Language

1. Language 言語ユニット

2. Language as Element of Cultural Diversity • 6000+ Languages spoken today, not including dialects • 1500+ Spoken in Sub-Saharan Africa alone • 400+ in New Guinea alone • 100+ in Europe • However, this diversity is diminishing: • 2000+ Threatened or Endangered Languages

6. Language families • The Indo-European language family • Largest most wide-spread family • Spoken on all continents • Subfamilies—Romance, Slavic, Germanic, Indic, Celtic, and Iranic • Seven Indo-European tongues are among the top 10 languages spoken in the world

7. Which languages share a common ancestor? Some Indo-European Shared Words Many Indo-European languages have common words for snow, winter, spring; for dog, horse, cow, sheep bear but not camel, lion, elephant, or tiger; for beech, oak, pine, willow, but not palm or banyan tree.

8. Indo-European Language Family (50% of World) • Main Branches: • Germanic - Dutch, German • Romance - Spanish, French • Baltic-Slavic - Russian • Indo-Iranian - Hindu, Bengali

9. Indo-European Language Family - Germanic Branch • West Germanic • English (514 million) • German (128) • Dutch (21) • East Germanic • Danish (5) • Norwegian (5) • Swedish (9)

10. Germanic Branch - Icelandic Iceland colonized by Norwegians in AD 874. Largely unchanged because of isolation. .

11. Germanic Branch - English Diffused throughout the world by hundreds of years of British colonialism. Brought to New World by British colonies in 1600s. Has become an important global lingua franca.

12. Development of English • Germanic Tribes (Germany/Denmanrk) • Jutes • Angles • Saxons • Vikings (Norway) • 9th - 11th Centuries • Normans (French) • Battle of Hastings, 1066 • French was official language for 150 years.

13. Development of English - Adopted Words • Germanic Tribes (Germany/Denmark) • kindergarten, angst, noodle, pretzel • Vikings (Norway) • take, they, reindeer, window • Normans (French) • renaissance, mansion, village, guardian

14. Indo-European Language Family - Romance Branch • Like English these languages have been spread by Colonialism. • Spanish (425 million) • Portuguese (194) - most in Brazil • French (129) • Italian (62) • Romanian (26)

15. Indo-European Family - Romance Branch The Roman Empire, at its height in 2nd century A.D., extinguished many local languages. After the fall of Rome in the 5th century, communication declined and languages evolved again. • Literature was all written in Latin until the 13th and 14th centuries. • Dante Alighieri’s 1314 Inferno written in vulgar latin(Florentine).

16. major language families • Altaic language family • Includes Turkic, Mongolic, and several other subgroups • Homeland lies largely in deserts, tundras, and coniferous forests of northern and central Asia • Uralic family • Finnish and Hungarian are the two most important tongues • Both have official status in their countries

17. Language families • The Afro-Asiatic family • Has two major divisions—Semitic and Hamitic • Semitic covers the area from Tigris-Euphrates valley westward through most of the north half of Africa to the Atlantic coast • Large area but consists of mostly sparsely populated deserts • Arabic is the most widespread Semitic language • Hebrew was a “dead” language used only in religious ceremonies • Amharic a third major Semitic tongues has 20 million speakers in the mountains of East Africa

18. Language families • The Afro-Asiatic family • Has two major divisions—Semitic and Hamitic • Smaller number of people speak Hamitic languages • Share North and East Africa with Semitic speakers • Spoken by the Berbers of Morocco and Algeria • Spoken by the Tuaregs of the Sahara and Cushites of East Africa • Originated in Asia but today only spoken in Africa • Expansion of Arabic decreased the area and number of speakers

19. Language Families of Africa Fig. 5-14: The 1,000 or more languages of Africa are divided among five main language families, including Austronesian languages in Madagascar.

20. Afro-Asiatic Language Family • Main Branch: • Semitic • Arabic(256) • Language of the Koran; spread by Islamic Faith and Islamic (Ottoman) Empires • Hebrew (5) • Language of the old Testament (with Aramaic); completely revived from extinction in Israel, 1948.

21. proto-Bantu peoples originated in Cameroon-Nigeria • They spread throughout southern Africa AD 1 - 1000 • Bantu peoples were agriculturalists who used metal tools • Khoisan peoples were hunter-gatherers and were no match for the Bantu. • Pygmies adopted Bantu tongue and retreated to forest • Hottentots and Bushmen retained the clicks of Khoisan languages Niger-Congo Diffusion

22. LanguageComplexity In Nigeria ethnic conflict between southern Ibos and western Yoruba led the government to move the capital to a more neutral central location (Abuja). Many other ethnic battles rage continuously. In Switzerland, four official languages, a history of peace and tolerance, and a political system that puts power in the hands of local leaders ensure peace. Nigeria has more than 200 individual languages!

