IntroChinLing ST/ 1 Bartos THE SINO-TIBETAN LANGUAGE FAMILY 汉藏语系 1. General information – has the 2nd largest native speaker community (after the Indo-European family): > 1.1 billion; acc. to some estimations: cca. 250–300 independent languages – many cases of uncertainty in relationships ( ← few of these lg’s have writing systems, and many of those are not phonetic + genetic vs. areal effects) – longer written tradition: Chinese (cca. 3500 yrs), Tibetan 藏语 (cca. 1300 yrs), Burmese 缅 甸语 (cca. 900 yrs) – cultural split: Indosphere – Sinosphere (acc. to the dominant culture) - synthetic/agglutinative - analytic/isolating - polisyllabic - monosyllabic - non-tonal - tonal 2. The basis of genetic affiliation 2.1. Cognate words, phonetic reconstruction – greatest obstacle: few written sources outside Chinese and Tibetan + non-phonetic Chinese script OLD CHINESE WRITTEN TIBETAN WRITTEN BURMESE MEANING *ngag 我 nga Na 'I' *s´m 三 gsum su^m 'three' *ngag 五 lnga Na^ 'five' *mj´k 目 mig mjak 'eye' *ngjag 鱼 nya Na^ 'fish' *khwin 犬 khyi khwe 'dog' *srat 杀 bsat sat 'kill' *sjin 薪 shing sac '(fire)wood' *mjing 名 ming ´-man) ’name’ *khag 苦 kha kha^ ’bitter’ 2.2. Typological similarities – but see the Indosphere ~ Sinosphere cut (above) – basic word order? TB: SOV, Sinitic: SVO – classifers? – looks like an areal feature (Korean, Japanese, Vietnamese: yes, many TB lgs: no) – reduplication? – not widespread in the Indosphere 3. Various views on the internal structure of the family 3.1. The ‘standard’ view (Benedict … Matisoff) IntroChinLing ST/ 2 Bartos Sino-Tibetan CHINESE /SINITIC TAI -KADAI /KAM -THAI HMONG -MIEN 汉语 壮侗语族 苗瑶语族 – Zhuang 壮语 – Miao 苗语 – Thai 泰语 – Yao 瑶语 – Dai 傣语 … – Lao 老挝语 TIBETO -BURMAN – Shan 掸语 藏缅语族 … Kamarupan Himalayan Qiang Kachin Lolo-Burmese Baic Karen – Kuki-chin – Tibetan 藏语 – Qiang 羌语 – Kachin – Loloish ( yi) 彝语 – Bai – Karen -naga – Lepcha – Muya (Jingpaw) – Burmese 白语 克伦语 – Bodo-garo – Newari – Pumi 普米 景颇 缅甸语 – Tani – Tamang – Namuyi – Mikir – Gurung – rGyalrong – Meithei … 嘉戎 … … – Li Fang-Kuei ( 李方桂), Luo Changpei ( 罗常培): the Hmong-Mien and Tai-Kadai lgs belong here, but Karenic doesn’t – Benedict: Sino-Tibetan → Chinese + Tibeto-Karen; the Hmong-Mien and Tai-Kadai lgs belong to the Austronesian family 3.2. “Like fallen leaves”: Van Driem’s Sino-Bodic theory – primary basis: (i) Old Chinese and Old Tibetan morphological similarities, (ii) genetic and archeological evidence – Chinese: just a subbranch within TB, closest to the Bodic lgs – proto-TB homeland: present-day Sichuan 四川 (up to 10,000 B.C.) – first split: Western TB ( → neolithic cultures in India) ~ Eastern TB – second split: Eastern TB → Northern TB → NE-TB → Yangshao 仰韶 neol. cult. → Chinese NW-TB → Majiayao 馬家窰 neol. cult. → Bodic → Southern TB → Lolo-Burmese, Karenic, Qiangic, etc. 3.3. Sino-Austronesian: L. Sagart – different variants: does or doesn’t include TB – based on sound correspondences among (alleged) cognates in the Swadesh- and Swadesh- Yakhontov lists (of the most basic word-stock) + morphological regularities IntroChinLing ST/ 3 Bartos PROTO -AUSTRONESIAN OLD CHINESE TIBETO -BURMAN MEANING *punuq *nuk 脑 (s-)nuk ’brain’ *qiCeluR *c ´-lo(r?) 卵 twiy ’egg’ *-kut *m-khut 掘 kot (Jingpaw ) ’dig’ *nunux *nok 乳 nuw ’(fem.) breast’ *uRung *k-rok 角 rung ’horn’ *kurung *k ´-rong 笼 krungH ’cage’ Reading: LaPolla, R. 2006. Sino-Tibetan languages. http://www.latrobe.edu.au/linguistics/staff/Data/LaPolla/PublicationItems/Papers/STLanguag es.pdf Further literature: Benedict, Paul. (1972), Sino-Tibetan: A Conspectus . (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge) Hale, A. (1982), Research on Tibeto-Burman Languages (Berlin) Li Fang-Kuei. (1973), 'Languages and Dialects of China'. Journal of Chinese Linguistics 1 : 1-13 Ma Xueliang (1991), A General Introduction to Sino-Tibetan Languages . (Beijing University Press, Beijing) Matisoff, J.A. (2003), Handbook of Proto-Tibeto-Burman . (Univ. of California Press, Berkeley & L.A.) Sagart, L. (1993), Chinese and Austronesian: evidence for a genetic relationship. Journal of Chinese Linguistics 21 : 1–62. Shafer, Robert. (1966/1974), Introduction to Sino-Tibetan (Wiesbaden) van Driem, G. (1997), Sino-Bodic. Bulletin of the SOAS 60 : 455–488. van Driem, G. (1999), A new theory on the origin of Chinese. Bulletin of the Indo-Pacific Prehistory Association 18 : 43–58. STEDT: http://stedt.berkeley.edu/index.html .