On Using Qualitative Lexicostatistics to Illuminate Language History: Some Case Studies
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
Load more
Recommended publications
-
North Caucasian Languages
The Turkish Online Journal of Design, Art and Communication - TOJDAC April 2017 Special Edition COMPARISON OF VARIOUS QUANTITATIVE MEASURES OF PROXIMITY OF LANGUAGES: NORTH CAUCASIAN LANGUAGES Galeev Timur Ildarovich Kazan federal university (KFU), Kazan, Russia [email protected] Solovyev Valery Dmitrievich Kazan federal university (KFU), Kazan, Russia ABSTRACT A comparison of North Caucasian languages is performed in the article according to various measures of proximity constructed using grammatical, lexical and genetic databases. Statistical methods are applied to the study of correlations among these proximity measures, and also between them and both geographical proximity and genealogical kinship. A full correlation has been found among language kinship, geographic situation and genetic kinship of peoples. Also, a high correlation was found between each of them and lexical similarity. In general these correlations persist at different levels – starting at the whole set of studied languages until the level of the smallest groups of related languages. It is shown that a significant factor in the analysis of geographical situation is the existence of a common boundary between the regions of distribution of languages. Keywords: Various Quantitative Measures, geographical situation common boundary, Creativity, languages 1. INTRODUCTION The classification of languages by genetic kinship, developed in the last two centuries within the framework of historical linguistics applying the comparative historical method, offers a qualitative characteristic of language proximity by including them into macrofamilies, families, branches, groups, etc. Glottochronology provides a quantitative measure of proximity that, in particular, allows assessing the age of families and other language groups. Unfortunately, in many cases there is no consensus among experts about languages kinship; it must be said also that lexicostatistical data are controversial. -
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. -
"Evolution of Human Languages": Current State of Affairs
«Evolution of Human Languages»: current state of affairs (03.2014) Contents: I. Currently active members of the project . 2 II. Linguistic experts associated with the project . 4 III. General description of EHL's goals and major lines of research . 6 IV. Up-to-date results / achievements of EHL research . 9 V. A concise list of actual problems and tasks for future resolution. 18 VI. EHL resources and links . 20 2 I. Currently active members of the project. Primary affiliation: Senior researcher, Center for Comparative Studies, Russian State University for the Humanities (Moscow). Web info: http://ivka.rsuh.ru/article.html?id=80197 George Publications: http://rggu.academia.edu/GeorgeStarostin Starostin Research interests: Methodology of historical linguistics; long- vs. short-range linguistic comparison; history and classification of African languages; history of the Chinese language; comparative and historical linguistics of various language families (Indo-European, Altaic, Yeniseian, Dravidian, etc.). Primary affiliation: Visiting researcher, Santa Fe Institute. Formerly, professor of linguistics at the University of Melbourne. Ilia Publications: http://orlabs.oclc.org/identities/lccn-n97-4759 Research interests: Genetic and areal language relationships in Southeast Asia; Peiros history and classification of Sino-Tibetan, Austronesian, Austroasiatic languages; macro- and micro-families of the Americas; methodology of historical linguistics. Primary affiliation: Senior researcher, Institute of Slavic Studies, Russian Academy of Sciences (Moscow / Novosibirsk). Web info / publications list (in Russian): Sergei http://www.inslav.ru/index.php?option- Nikolayev =com_content&view=article&id=358:2010-06-09-18-14-01 Research interests: Comparative Indo-European and Slavic studies; internal and external genetic relations of North Caucasian languages; internal and external genetic relations of North American languages (Na-Dene; Algic; Mosan). -
Divergence of Altai Macro System Languages and Issues of Their Genetic Relationship O. Sapashev* A. Smailova** B. Zhaksymov
Türkbilig, 2016/31: 109-126. DIVERGENCE OF ALTAI MACRO SYSTEM LANGUAGES AND ISSUES OF THEIR GENETIC RELATIONSHIP O. SAPASHEV* A. SMAILOVA** B. ZHAKSYMOV*** Abstract: Scientists recognize the difficulties associated with final and perfect solution of the problem of origin of the Altai community. The most important issue according to their opinion is a difficulty in differentiation of elements of a possible genetic commonality, the traces of which can be found in all Altaic languages, from the secondary elements of community, developing in different periods of close contacts of various Altaic peoples for at least of two millennia period. Mutual lexical borrowings of not only from single Altaic languages, but also borrowings from non-Altaic languages (the phenomenon of the substrate or super stratum) led to a significant lexical generality of secondary order and gave the reasons for establishment of various kinds of correspondences not relating to common Altaic protolanguage heritage that creates a large difficult to apply comparative- historical method. Keywords: