The Structure of Kiranti Languages: Comparative Grammar and Texts (Book Review‪)‬

The Structure of Kiranti Languages: Comparative Grammar and Texts Karen H. Ebert. Zurich: ASAS, Universiat Zurich, 1994. Pages: 283. ISBN 3-952010-5-2 Karen H. Ebert's grammar on Tibeto-Burman (T-B) Chianti languages (acronym SKI: CGT), to my knowledge is the first typological (although the term 'comparative grammar' has not strictly been used in Crystal's (1980:66 and 362-363) sense grammar of such type on geographically less-accessible and 'nearly extinct' (Crystal 2000: 20) Kiranti languages (see Appendix A for their regional distribution) spoken in Eastern hills of Nepal from the Likhu river in the west plus across the Nepal border to north-east India viz., Sikkim and Darjeeling. Phylogenetically (1), the generic phyla 'Kiranti' under T-B subfamily, includes not less than thirty-two (cf. Rai 1985, Hansson 1991a, Nishi 1992 and Pokharel 1994) scantily described languages. Or most of them are yet awaiting linguistic description and further documentation in any form of grammar or dictionary. To some extent, some of these languages have been investigated only recently after Allen's A Sketch of Thulung Grammar (1975) in the Kiranti linguistic literature.