Time Depth in Historical Linguistics”, Edited by Colin Renfrew, April
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Ilia Peiros “Evolution of Human Languages” Program, Santa Fe Institute Moscow 20.03.2013
Ilia Peiros “Evolution of Human Languages” Program, Santa Fe Institute Moscow 20.03.2013 Linguistic Contacts in Ancient East Asia (early draft version) In his first and last English publications, Sergei Starostin discussed the ancient linguistic contacts of the Chinese language. The puzzle of East Asian linguistic prehistory is still far from being solved, but some of the pieces are already known. * * * Ancient East Asia can be seen as an area of interaction between three major linguistic powers: the local Austric super-family and the two invaders (the Sino-Tibetan, especially the Chinese, and the Altaic families). Austric The Austric super-family is made up of four daughter-families, grouped into two branches: Austronesian + Tai-Kadai and Austroasiatic + Miao-Yao (Peiros 19981). 1. The Austronesian (AN) languages can be roughly subdivided into three branches: Formosan (AN languages of Taiwan), Malayo-Polynesian (Western AN, Central Pacific, etc.) and Oceanic. Phonological correspondences (only for Formosan and some MP languages) are used to reconstruct the Proto-AN system. Blust’s AN comparative dictionary (Blust, n.d.) represents the Formosan and Malayo-Polynesian lexicon fairly well, while the set of comprehensive Proto-Oceanic etymologies is quite limited (see Ross et al., 1998, 2003, 2008). The disintegration of the Proto-AN language began earlier than 5 thousand years ago (5 KYA)2 not in Taiwan, as it is generally believed (Blust 2008, Adelar), but somewhere in the subtropical areas of mainland China (Peiros). 2. Most of the Tai-Kadai daughter-groups are known relatively well. The only exception is the Gelao group (Ostapirat, 2000; Diller et al. -
Eric Smith, Santa Fe Institute
Dating and Relationships (or...) Computational historical linguistics and long-range reconstruction Eric Smith, Santa Fe Institute Part of the Evolution of Human Languages project at SFI <http://ehl.santafe.edu/> in collaboration with the Tower of Babel project <http://starling.rinet.ru/main.html> Thanks to Murray Gell-Mann, George Starostin, Ilia Peiros, in memory of Sergei Starostin Work done jointly with Tanmoy Bhattacharya, Jon Wilkins, Dan Hruschka, William Croft, Ian Maddieson, Logan Sutton, and Mark Pagel Outline • Goals of historical linguistics • The classical comparative method • Attempts at deep reconstruction • New observations change the landscape • Our attempts at quantitative reconstruction Goals of historical linguistics • To understand how languages change, and how they have changed historically • To identify relations among languages due to common ancestry or cultural contact • To reconstruct the languages of past speakers • To contribute to an understanding of human populations and migrations • To understand what is possible in language as a window on cognitive constraints The interaction of history with process • History-dependent phenomena combine lawful dynamics with historical accident • Accidents make branching processes -- h0ROTO 4URKICv help us infer diachronic relations from synchronic variability • Diachronic relations assign the v correct weights to processes h# h HULYM 3 h7ESTERN ENISEI A 9 Y which act probabilistically h AN v 4URKICv v v UT v LTAI /LD AK 9 ! h h 4URKIC 4 - 1YZ 3 4 8 3 . 8 9 + # $ 3 OFA UV AR AK AK YR ! HOR ALAJ HUV IDDLE# OLGAN ! OTHERCLOSELANGUAGES Y 5 G LTAI/IR A UT AS YL8 LTAI YZ ASH IGHUR AK HULYM AS OT The classical comparative method of historical linguistics: to interpret innovations • A hypothesis of relationship among a set of languages. -
A. Dolgopolsky's Nostratic Dictionary and Afro-Asiatic
