interests

My research involves comparative and historical reconstruction of Mayan morphosyntax and the study of the origin, orthography, and grammatical structure of ancient Mayan hieroglyphic texts.  I am also interested in the study of the linguistic history of other Mesoamerican languages and scripts (e.g. Epi-Olmec, Zapotec, Teotihuacan), and the origin of Mesoamerican writing systems.  I also deal with issues of language and power (Bourdieu, Foucault, Weber) and civilizational studies (Wallerstein), as well as on the art history and archaeology of ancient Costa Rican societies, especially the Precolumbian jade lapidary tradition.


Current and Ongoing Projects

Primary Standard Sequence: Database Compilation, Grammatical Structure, Primary Documentation.  The publication of the results will take place in two phases.  The first part will focus on the paleographic background and the readings of important glyphs.  The second part will focus on the grammatical structure and the historical development of the PSS dedicatory formula.  Supported by FAMSI Grant #02047.  http://www.famsi.org/reports/02047/index.html.

Late Preclassic Inscription Documentation (LAPIDA).  Supported by FAMSI Grant #99049.  http://www.famsi.org/reports/99049/index.html.

Diachronic Ch'olan-Tzeltalan Morphosyntactic Reconstruction.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dissertation

Ph.D. - Anthropology - State University of New York, Albany, NY.  Title of Thesis: The Grammar, Orthography, Content, and Social Context of Late Preclassic Portable Texts.  2001.  (Beware: It's a pretty large document, about 25 MB!)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Courses

Fall 2004: Introduction to Sociolinguistics (LING 170)

Spring 2005: Survey of Mesoamerican Languages (LING 115), Historical Linguistics (LING 101)

Summer 2005: Yucatec Maya, Introduction to Linguistics (LING 30)

Fall 2005: Introduction to Sociolinguistics (LING 170), Mesoamerican Writing Systems (LING 115)

Spring 2006: Historical Linguistics (LING 101), Mayan Languages and Culture (LING 115)

Summer 2006: Yucatec Maya, Introduction to Linguistics (LING 30)

Fall 2006: Language Variation and Change (LING 202), Introduction to Mayan Art and Writing (LING 415)

Spring 2007: Introduction to Yucatec Maya (LING 415.015), Structure of Mayan Art and Writing (LING 415.001)

Summer 2007: Yucatec Maya

Summer 2007: Introduction to Language (LING 101)

Fall 2007: Language Variation and Change (LING 202), Mesoamerican Languages and Linguistics (LING 415.015)

Spring 2008: Introduction to Language, Honors (LING 101H), Mesoamerican Writing Systems (LING 415.015)

Fall 2008: Research leave

Spring 2009: Yucatec Maya (LING 415.015), Historical and Comparative Linguistics (LING 525)

Fall 2009: Language Variation and Change (LING 202.001), Mesoamerican Writing Systems (LING 415.014)

 

Endeavors Article

http://research.unc.edu/endeavors/win2009/symbols_on_stone.php

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Selected Publications

Below are most of my publications so far.

 

• Full Phonetic Complementation, Semantic Classifiers, and Semantic Determinatives in Ancient Mayan Hieroglyphic Writing.  Ancient Mesoamerica 19:195-213.  2008.

 

• Two Parallel Passages From The Late Preclassic Period: Connections Between San Bartolo And An Unprovenanced Jade Pendant.  Wayeb Notes 29.  http://www.wayeb.org/notes/wayeb_notes0029.pdf.  2008.

 

• Notes on Three Foreign Artifacts from the Cerro de las Mesas Jade Cache.  Mexicon 30:20-22.  http://www.mexicon.de/mxv_3008.html#mora301.  2008.

 

• A Logographic Value HU7 (~7U7) 'to blow' or 'sacred, moral, power' for the GOD.N Verbal Glyph of the Primary Standard Sequence. Wayeb Notes 27.  http://www.wayeb.org/notes/wayeb_notes0027.pdf.  2007.

 

• Kaminaljuyu Stela 10: Script Classification and Linguistic Affiliation.  Ancient Mesoamerica 16:63-87.  2005.

• The Proto-Ch'olan Positional Status Marker *-täl and Additional Comments on Classic Mayan Positional Morphology.  Wayeb Notes 17.  2005.

• A Possible Alternative Way of Expressing Month Names in Maya Writing.  Glyph Dwellers Report 19.  2005.

• A New Sign with Phonetic no Reading?  Wayeb Notes No. 15.  2004.

• Discourse Structure and Coordinate Constructions in Classic Lowland Mayan Texts.  In: The Linguistics of the Maya Script, edited by Søren Wichmann, pp. 339-364.  University of Utah Press.  2004.

• The Origin of Mayan Syllabograms and Orthographic Conventions.  Written Language and Literacy, 6(2):193-237.  2003.

• Historical Reconstruction of Mayan Applicative and Antidative Constructions.  International Journal of American Linguistics.  69(2):186-228.  2003.

• An Epi-Olmec Jade Pendant Found in Costa Rica.   Mexicon 24(1):14-19.  2002.  http://vma.uoregon.edu/Mexicon/xxiv1Mora-Morin.pdf.

• The Origins of Maya Civilization: The Old Shell Game, Commodity, Treasure, and Kingship.  In Ancient Maya Political Economies, edited by Marilyn Masson and David Freidel, pp. 41-86.  New York: Altamira Press.  Coauthored with David Freidel and Kathryn Reese-Taylor.  2002.

• The Syllabic Value of Mayan T77 as k’i.   Research Reports on Ancient Maya Writing 46:8-45.  2000.                     

