A Comparative Study of English Nepali and Magar Kinship Terms

Abstract

The research work entitled ‘A Comparative Study of English Nepali and Magar Kinship Terms’ is a linguistic comparative study of English, Nepali and Magar kinship terms, which are used to refer to various kinship relations established by birth or marriage. The study comprises the linkage of five generations including the ego, the parents, the grandparents,children and grandchildren through male and female egos in the respective languages. The main objective of this research work is to compare and contrast the kinship terms of English, Nepali and Magar,and also find out the differences and similarities between the languages through componential analysis. The data was collected through face-to-face interview. The study helped to find out facts on what ‘kinship term and kinship relation’ is, in the linguistic studies in relation to particular speech community specifying the comparison of English, Nepali and Magar kinship terms rather than addressive terms. Although there are many differences between English, Nepali and Magar kinship terms, there are similarities too. Comparatively Nepali andMagar languages have more similarities than English and Nepali or Magarlanguages. The perspective of the study is to bring out some linguistic output to the current as well as forth generation this can surely prove to be a valuable asset for the intensive researchers. The thesis consists four chapters: Introduction, Methodology, Analysis and Interpretation, and Findings and Recommendations. The first chapter contains general background of the study, review of literature related to the perspective, objective of the study, its significance, consonant and vowel sounds of English and Magar languages and definition of different terms used in the thesis. The second chapter contains sources of data, research tools, process of data collection, and limitations of the study. The third chapter consists of analysis and interpretation of the data inappropriate tables and diagrams. The fourth chapter contains findings and recommendations of the study.