Carol V McKinney

Based on in-depth fieldwork, research, and personal interviews, this comprehensive ethnographic study of the Bajju people of southern Kaduna State in Nigeria covers their origins, history, culture, religious beliefs, and practices. Bajju precolonial political-religious organization, economy, legal system, social organization, and values are described. Also included are chapters on the Hausa-Fulani, the colonial context, the Christian era, and cultural change. Ethnologists, missiologists, development personnel, and the Bajju themselves will find this a rich resource. For me as a Bajju scholar, this study is as important as E. E. Evans-Pritchard's classic study, Witchcraft, Oracles and Magic among the Azande (1937). For that reason, all Bajju sons and daughters must read this important work (from the foreword by Dr. Samuel Waje Kunhiyop). Baranzan's People: An Ethnohistory of the Bajju of the Middle Belt of Nigeria is a companion volume to Bajju Christian Conversion in the Middle Belt of Nigeria, published by SIL International(R) 2019.

Why have large numbers of the Bajju people of the Middle Belt of Nigeria become Christians? The first conversions occurred in 1929 and today almost one hundred percent of the Bajju claim to be Christians, so this people movement happened within a relatively short period. McKinney details the various contexts in which religious change took place among the Bajju: in traditional Bajju culture, in their relations with the Hausa-Fulani, in the British colonial context, and in the missionary context. She presents the results of an in-depth interview schedule administered in 1984 and 2011 to respondents in both a rural village and a Kaduna suburb. This longitudinal study, together with the author's involvement in participant observation, personal language learning, and archival records research, help provide answers to the questions of why, and to what degree, a worldview paradigm shift has occurred among the Bajju. The author also discusses some traditional religious beliefs retained by Bajju Christians, and charts traditional religious beliefs with biblical texts. Bajju Christian Conversion in the Middle Belt of Nigeria will be essential to anthropologists specializing in conversion studies, and be of interest to missiologists, and to the Bajju people themselves. It is a companion volume to Baranzan's People: An Ethnohistory of the Bajju of the Middle Belt of Nigeria, published by SIL International(R) 2019.

This articulatory phonetics course is designed especially for students whose aim is to learn an unwritten language. It teaches how to pronounce and transcribe virtually all the known sounds of the world's languages. The authors incorporate data from current research on a number of sounds, including two recently documented sounds (the labial flap and the interdental approximant). The McKinneys also provide fresh information on fortis-lenis consonants based on research of the Nigerian language, Jju. The majority of the book teaches the articulatory details of specific speech sounds, but chapters also include acoustic phonetics, palatography, the fascinating area of dialectal differences, and practical considerations for conducting phonetic field work. Anecdotes from the authors' and others' field experiences enliven the book. Another strength is phonetic exercises given in each chapter and the Appendices that cite data from many of the lesser-known languages of the world. An extensive Glossary and list of references help to not only review the basic concepts, but also provide resources for the interested student to dig deeper. Norris McKinney (Ph. D., University of Michigan) and Carol McKinney (Ph. D., Southern Methodist University) conducted fieldwork for over ten years while living among the Bajju people of northern Nigeria. Both have taught articulatory phonetics, and Norris also taught acoustic phonetics. He began writing this book as an update on data taught in SIL phonetics courses. Norris passed away before this book could be published, and Carol has brought this work to completion on his behalf.

Renowned linguist Kenneth L. Pike and his coauthors offer three previously unpublished essays that apply theoretical linguistic research to the areas of historical linguistics, cross-cultural communications, and text analysis. "Toward the Historical Reconstruction of Matrix Patterns in Morphology" establishes a comprehensive theory of morphological structure based on a number of languages. "Understanding Misunderstanding as Cross-Cultural Emic Clash" examines the crucial role that language plays in the numerous problems encountered in contacts between people from divergent cultural backgrounds. "The Importance of Purposive Behavior in Text Analysis" explores the centrality of establishing the relationship of reality to what is actually expressed in a text.