Sérgio Meira
{{short description|Brazilian linguist (born 1968)}}
{{Infobox scientist
| name = Sérgio Meira
| image =
| image_size =
| caption =
| birth_name = Sérgio Meira de Santa Cruz Oliveira
| birth_date = {{birth date and age|1968|12|31|mf=y}}
| birth_place = Recife, Brazil
| death_date =
| field = Cariban languages, Anthropology
| work_institutions = Rice University
Radboud University Nijmegen
Museu Paraense Emílio Goeldi
Leiden University
Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics
KNAW
| alma_mater = Rice University
| doctoral_advisor = Spike Gildea
| doctoral_students =
| notable_students =
| thesis_title = A grammar of Tiriyo
| thesis_year = 1999
| thesis_url = http://scholarship.rice.edu/handle/1911/19417
| known_for =
| awards = Lodieska Stockbridge Vaughan Fellowship, Rice University (1998)
John W. Gardner Award, Rice University (1999)
Mary R. Haas Book Award (2000)
| footnotes =
}}
Sérgio Meira de Santa Cruz Oliveira (born December 31, 1968) is a Brazilian linguist who specializes in the Cariban and Tupian language families of lowland South America and in the Tiriyó language in particular. He has worked on the classification of the Cariban language family,{{cite book|last1=Meira|first1=Sérgio|editor1-last=Brown|editor1-first=Keith|editor1-link=Keith Brown (linguist)|title=Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics|title-link=Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics|date=2007|publisher=Elsevier|location=Amsterdam|isbn=978-0-08-044299-0|pages=199–203|edition=2.|chapter-url=http://etnolinguistica.wdfiles.com/local--files/site%3Aell/ELL2_Meira_Cariban.pdf|access-date=29 June 2014|chapter=Cariban Languages}} and has collected primary linguistic data from speakers of 14 Cariban languages{{efn|Akawaio, Akurio, Apalaí, Bakairi, Carijona, Hixkaryana, Kalina, Katxúyana, Kuhikuru, Macushi, Tiriyó, Waiwai, Wayana, and Yukpa.{{cite book|editor1-last=Berez|editor1-first=Andrea L.|editor2-last=Mulder|editor2-first=Jean|editor3-last=Rosenblum|editor3-first=Daisy|title=Fieldwork and Linguistic Analysis in Indigenous Languages of the Americas|date=May 2010|publisher=University of Hawaiʻi Press|hdl=10125/4463 |isbn=978-0-8248-3530-9|url=http://scholarspace.manoa.hawaii.edu/handle/10125/4463|access-date=6 July 2014}}}} and 5 non-Cariban languages.{{efn|Yaathê/Fulniô (Macro-Je), Kinaray-a (Austronesian), Mawayana (Arawak), Dholuo (Nilo-Saharan), Mawé (Tupian)}}
Education and personal life
Meira holds a BA and a PhD in Linguistics Theory and Analysis from Rice University. His doctoral research was in collaboration with his supervisor Spike Gildea. Sérgio Meira is a member of the American Anthropological Association (AAA) and of the Society for the Study of the Indigenous Languages of the Americas (SSILA).
In addition to his native Portuguese, Sérgio Meira is proficient in English,{{efn|He has completed his higher education in English, and most of his published works are in English.}} French,{{efn|He holds a Certificat d'études de français pratique from the Alliance française and taught French in Brazil.}} and Spanish,{{efn|He has published in Spanish.{{cite journal |last1=Meira|first1=Sérgio|title=Primeras observaciones sobre la lengua yukpa|website=University of Texas at Austin |language=es |date=2005 |url=https://hdl.handle.net/2152/10141 |hdl=2152/10141 |hdl-access=free}}}} is moderately fluent in Esperanto,{{efn|He holds a Basic Course Certificate from the Brazilian Esperanto Association, and is a self-proclaimed Esperantist whose ideology most closely resembles raumism.{{cite web|last1=Meira|first1=Sérgio|title=CURRICULUM VITAE|url=http://abralin.org/abralin2007/instituto/cvs/sergio.doc|website=Brazilian Linguistics Association|access-date=16 July 2014|language=Portuguese|date=6 November 2006}}{{dead link|date=May 2020|bot=medic}}{{cbignore|bot=medic}} [https://archive.org/details/sergio_201407 Alt URL]{{cite web|author1=Smeira|title=Volapuko jam superas Esperanton en Vikipedio - Smeira diras|url=http://www.liberafolio.org/2007/volapukapedio#1356859544462251|website=Libera Folio|access-date=6 July 2014|language=Esperanto|date=15 September 2007|quote=Laux mi mem, mi estas Esperantisto, cxar tiel oni (mi kredas) cxiam nomis tiujn, kiuj scipovas Esperanton. Samideano? Se la difino estas: tiu, al kiu placxas la ekzisto de Esperanto kaj ties kulturo, jes; sed se la difino estas: tiu, kiu volas kunlabori, por ke Esperanto farigxu internacia lingvo, ne. Miaj ideoj tiurilate estas pli prok simaj al rauxmismo.}}}} Italian, German, Dutch, Volapük,{{efn|He is an academician at the International Volapük Academy, translated from Volapük for the International Rasmus Malling-Hansen Society, and wrote multiple articles for the Volapük Wikipedia.}} Romanian, and has a good command of Catalan, Russian, Latin, and other languages.{{cite web|title=Sérgio Meira de Santa Cruz Oliveira|url=http://lattes.cnpq.br/5899516033961856|website=Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico|access-date=29 June 2014|language=Portuguese|date=4 November 2014}}
Career
He is currently a researcher at the Radboud University Nijmegen. His research focuses on historical linguistics, fieldwork and description of the Cariban and Tupian language families, as well as language and cognition.
