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Date: Fri, 11 Oct 1996 15:11:11 MDT

From: kearsy[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]mail.utexas.edu (Kearsy Cormier)

Subject: incl/excl pronouns: summary





Many thanks to those of you who responded to my question about

inclusive and exclusive pronouns. It turns out that there many, many

languages that do have this distinction. They include most if not all of the

following language families: Algonquian, Austronesian and

Austroasiatic, among others. I can supply you with a more complete list

if you are interested.



Also, thanks to those of you who pointed out that American Sign

Language also distinguishes between incl/excl pronouns. ASL is the

language I am currently studying with regard to this topic. (I was curious

how the distinction worked in spoken languages.)



Several of you pointed out that some non-standard varieties of

American English carry this incl/excl distinction - e.g. "weuns" and

"usuns". I was not aware that these forms differed in meaning from the

standard "we" and "us". Any comments?



-Kearsy



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Kearsy Cormier kearsy[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]mail.utexas.edu

University of Texas at Austin

PhD student, Department of Linguistics