Altaic, macro-system, genetic kinship, language typology, the rudiments Altay Makro Sistemi Dillerinin Farklılıkları ve Onların Genetik İlişkilerine Dair Konular Özet: Altayistik çalışan araştırmacıları, Altay toplumun kökeni sorununun nihai ve mükemmel bir çözümüyle ilişkili olan zorluklar bekler. Araştırmacıların görüşüne göre en önemli konu, olası genetik ortaklık unsurlarının ve Altay dillerinde bulunabilecek izlerin farklılaşması zorluğudur. Bu zorluklar, toplumun ikincil unsurlarından kaynaklanır ve farklı zamanlarda çeşitli Altay topluluklarının en az iki bin yıllık yakın ilişkiler sonucu gelişmiştir. Sadece Altay dilleri ve Altay dilleri dışındaki dillerden karşılıklı sözcük alışverişi (altkatman ve üstkatman olgusu) ikincil seviyede önemli sözcüksel genellemeler ortaya çıkardı ve tarihi-karşılaştırmalı metodun uygulanmasını zorlaştıran ortak proto Altay dil mirasıyla ilgili olmayan bir yapının oluşmasına neden oldu. -
Japanese As an Altaic Language: an Investigation of Japanese Genetic Affiliation Through Biological Findings
JAPANESE AS AN ALTAIC LANGUAGE: AN INVESTIGATION OF JAPANESE GENETIC AFFILIATION THROUGH BIOLOGICAL FINDINGS Yuko Igarashi Department of Linguistics University of Victoria, B.C., Canada 1. INTRODUCTION Japanese is one of the language isolates (Shibatani, 1990). In the 18 th century, however, Sir William Jones hypothesized all languages in the world are derived from a single mother tongue; thus they are genetically related to others (Lamb & Mitchell, 1991). Led by this hypothesis, scholars have engaged in comparing languages systematically to observe their genetic affiliations through the linguistic correspondences between them (Crystal, 1997). The genetic classification of languages in Europe was successfully achieved by their efforts; in addition, they have thought that the methods used to establish the Indo-European language family can be applied to the categorization of other languages (Crystal, 1997; Lehmann, 1992). Based on this hypothesis, scholars have been searching for the genetic affiliation of Japanese for more than a century (Miller, 1991; Vovin, 1994); however, they have not reached any agreement yet. Fujiwara and Ono compared Japanese to Dravidian languages (Martin, 1991). Maruyama researched the possibility of Japanese genetic affiliation to Ma1ayo-PolYnesian (Martin, 1991). Benedict attempted to find evidence for a genetic relationship between Japanese and the Austro-Tai language family (Vovin, 1994). Some scholars such as Chew (1976) and Martin (1996) have explored Japanese genetic affiliation to Korean because they think Japanese is structurally close to Korean. Korean is considered to be another language isolate (Shibatani, 1990); however, Poppe (1965) is of the opinion that Korean may be an Altaic language because it is structurally similar to Japanese and to Altaic and because many of its vocabularies have been successfully compared with Altaic languages. -
Significance Testing of the Altaic Family
Significance testing of the Altaic family Andrea Ceolin University of Pennsylvania Copyright: Diachronica 36:3 (2019), pp. 299–336 issn 0176-4225 | e-issn 1569-9714 © John Benjamins Publishing Company https://doi.org/10.1075/dia.17007.ceo The publisher should be contacted for permission to re-use or reprint this material Abstract Historical linguists have been debating for decades whether the classical comparative method provides sufficient evidence to consider Altaic languages as part of a single genetic unity, like Indo-European and Uralic, or whether the implicit statistical robustness behind regular sound correspondences is lacking in the case of Altaic. In this paper I run a significance test on Swadesh-lists representing Turkish, Mongolian and Manchu, to see if there are regular patterns of phonetic similarities or correspondences among word-initial phonemes in the basic vocabulary that cannot be expected to have arisen by chance. The methodology draws on Oswalt (1970), Ringe (1992, 1998), Baxter & Manaster Ramer (2000) and Kessler (2001, 2007). The results only partially point towards an Altaic family: Mongolian and Manchu show significant sound correspondences, while Turkish and Mongolian show some marginally significant phonological similarity, that might however be the consequence of areal contact. Crucially, Turkish and Manchu do not test positively under any condition.1 Keywords: comparative method, historical linguistics, Altaic, lexicostatistics, Swadesh lists, multilateral comparison 1 Introduction Traditional Altaicists (Ramstedt 1957; Poppe 1960, 1965; Menges 1975; Manaster Ramer & Sidwell 1997) and Nostraticists (Bomhard 1996, 2008, 2011; Dolgoposky 1986; Illič-Svityč 1971; Starostin 1991), and in particular Starostin et al. (2003), have argued that sound correspon- dences among Turkic, Mongolic and Tungusic can be identified through a rigorous application of the classical comparative method. -
Lexicostatistics Applied to the Historical Development of Three Languages of the Philippines