2011 LINGUA POSNANIENSIS LIII (1) doi 10.2478/v10122-011-0008-3 A. Dolgopolsky’s NOSTRATIC DICTIONARY AND AFRO-ASIATIC (SEMITO-HAMITIC) GÁBOR TAKÁCS Abs TRACT : Gábor takács. A. Dolgopolsky’s Nostratic Dictionary and Afro-Asiatic (Semito-Hamitic) . Lingua posnaniensis, vol. Liii (1)/2011. the poznań society for the advancement of the arts and sci- ences. pL issn 0079-4740, isBn 978-83-7654-140-2, pp. 109–119. the monumental comparative dictionary by aharon dolgopolsky (prof. emer. of the University of haifa), long awaited by many specialists interested in the long-range comparison of language families, is here at last, available online since spring 2008.1 what we have here is a life’s work completing more than fifty years’ research. the first online publication will soon be followed by a second revised edition. the present reviewer had the privilege in haifa in december 2008 to be able to assist the author in reviewing the etymological entries with initial *m-. the author is the internationally widely known doyen of this domain, which he established still in moscow in the early 1960s together with the late vladislav illič-svityč (1934–1966). Both of them were working initially and basically in the field of indo-european comparative linguistics. illič-svityč was an expert on Balto-slavonic accentology, while dolgopolsky started his careeer as a researcher of romance philology. But soon, both of them had become familiar with the results of semito-hamitic (recently called afro-asiatic after Greenberg), kartvelian, dravidian, Uralic, and altaic historical linguistics. this had led them to a conviction, that has arisen independently in them, on the relationship of the six so-called nostratic language families enumerated above (in- cluding indo-european). -
Problems in Assessing the Probability of Language Relatedness
This is a draft paper, building the basic of a talk, presented at The 15th Annual Sergei Starostin Memorial Conference on Comparative-Historical Linguistics (Institute for Oriental and Classical Studies, Higher School of Economics, Moscow). Please cite the study as: List, J.-M. (2020): Problems in assessing the probability of language relatedness. Talk, presented at the The 15th Annual Sergei Starostin Memorial Conference on Comparative- Historical Linguistics (Institute for Oriental and Classical Studies, Higher School of Economics, Moscow). Draft available at https://lingulist.de/documents/papers/list-2020-proving-relatedness-draft.pdf Problems in Assessing the Probability of Language Relatedness Johann-Mattis List Whether or more languages are genetically related and form a language family whose members all developed from a common source is one of the most frequently debated questions in the field of historical linguistics. In order to avoid being stuck in qualitative arguments about details, scholars have repeatedly tried to establish formal approaches that would allow to assess language relatedness in quantitative or proba- bilistic frameworks. Up to now, however, none of the numerous approaches which have been made so far has been able to convince a critical number of scholars. In this study, I will discuss common problems underlying all current approaches. By empha- sizing that they all fail to provide sufficient estimates with respect to the validity of the test procedure, I will try outline common guidelines and tests that can help in the future development of quantitative approaches to the proof of language relatedness. 1 Introduction Unlike in biology, where it is generally assumed that life on earth has only developed one time in the history of the planet, with all living creatures ultimately going back to a common ancestor, linguists are far more hesitant in assuming that language developed only once, and that all languages spoken on earth go back to the same source. -
Philological Sciences. Linguistics” / Journal of Language Relationship Issue 3 (2010)
Российский государственный гуманитарный университет Russian State University for the Humanities RGGU BULLETIN № 5/10 Scientific Journal Series “Philological Sciences. Linguistics” / Journal of Language Relationship Issue 3 (2010) Moscow 2010 ВЕСТНИК РГГУ № 5/10 Научный журнал Серия «Филологические науки. Языкознание» / «Вопросы языкового родства» Выпуск 3 (2010) Москва 2010 УДК 81(05) ББК 81я5 Главный редактор Е.И. Пивовар Заместитель главного редактора Д.П. Бак Ответственный секретарь Б.Г. Власов Главный художник В.