Oral Art of Soqoṭra

Miranda J. Morris, Ph.D. (1979), S.O.A.S., University of London, is an independent researcher who has published books and articles on the languages, ethnobotany and ethnography of the people of southern Arabia, most recently A Comparative Cultural Glossary across the Modern South Arabian Languages (JSS, Supplement 43, OUP, 2019).

"This impressive contribution to Semitic philology is a titanic work almost without precedent in the study of Semitic-speaking oral literature. The author uses their uniquely deep first-hand knowledge to create a fully-fledged presentation of the Western dialect of Soqotri. This is an exceedingly rich and varied collection of phonological, morphological and lexical evidence on Western Soqotri. The importance of the book for MSA and general Semitic etymology and historical lexicography is paramount, and the specialists in these fields will be very much in debt to the author for this rich and reliable source of information. Its impact on the future of Soqotri studies cannot be overstated: years, if not decades of intensive linguistic and philological work will be needed to properly assess the riches generously shared with us by the author." Leonid Kogan, HSE University, Russia “I recommend this work most highly to anyone working on, or interested in, Soqoṭri, oral poetry, endangered languages and the complex relationship between local language, local cultures and local ecosystems. I very much hope that the Soqoṭran islanders who contributed to this work will soon have access to the volumes, at least in electronic form.” J anet C.E. Watson, Bibliotheca Orientalis , (2021).