Deseret Language and Linguistic Society Symposium Volume 27 Issue 1 Article 7 3-23-2001 Lexicostatistics Applied to the Historical Development of Three Languages of the Philippines Hans Nelson Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/dlls BYU ScholarsArchive Citation Nelson, Hans (2001) "Lexicostatistics Applied to the Historical Development of Three Languages of the Philippines," Deseret Language and Linguistic Society Symposium: Vol. 27 : Iss. 1 , Article 7. Available at: https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/dlls/vol27/iss1/7 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Journals at BYU ScholarsArchive. It has been accepted for inclusion in Deseret Language and Linguistic Society Symposium by an authorized editor of BYU ScholarsArchive. For more information, please contact [email protected], [email protected]. Lexicostatistics Applied to the Historical Development of Three Languages of the Philippines Hans Nelson or years, historical linguists have able for analysis. Thus the lexicostatistic . attempted to classify language family approach is useful for an analysis of the Frelationships using a variety of meth languages among the islanders of the ods. One such method is lexicostatistics. Philippines, an area only about the size of "Lexicostatistics ... is a technique that allows New Mexico, with roughly eighty-five to one us to determine the degree of relationship hundred known languages. The approach between two languages by comparing the could be effective for at least roughly catego vocabularies of the languages and determin rizing and subgrouping these variants. ing the degree of similarity between them" This paper will use lexicostatistics to look (Crowley 1998, 171). -
Lexical Matches Between Sumerian and Hurro-Urartian: Possible Historical Scenarios
Cuneiform Digital Library Journal 2014:4 <http://www.cdli.ucla.edu/pubs/cdlj/2014/cdlj2014_4.html> © Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative ISSN 1540-8779 Version: 3 December 2014 Lexical Matches between Sumerian and Hurro-Urartian: Possible Historical Scenarios Alexei Kassian Institute of Linguistics of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow Th e paper deals with lexical matches between two ancient Near Eastern languages: Sumerian and Hurrian (Hurro-Urartian); namely, several basic terms (like ‘hand,’ ‘rain,’ etc.), that demonstrate phonetical similarities in both languages, are discussed. Four possible scenarios are evaluated from the typological, etymological and statistical points of view: (1) chance coincidences; (2) lexi- cal borrowings from Sumerian into Hurro-Urartian or vice versa; (3) genetic relationship between Sumerian and Hurro-Urartian; (4) prehistoric language shift : adoption by a Hurro-Urartian (or closely related) group of the Sumerian language or vice versa. Out of these four, two scenarios—lexical borrowings and genetic relationship—are typologically unlikely. Th e statistical probability of chance coincidences is low, although formally this explanation cannot be excluded. Th e fourth scenario—language shift —fi ts linguistic evidence and does not contradict archaeological data. Keywords: Hurrian, Sumerian, Ancient Near East, language contacts, language shift , loanwords, lexicostatistics §1. Introduction a language of the Urartian empire (present-day Armenia §1.1. Th e languages and neighboring areas).2 For the preliterate period, it is §1.1.1. Sumerian is a language spoken in southern Mes- natural to associate the HU people with the Kura-Araxes opotamia (modern Iraq). Its earliest cuneiform attesta- (Early Trans-Caucasian) archaeological culture (Kassian tions date from the late 4th or early 3rd millennium BC, 2010: 423-428 with further references). -
Download This PDF File
Volume 3 Issue 1 INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF HUMANITIES AND June 2016 CULTURAL STUDIES ISSN 2356-5926 North Caucasian languages: comparison of three classification approaches Valery Solovyev Kazan State University, Kazan, Russia [email protected] Abstract In the paper three approaches to reconstruction of languages evolution trees are compared on the material of North Caucasian languages: the expert one (comparative-historical method), lexicostatistics, application of phylogenetic algorithms to databases. It is shown that degree of coherence of different computer solutions is approximately the same as degree of coherence of expert solutions. A new classification of North Caucasian languages is proposed, as a result of applying the consensus method to different known classifications. Keywords: North Caucasian languages, phylogenetic algorithms, evolution trees, linguistic databases, consensus method. http://www.ijhcs.com/index Page 1309 Volume 3 Issue 1 INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF HUMANITIES AND June 2016 CULTURAL STUDIES ISSN 2356-5926 1. Introduction Over the last years comparative linguists have developed language classification methods based on computer-aided calculations of linguistic similarities. Such methods have added substantially to the toolset of comparative linguistics. Methods utilizing computer programs to construct phylogenetic trees are conventionally called “automated”. The most complete overview of the state of affairs in this area is given in Nichols and Warnow (2008). This work is concerned with both the comparison of algorithms for constructing trees and the analysis of attempts to apply them to various language families. In order to determine the possibilities and usefulness of phylogenetic algorithms, it is proposed to test them on data from well-described families with unquestionable structure (benchmark or Gold Standard) and to compare the trees generated by computational algorithms with those obtained in a traditional manner. -
Dictionary of Lexicography