В. Сурков Редакционный совет серии «Филологические науки. Языкознание» / «Вопросы языкового родства» Председатель Вяч. Вс. Иванов (Москва – Лос-Анджелес) М. Е. Алексеев (Москва) В. Блажек (Брно) У. Бэкстер (Анн Арбор) В. Ф. Выдрин (Санкт-Петербург) М. Гелл-Манн (Санта Фе) А. Б. Долгопольский (Хайфа) Ф. Кортландт (Лейден) А. Лубоцкий (Лейден) Редакционная коллегия серии: В. А. Дыбо (главный редактор) Г. С. Старостин (заместитель главного редактора) Т. А. Михайлова (ответственный секретарь) К. В. Бабаев С. Г. Болотов А. В. Дыбо О. А. Мудрак В. Е. Чернов ISSN 1998-6769 © Российский государственный гуманитарный университет, 2010 УДК 81(05) ББК 81я5 Вопросы языкового родства: Международный научный журнал / Рос. гос. гуманитар. ун-т; Рос. Акад. наук. Ин-т языкознания; под ред. В. А. Дыбо. ― М., 2010. ― № 3. ― X + 176 с. ― (Вестник РГГУ: Научный журнал; Серия «Филологические науки. Языко- знание»; № 05/10). Journal of Language Relationship: International Scientific Periodical / Russian State Uni- versity for the Humanities; Russian Academy of Sciences. Institute of Linguistics; Ed. by V. A. Dybo. ― Moscow, 2010. ― Nº 3. ― X + 176 p. ― (RSUH Bulletin: Scientific Periodical; Linguistics Series; Nº 05/10). ISSN 1998-6769 http ://journal.nostratic.ru [email protected] Дополнительные знаки: С. -
Linguistics for Archaeologists: Principles, Methods and the Case of the Incas
Linguistics for Archaeologists Linguistics for Archaeologists: Principles, Methods and the Case of the Incas Paul Heggarty1 Like archaeologists, linguists and geneticists too use the data and methods of their dis‑ ciplines to open up their own windows onto our past. These disparate visions of human prehistory cry out to be reconciled into a coherent holistic scenario, yet progress has long been frustrated by interdisciplinary disputes and misunderstandings (not least about Indo‑European). In this article, a comparative‑historical linguist sets out, to his intended audience of archaeologists, the core principles and methods of his discipline that are of relevance to theirs. They are first exemplified for the better‑known languages of Europe, before being put into practice in a lesser‑known case‑study. This turns to the New World, setting its greatest indigenous ‘Empire’, that of the Incas, alongside its greatest surviving language family today, Quechua. Most Andean archaeologists assume a straightforward association between these two. The linguistic evidence, however, exposes this as nothing but a popular myth, and writes instead a wholly new script for the prehistory of the Andes — which now awaits an archaeological story to match. 1. Archaeology and linguistics genetic methods from the biological sciences now being applied to language data. In a much discussed Recent years have seen growing interest in a ‘new syn- paper in Nature, Gray & Atkinson (2003) put forward thesis’ between the disciplines of archaeology, genetics a phylogenetic analysis of Indo-European languages, and linguistics, at the point where all three intersect based on comparative vocabulary lists, which falls in seeking a coherent picture of the distant origins of neatly in line with the ‘out of Anatolia’ hypothesis. -
Comparative-Historical Linguistics and Lexicostatistics
COMPARATIVE-HISTORICAL LINGUISTICS AND LEXICOSTATISTICS Sergei Starostin COMPARATIVE-HISTORICAL LINGUISTICS AND LEXICOSTATISTICS [This is a translation, done by I. Peiros and N. Evans, of my paper "Sravnitel'no-istoričeskoe jazykoznanie i leksikostatistika", in "Lingvističeskaja rekonstrukcija i drevnejšaja istorija Vostoka", Moscow 1989. I have introduced, however, a number of modifications into the final English text — basically rewritten it again, since the English version needs English examples and etymologies, not Russian ones.] The last two decades have witnessed a fundamental advance in the techniques of comparative linguistic research. A prolonged period of comparative work with a wide range of language families has laid the foundation for the study of genetic relationships between remotely related languages or language groups. The first step in this direction was taken by V.M. Illich-Svitych in his seminal work 'Towards a comparison of the Nostratic languages' in which, with a combination of rigorous methods and intuitive flare, he begins to demonstrate the relatedness of a number of languages of the Old World. This new level of comparative studies appears completely legitimate. In fact, if we take the theory of language divergence as axiomatic, we have to concede the fact that from around the sixth millenium B.C. to the first millenium B.C. there was quite a number of different reconstructable proto-languages throughout the world. Once the level of reconstruction of various proto-languages is improved, the question inevitably arises: are any of these proto-languages genetically related and, if so, can we prove this relationship? To the first part of this question we must now answer in the affirmative. -