• The Origins of Maya Writing: The Case for Portable Objects.  In U Mut Maya VII, edited by Tom and Carolyn Jones, pp. 133-164.  Arcata: Humboldt State University.  1997.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Links


Institutions and Organizations

Society for the Study of Indigenous Languages of the Americas (SSILA): http://www.ssila.org/

The Archive of the Indigenous Languages of Latin America: http://www.ailla.utexas.org/site/welcome.html

Center for the Indigenous Languages of Latin America (CILLA): http://www.utexas.edu/cola/llilas/centers/cilla/links.html

Linguistics Society of America (LSA): http://www.lsadc.org/

Society of American Archaeology (SAA): http://www.saa.org/

American Anthropological Association (AAA): http://www.aaanet.org/

Mesoweb: http://www.mesoweb.com/

Foundation for the Advancement of Mesoamerican Studies, Inc. (FAMSI): http://www.famsi.org/

Wayeb: http://www.wayeb.org/

K'inal Winik Cultural Center: http://www.csuohio.edu/kinalwinik/

Instituto de Lingüística y Educación, Universidad Rafael Landívar: http://www.url.edu.gt/VAcademica/ILE/default.htm

Maya Archaeology: http://www.maya-archaeology.org/

The Maya Meetings at UT-Austin: http://www.utmaya.org/

The Mesoamerica Center at UT-Austin: http://www.utmesoamerica.org/

Center for Maya Research/Research Reports on Ancient Maya Writing: http://www.precolumbia.com/bearc/CMR/home.html

Center for Ancient American Studies/Ancient America: http://www.precolumbia.com/bearc/CAAS/home.html

Guatemala Scholars Network (GSN): http://www.vanderbilt.edu/AnS/Anthro/GSN/

Programa de Investigaciones Multidisciplinarias Sobre Mesoamérica y El Sureste (PROIMMSE):  http://proimmse.unam.mx/

Grants and Funding Sources

National Science Foundation -- Linguistics: http://www.nsf.gov/funding/pgm_summ.jsp?pims_id=5408&org=BCS&from=home

The Wenner-Gren Foundation: http://www.wennergren.org/

FAMSI: http://www.famsi.org/


Departments and Programs

UNC-CH, Linguistics: http://www.unc.edu/depts/ling/

UNC-CH, Consortium for Latina American and Caribbean Studies at DUKE/UNC: http://www.unc.edu/depts/ilas/front.html

UNC-CH, Anthropology: http://www.unc.edu/depts/anthro/

SUNY-Albany, Anthropology: http://www.albany.edu/anthro/

KU-Lawrence, Anthropology: http://www.ku.edu/~kuanth/

KU-Lawrence, Linguistics: http://www.linguistics.ku.edu/

Electronic Journals, Newsletters, Blogs

Journal of Mesoamerican Languages and Linguistics (Elanguage): http://www.elanguage.net/journals/index.php/jmll/index.

Glyph Dwellers: http://nas.ucdavis.edu/NALC/glyphdwellers.html

Wayeb Notes: http://www.wayeb.org/indexnotes.htm

Journal of World Systems Research: http://jwsr.ucr.edu/index.php

Linguistic Discovery: http://linguistic-discovery.dartmouth.edu/webobjbin/WebObjects/Journals.woa/xmlpage/1/issue

Erik Boot’s Excellent Website http://mayanewsupdates.blogspot.com/

Resources

Digital Media Archive, Language Acquisition Research Center at San Diego State University, Yucatec Maya: http://larcdma.sdsu.edu/user/index.php?lang=Yucatec%20Maya


Museo Popol Vuh: http://www.popolvuh.ufm.edu.gt/eng/index.htm

Calendar program: http://www.pauahtun.org/Calendar/tools.html

SIL phonetic fonts: http://www.sil.org/computing/fonts/

The Ethnologue: http://www.ethnologue.com/

MIT Linguistics: http://web.mit.edu/linguistics/www/

The Linguist List: http://www.linguistlist.org/

Dictionary of American Regional English: http://dare.wisc.edu/

Centro Maya de Idiomas: http://www.centromaya.org/

Judith Maxwell: http://www.tulane.edu/~maxwell/

William Labov's homepage: http://www.ling.upenn.edu/~wlabov/home.html

Matthew S. Dryer's website: http://linguistics.buffalo.edu/people/faculty/dryer/dryer/dryer.htm

Brian Stross: http://uts.cc.utexas.edu/~strossb/index.html

William Croft's website: http://lings.ln.man.ac.uk/Info/staff/WAC/WACHome.html

Brian D. Joseph's website: http://www.ling.ohio-state.edu/~bjoseph/

Hans H. Hock's website: http://www.econ.uiuc.edu/~hanko/REEC/Fac/fac.html#hock

Archive of the Indian Languages of Chiapas: http://www.anthro.ucsd.edu/~jhaviland/ArchiveHTML/

Lyle Campbell's website: http://www.hum.utah.edu/index.php?module=facultyDetails&personId=167&orgId=301

Sk'op Sotz'leb: The Tzotzil of Zinacantán: http://zapata.org/tzotzil/

Workshop on American Indigenous Languages: http://orgs.sa.ucsb.edu/nailsg/index.html

Kaufman's (2003) Preliminary Mayan Etymologycal Dictionary.

Linguistics software (transcription) download: http://www.linguistics.ucsb.edu/resources/computing/download/download.htm

Susanna Cumming's web resources for linguistics: http://www.linguistics.ucsb.edu/faculty/cumming/index.htm

Linguistic Data Consortium: http://www.ldc.upenn.edu/

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Contact Info

325 Dey Hall CB #3155
Linguistics Department
Chapel Hill, NC 27599
Phone: 919/843-5621
Email: davidmm@unc.edu

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