Dictionary of Lexicography Anyone who has ever handled a dictionary will have wondered how it was put together, where the information has come from, and how and why it can benefit so many of its users. The Dictionary of Lexicography addresses all these issues. The Dictionary of Lexicography examines both the theoretical and practical aspects of its subject, and how they are related. In the realm of dictionary research the authors highlight the history, criticism, typology, structures and use of dictionaries. They consider the subjects of data-collection and corpus technology, definition-writing and editing, presentation and publishing in relation to dictionary-making. English lexicography is the main focus of the work, but the wide range of lexicographical compilations in other cultures also features. The Dictionary gives a comprehensive overview of the current state of lexicography and all its possibilities in an interdisciplinary context. The representative literature has been included and an alphabetically arranged appendix lists all bibliographical references given in the more than 2,000 entries, which also provide examples of relevant dictionaries and other reference works. The authors have specialised in various aspects of the field and have contributed significantly to its astonishing development in recent years. Dr R.R.K.Hartmann is Director of the Dictionary Research Centre at the University of Exeter, and has founded the European Association for Lexicography and pioneered postgraduate training in the field. Dr Gregory James is Director of the Language Centre at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, where he has done research into what separates and unites European and Asian lexicography. -
Save the Trees: Why We Need Tree Models in Linguistic Reconstrution (And When We Should Apply Them)
Paper has been accepted for Publication in the Journal of Historical Linguistics. When referring to it before it has officially appeared, please quote as: Jacques, G. and List. J.-M. (2018): Save the trees: Why we need tree models in linguistic reconstrution (and when we should apply them). Journal of Historical Linguistics. Save the Trees: Why We Need Tree Models in Linguistic Reconstruction (and When We Should Apply Them)* Guillaume Jacques and Johann-Mattis List February 26, 2018 Skepticism against the tree model has a long tradition in historical linguistics. Although scholars have emphasized that the tree model and its long-standing counterpart, the wave theory, are not necessarily incompatible, the opinion that family trees are unrealistic and should be completely abandoned from historical linguistics has always enjoyed a certain popularity. This skepticism has further increased with recently proposed techniques for data visualization which seem to confirm that we can study language history without trees. We show that the concrete arguments brought up in favor of anachronistic wave models do not hold. In comparing the phenomenon of incomplete lineage sorting in biology with processes in linguistics, we show that data which does not seem to be resolvable in trees may well be explained without turning to diffusion as an explanation. At the same time, methodological limits in historical reconstruction may easily lead to an overestimation of regularity, which may in turn surface as conflicting patterns when trying to reconstruct a coherent phylogeny. We illustrate how trees can benefit language comparison in several examples, but we also point to their drawbacks in modeling mixed languages. -
The Basque Language: History and Origin1
43 International Journal of Modern Anthropology Int. J. Mod. Anthrop. (2011) 4 : 43 - 59 Available online at www.ata.org.tn ; doi: 10.4314/ijma.v1i4.3 Original Synthetic Report The Basque Language: History and Origin1 John D. Bengtson John D. Bengtson is currently Vice-President of the Association for the Study of Language in Prehistory (ASLIP), and a participant in the Evolution of Human Language Project (Santa Fe Institute). He has published more than 70 articles on historical linguistics and paleolinguistics, and two books: In Hot Pursuit of Language in Prehistory: Essays in the four fields of anthropology (Festschrift in honor of Harold C. Fleming) (2008), and Linguistic Fossils: Studies in Historical Linguistics and Paleolinguistics (2008). Association for the Study of Language in Prehistory, 5108 Credit River Drive, Savage, MN 55378, U.S.A. E-mail: [email protected] Web page: http://jdbengt.net/ ASLIP / Mother Tongue Web page: http://www.aslip.org/ Tower of Babel Web page: http://starling.rinet.ru/main.html Abstract - How do we discover the origin and history (and prehistory) of a language, even when there are no written records of earlier stages? The methods of historical linguistics analyze the following components: Basic vocabulary (lexicon); Morphology (grammar); Phonology (sound system); and Cultural vocabulary (words passed from culture to culture). The first three components tell us about the “genetic” origin of a language, while the fourth, cultural vocabulary, tells us about cultural contacts. The analysis of these components of the Basque language leads to the conclusion that its deep “genetic” lexical and grammatical structure is of Dene- Caucasian origin, while cultural contacts have included Semites, Egyptians, Celts, Germans, as well as the well-known contacts with early Latin (Roman Empire) and later forms of Latin (Romance languages).