Phonetic Comparison, Varieties, and Networks: Swadesh’S Influence Lives on Here Too
Phonetic comparison, varieties, and networks: Swadesh’s influence lives on here too. Jennifer Sullivan and April McMahon, University of Edinburgh Outline of presentation 1) The perhaps unexpected relevance of Swadesh here 2) Small-scale comparison of methods measuring phonetic similarity among English/Germanic varieties 3) Implications of results for how we measure phonetic similarity in a synchronic context 4) Begin to tackle question of Chance Phonetic Similarity Swadesh’s Legacy Lexicon: Ubiquitous Phonetics: Papers on 100/200 word lists of basic English varieties and other vocabulary languages Measurement of Language Lexicostatistics and Distance Glottochronology equally (Lexicostatistics) applied by Swadesh to Varieties Threshold scores from these Estimation of dates of Language splits techniques for separating Languages from Varieties (Glottochronology) (Swadesh 1950, 1972) Swadesh’s Insights Swadesh did not quantify phonetic similarity in the manner of Lexicostatistics but interested in English variety vowel variability (1947) and explores isogloss tradition (1972: 16). “Mesh principle” (1972: 285-92) argues against ignoring dialect gradation and always assuming clear treelike splits. Broached the issue of chance in assessing whether languages were related or not. Lexicostatistics Cognacy Score 1,0 ‘Phonostatistics’ (within cognates) Phonetic identity score 1,0 Edit Distance (Whole phone) Graded phonetic measurements Phonetic feature methods Swadesh 100 list Swadesh 200 list Gmc Cognates only cold five brother eye four daughter foot ice eight heart mother holy horn right home long three nine mouth north one over two six white seven storm 30 word subset swear (McMahon et al 2005-07) ten word Phonetic comparison in Varieties 2 Languages: English, German (Hochdeutsch) 4 Varieties of English: Std American, RP, Std Scottish, Buckie Questions Convergence problem e.g. -
Current Progress in Altaic Etymology
Blažek : Current Progress in Altaic Etymology Linguistica ONLINE. Added: January, 30th 2006. tjurkskix jazykov: obščetjurkskie i mežtjurkskie leksičeskie osnovy na bukvy "k", "q", http://www.phil.muni.cz/linguistica/art/blazek/bla-004.pdf Moskva: Jazyki russkoj kuľtury 1997). In his publications O. Mudrak especially ISSN 1801-5336 concentrates on two topics, historical phonology of Chuvash (1987, 1989, 1993, 1994) and reconstruction of Jurchen (1985, 1988). I. Gruntov has published an article on the historical phonology of Japanese in the Altaic context (2000). [*] The first version of the present review was finished in May 2005. This new version Current Progress in Altaic Etymology originates to up-to-date the sources on the one hand. The second reason consists in the Václav Blažek unexpected death of the head of the author’s team, Sergei Starostin, on 30th September 2005. Sergei Starostin, Anna Dybo, Oleg Mudrak, with assistance of Ilya Gruntov and Vladi- The Etymological Dictionary of the Altaic Languages (= EDAL) is open by Preface mir Glumov: Etymological Dictionary of the Altaic Languages, Part One [A-K], Part (pp. 7-9) where the purposes of the present dictionary and a short history of Altaic Two [L-Z], Part Three [Indices], Leiden-Boston: Brill 2003, published in the prestigeous studies are described. The Introduction (pp. 11-236) starts with the Chapter One devoted series Handbook of Oriental Studies / Handbuch der Orientalistik 8/1-3, edited by Denis to The problem of Interlingual borrowings in Altaic languages (pp. 13-21). Here it is Sinor & Nicola di Cosmo [ISSN 0169-8524]. These three volumes are of a respectable demonstrated, how the phonetic criteria may serve to distinguish the borrowings from size: pp 1-858, 859-1556, 1557-2096 respectively. -
Zerohack Zer0pwn Youranonnews Yevgeniy Anikin Yes Men
