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It’s not all about you: New perspectives on address research
Edited by Bettina Kluge and María Irene Moyna
[Topics in Address Research 1] 2019
► pp. 415–434

Terms of address and self-reference in Ulaanbaatar Mongolian

This chapter deals with a system of terms of address and self-reference in the Mongolian of Ulaanbaatar, capital of the Mongolian state. It first deals with the morphological strategies (politeness and definiteness marking, respectively) that are used to extend the reference of regular inalienable person-referring nouns to second and first person referents. Based on ten interviews, it then presents the semi-closed set of person-referring nouns that this system is based on: terms for relatives, friends, lovers, and marginally professions. Semantic extensions between these categories as well as into the category of strangers are described and partially explained through the interplay of factors such as the social background of the interlocutors and communicative intent.

Keywords: Khalkha Mongolian, address, first person, politenes
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Methodology
  • 3.Morpho-syntactic properties of the system
  • 4.Subclasses of terms of address
    • 4.1Nouns referring to relatives
      • Elder siblings and grandparents
      • Younger siblings
      • Parents
      • Children
    • 4.2Nouns referring to friends
    • 4.3Nouns referring to lovers
    • 4.4Nouns referring to occupations
  • 5.Conclusions
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • Abbreviations
  • References
Published online: 28 November 2019
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/tar.1.17bro
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