The Saek Language

Little research had been conducted on Saek, a Tai-family language spoken by the Saek people of Laos and Thailand, until the preeminent linguist William J. Gedney began his exhaustive study of it in the 1960s. Never before published, Gedney’s field data on Saek are collected here, including a 550-page glossary and 450 pages of Saek oral literature presented in free translation and linear glosses. The volume concludes with two important, previously unpublished Gedney papers, “Saek Final-L: Archaism or Innovation?” and “The Twelve Year Names in Saek.” While William J. Gedney’s “The Saek Language” offers a particularly rich vein of primary data to specialists in comparative Tai, its texts—ranging from oral histories and descriptions of Saek life to folktales—are also of value to historians, anthropologists, and folklorists. Introductions contextualize the linguistic data for more general readers.