�� an extraordinary study � Kulick displays formidable talents as both ethnographer and linguistic investigator
� This is one of those rare works, which, while highly sophisticated and nuanced, never fails to be accessible
and lively.�
-- Anthropological Linguistics
Submitted by Publisher's Web Site, September, 2001
Summary
Don Kulick's book is an anthropological study of language and cultural change among a small group of people
living in the Sepik region of Papua New Guinea. He examines why the villagers of Gapun are abandoning their vernacular
in favor of Tok Pisin, the most widely spoken language in Papua New Guinea, despite their attachment to their own
language as a source of identity and as a tie to their lands. He draws on an examination of village language socialization
process and on Marshall Sahlins's ideas about structure and event.