His work helped in the development of the South American Phonological Inventory Database (SAPhon),{{cite web |title=Acknowledgements|url=http://linguistics.berkeley.edu/~saphon/en/acknowledgements.php|website=South American Phonological Inventory Database|publisher=University of California|access-date=29 June 2014|location=Berkeley}} the World Atlas of Language Structures (WALS),{{cite web|editor1-last=Dryer|editor1-first=Matthew S.|editor2-last=Haspelmath|editor2-first=Martin|title=Language Tiriyo|url=http://wals.info/languoid/lect/wals_code_tir|website=World Atlas of Language Structures|access-date=29 June 2014}} and Glottolog.{{cite web|editor1-last=Nordhoff|editor1-first=Sebastian|editor2-last=Hammarström|editor2-first=Harald|editor3-last=Forkel|editor3-first=Robert|editor4-last=Haspelmath|editor4-first=Martin|title=Glottolog 2.2 - Cariban|url=http://glottolog.org/|website=Glottolog 2.2|publisher=Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology|date=2013|access-date=29 June 2014|location=Leipzig}}
Volapük
Sérgio Meira is one of eight academicians at the International Volapük Academy. He was appointed in 2007 by Brian Reynold Bishop, the seventh cifal and the academy's president at that time.{{cite web|author1=Ralph Midgley|author2=Michael Everson|title=Dö kadäm Volapüka|url=http://volapuk.evertype.com/kadam/kadam.html|website=Flenef bevünetik Volapüka|access-date=25 June 2014|language=Volapük, English}} He is also an active member of the Volapük discussion group, which unites most living volapükologists.
Meira translated articles, including Rasmus Malling-Hansen's obituary, from Volapük into English for the International Rasmus Malling-Hansen Society.{{cite web|title=Malling-Hansen, the Volapykist|url=http://www.malling-hansen.org/malling-hansen-the-volapykist.html|website=The International Rasmus Malling-Hansen Society|access-date=28 June 2014|language=Danish, English, Volapük|quote=We are very happy to bring on our website, an English version of this article, kindly translated by Sérgio Meira from Brazil. Mr. Meira is a sincere spokesman in favour of the artificial world language, Volapük, and is also working on an article about Malling-Hansen on the Volapük version of Wikipedia. [...] The obituary is translated from Volapük to English by Sérgio Meira from Brazil. We want to express our deepest gratidude to him for his very generous contribution to the understanding of Malling-Hansen's interest in the artificial world language, Volapük.}} He also did translation work on the Volapük Wikisource, but later suggested that his work be deleted because it would be considered copyright infringement.{{cite web|last1=Meira|first1=Sérgio|title=Wikisource:Proposed_deletions/Archive_2007|url=https://wikisource.org/wiki/Wikisource:Proposed_deletions/Archive_2007#October_2007|website=Wikisource|access-date=17 July 2014|date=10 October 2007}} Sérgio Meira is one of Andrew Drummond's correspondents who contributed to his knowledge of Volapük material prior to the writing of A Hand-Book of Volapük.
In late October 2006, Sérgio Meira started contributing to the Volapük Wikipedia. He is the main author of most of the featured articles.
Selected publications
Meira has a number of publications; an overview of some highlights is given below:
=Cariban family=
- On the Origin of Ablaut in the Cariban Family (2010)
- 'Natural concepts' in the spatial topological domain—adpositional meanings in cross-linguistic perspective: an exercise in semantic typology (2003)
- The Southern Cariban languages and the Cariban family (2005)
- Sobre a origem histórica dos 'prefixos relacionais' das línguas tupí-guaraní (2013)
=Tiriyó=
- Rhythmic stress in Tiriyó (Cariban)
Notes
{{Notelist|2}}
References
{{Reflist|3}}
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Category:Linguists from Brazil