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i i i Acknowledgments Many people and a number of institutions deserve heartfelt thanks for various kinds of assistance and support. The following granting agencies funded the research for this book at various stages: the Social Science Research Council, the National Science Foundation, the Wenner Gren Foundation, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Fulbright Commission of the United States. I began writing this book while working in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Alabama, where collegial support and friendship from Michael Murphy, Jim Knight, Jim Bindon, Bill Dressler, Kathy Oths, Lisa LeCount, John Blitz, Allan Maxwell, and Jason de Caro meant a great deal. Michael Murphy was a particularly important font of wisdom and humor and provided critical help by running interference for me on many occasions. Since moving to Brigham Young University’s Department of Linguistics and English Language in 2007, I have been tremendously energized by the stimulating work and encouragement of colleagues and students. I also want to express sincere gratitude to our chair, Bill Eggington , for his unflappable humor and wit, and for his unfailing support of a sometimes inept new colleague. He has smoothed the way on several occasions, which made all the difference. Many thanks also to Phyllis Daniel, LoriAnne Spear, Alicia McCleve, and Emily Allen for much assistance with matters that seem to come up many times a day. I thank Dean John Rosenberg of the College of Humanities, whose administrative acumen and humanistic scholarship and vision have created a uniquely wonderful environment for all of us. Not two years have passed since I began here, but I am already deeply indebted to him for a number of reasons. In the current environment of economic crisis, it is hardly an opportune time to be soliciting funds for anything extra. Yet, when approached by my editor Allyson Carter, who expressed the xiv Acknowledgments University of Arizona Press’s unqualified commitment to publishing this book but also stated the need for authors to become fundraisers for their own work during difficult times, I sought help from Dean Rosenberg. He responded with extraordinary but characteristic generosity. I am extremely fortunate to have a small but very supportive network of colleagues whose work has greatly enriched my own. Thanks to Marleen Haboud of the Pontificia Universidad Católica del Ecuador and the Universidad San Francisco de Quito for her energetic intellect and friendship. I have benefited so much from opportunities to interact with her and her colleagues and students at Católica. Mike Uzendoski’s insightful ethnography of Napo Quichua culture has expanded my perspectives on Amazonian Quichua linguaculture and poetics. Tod Swanson ’s work and friendship and many stimulating conversations at the Andes and Amazon Field School have given my work more depth and insight. Tony Webster’s work on Navajo poetry has given me hope for the future of ideophony. Joel Sherzer and his colleagues at the University of Texas at Austin have made enormous contributions to my ability to share my data through the Archives of Indigenous Languages of Latin America. This has been an energizing and liberating resource for my publishing efforts. A special thank-you to Heidi Johnson, who has personally overseen the digitization of my data, and who once went to great lengths to help me share an archived song with my Quechua friends in Ecuador, when dialup Internet use was all that was available there. Whenever I felt anxiety about the wisdom of focusing an entire book on the words and life of one person, it was always alleviated when I remembered Paul Friedrich’s insistence on the value of the unique individual as an ethnographic linguistic subject. His influence is apparent in other important ways as well, and I am unable to put into words how grateful I am for his work. I could hardly give adequate thanks to Luisa Cadena, who has not only taught me so much but has become, over the years, my Quechua alter ego. Her stories and her way of life have given me a greatly enhanced appreciation for the extraordinary beauty and intrinsic interest of the natural world we inhabit. I am also very grateful to her sister Celia, who has functioned as our literacy liaison by reading my letters to her and writing her thoughts to me, over the years. My own family has provided much support and inspiration. They have always accompanied me to Ecuador, making my trips there so [18...

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