Zerohack Zer0Pwn YourAnonNews Yevgeniy Anikin Yes Men YamaTough Xtreme x-Leader xenu xen0nymous www.oem.com.mx www.nytimes.com/pages/world/asia/index.html www.informador.com.mx www.futuregov.asia www.cronica.com.mx www.asiapacificsecuritymagazine.com Worm Wolfy Withdrawal* WillyFoReal Wikileaks IRC 88.80.16.13/9999 IRC Channel WikiLeaks WiiSpellWhy whitekidney Wells Fargo weed WallRoad w0rmware Vulnerability Vladislav Khorokhorin Visa Inc. Virus Virgin Islands "Viewpointe Archive Services, LLC" Versability Verizon Venezuela Vegas Vatican City USB US Trust US Bankcorp Uruguay Uran0n unusedcrayon United Kingdom UnicormCr3w unfittoprint unelected.org UndisclosedAnon Ukraine UGNazi ua_musti_1905 U.S. Bankcorp TYLER Turkey trosec113 Trojan Horse Trojan Trivette TriCk Tribalzer0 Transnistria transaction Traitor traffic court Tradecraft Trade Secrets "Total System Services, Inc." Topiary Top Secret Tom Stracener TibitXimer Thumb Drive Thomson Reuters TheWikiBoat thepeoplescause the_infecti0n The Unknowns The UnderTaker The Syrian electronic army The Jokerhack Thailand ThaCosmo th3j35t3r testeux1 TEST Telecomix TehWongZ Teddy Bigglesworth TeaMp0isoN TeamHav0k Team Ghost Shell Team Digi7al tdl4 taxes TARP tango down Tampa Tammy Shapiro Taiwan Tabu T0x1c t0wN T.A.R.P. Syrian Electronic Army syndiv Symantec Corporation Switzerland Swingers Club SWIFT Sweden Swan SwaggSec Swagg Security "SunGard Data Systems, Inc." Stuxnet Stringer Streamroller Stole* Sterlok SteelAnne st0rm SQLi Spyware Spying Spydevilz Spy Camera Sposed Spook Spoofing Splendide -
John Benjamins Publishing Company
John Benjamins Publishing Company This is a contribution from Studies in Language 42:3 © 2018. John Benjamins Publishing Company This electronic file may not be altered in any way. The author(s) of this article is/are permitted to use this PDF file to generate printed copies to be used by way of offprints, for their personal use only. Permission is granted by the publishers to post this file on a closed server which is accessible only to members (students and faculty) of the author's/s' institute. It is not permitted to post this PDF on the internet, or to share it on sites such as Mendeley, ResearchGate, Academia.edu. Please see our rights policy on https://benjamins.com/content/customers/rights For any other use of this material prior written permission should be obtained from the publishers or through the Copyright Clearance Center (for USA: www.copyright.com). Please contact [email protected] or consult our website: www.benjamins.com Areal sound change and the distributional typology of affricate richness in Eurasia Dmitry Nikolaev and Eitan Grossman Hebrew University of Jerusalem This paper makes a contribution to phonological typology by investigating the distribution of affricate-rich languages in Eurasia. It shows that affricate-rich and affricate-dense languages cluster areally within Eurasia and have area-specific histories. In particular, the affricate-rich areas of western Eurasia – a ‘European’ area and a Caucasian area – are not the result of contact-induced sound changes or borrowing, while the two affricate-rich areas of eastern Eurasia – the Hindukush area and the Eastern Himalayan area – are the result of contact. -
Implications of Macro-Areal Linguistics
DOI: 10.11649/sm.2015.004 Slavia Meridionalis 15, 2015 Instytut Slawistyki PAN Corinna Leschber Institute for Linguistic and CrossCultural Studies in Berlin Implications of Macro-Areal Linguistics While working on difficult etymologies of Balkan words, a repeating pat tern can be observed regarding the geographical occurrence of formally and semantically similar words. Archaic terminology in the Balkans shows roots bearing widespread and deeplevel connections with an intensive time depth. We have tried to show this by means of the example of the widespread root *mand-, as in mandra, as pointed out by Leschber (2011), which has cognates in Romance and Iberian languages, in German languages, in the Balkan languages, in Greek and Turkish, and in Sanskrit. See the Nostratic root *mand- in Dolgopolsky (2008, pp. 1338–1339, No. 1318) *mAǹ(V) “herd, herd animals”, further attested in the HamitoSemitic, Ugric and Altaic languages, and in Dravidian languages as manda, mandi, mande “herd, flock of sheep or goats, cattle herd, herd of buffaloes”. Bomhard (2008, p. 48) agrees with the findings on this reconstructed root. *mokor- The Etymological Dictionary of the Slavic Languages (Трубачев, 1992, pp. 115–119) proposes an interrelationship between the Slavic *mogyla, “tumulus”, The work has been prepared at author’s own expense. Competing interests: no competing interests have been declared. Publisher: Institute of Slavic Studies PAS. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 PL License (creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/pl/), which permits redistribution, commercial and non commercial, provided that the article is properly cited.