The languages of Central Siberia: introduction and overview

Leipzig: Max Planck Institute for evolutionary anthropology, 2004. — 123 p.In the following sections, I offer an overview of, and introduction to, the indigenous languages of central Siberia. Section 1 contains an introduction to the languages and their speakers, a brief history of the study of the languages of central Siberia, and finally an introduction to the history of lexical contacts among the various central Siberian peoples. Section 2 discusses a range of topics in the phonology of the languages of concern, in particular, the system of vowels, the extent of the use of contrastive palatalization of consonants, phonotactics, and finally a discussion of a range of
morphophonological processes, including stem and affix alternations and vowel harmony.