23. major language families • Africa south of the Sahara Desert is dominated by the Niger-Congo family • Spoken by about 200 million people • Greater part of the Niger-Congo culture region belongs to the Bantu subgroup • Includes Swahili—the lingua franca of East Africa

24. Sino-Tibetan language family • One of the major language families of the world • Extends throughout most of China and Southeast Asia • Han Chinese is spoken in a variety of dialects as a mother tongue by 836 million people • Han serves as the official form of speech in China

25. Sino-Tibetan Language Family (20%) • Branches: • Sinitic - Mandarin (1075),Cantonese (71), • Austro-Thai (77) - Thai, Hmong • Tibeto-Burman - Burmese (32) Chinese languages based on 420 one syllable words with meaning infered from context and tone.

26. Chinese Spoken … • Languages or dialects • Mandarin (about 850 million), • followed by Wu (90 million), • Min (70 million) and • Cantonese (70 million). • Most of these groups are mutually unintelligible, • Chinese is classified as a macrolanguage with 13 sub-languages in (Wikipedia)

27. major language families • Japanese/Korean language family • Another major Asian family with nearly 200 million speakers • Seems to have some kinship to both the Altaic and Austronesian

28. major language families • Austro-Asiatic language family • Found in Southeast Asia, Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, and spoken by some tribal people of Malaya and parts of India • Occupies a remnant peripheral domain • Has been encroached upon by Sino-Tibetan, Indo-European, and Austronesian

29. major language families • Occupy refuge areas after retreat before rival groups • Khoisan — found in the Kalahari Desert of southwestern Africa, characterized by clicking sounds • Dravidian — spoken by numerous darker-skinned people of southern India and northern Sri Lanka • Basque — spoken on the borderland between Spain and France is unrelated to any other language in the world

30. Austronesian diffusion • Presumed hearth in the interior of Southeast Asia 5,000 years ago • Initially spread southward into the Malay Peninsula • In a process lasting several thousand years, people sailed in tiny boats across the. uncharted vast seas to New Zealand, Easter Island, Hawaii, and Madagascar • Sailing and navigation was the key to Austronesian spread, not agriculture

31. Austronesian language family • Most remarkable language family in terms of distribution • Speakers live mainly on tropical islands • Ranges from Madagascar, through Indonesia and the Pacific Islands, to Hawaii and Easter Island • Longitudinal span is more than half way around the world • Latitudinally, ranges from Hawaii and Taiwan in the north to New Zealand in the south • Largest single language in this family is Indonesian —5O million speakers • Most widespread language is Polynesian

32. Austronesian diffusion • The remarkable diffusion of the Polynesian people • Form the eastern part of the Austronesian culture region • Occupy hundreds of Pacific islands in a triangular-shaped realm • New Zealand, Easter Island, and Hawaii form the three apexes of the realm • Made a watery leap of 2,500 miles from the South Pacific to Hawaii • Used outrigger canoes • Went against prevailing winds into a new hemisphere with different navigational stars • No humans had previously found the isolated Hawaiian Islands • Sailors had no way of knowing that land existed in the area

34. Austronesian diffusion • Geographers John Webb and Gerard Ward studied the prehistoric Polynesian diffusion • Their method involved the development of a computer model building in data on: • Winds • Ocean currents • Vessel traits and capabilities • Island visibility • Duration of voyage, etc. • Both drift and navigated voyages were considered

35. Searching for the primordial tongue • Using controversial techniques, linguists seek the more elusive prehistoric tongues • Nostratic—ancestral speech of the Middle East 12,000 to 20,000 years ago • Ancestral to nine modern language families • A 500-word dictionary has been compiled • Contemporary with Nostratic were other ancient tongues including Dene-Caucasian

37. The environment provides refuge • Inhospitable environments offer protection and isolation • Provide outnumbered linguistic groups refuge from aggressive neighbors • Linguistic refuge areas • Rugged bill and mountain areas • Excessively cold or dry climates • Impenetrable forests and remote islands • Extensive marshes and swamps • Unpleasant environments rarely attract conquerors • Mountains tend to isolate inhabitants of one valley from another

38. Examples of linguistic refuge areas • Rugged Caucasus Mountains and nearby ranges in central Eurasia are populated by a large variety of peoples • Alps, Himalayas, and highlands of Mexico are linguistic shatter belts — areas where diverse languages are spoken • American Indian tongue Quechua clings to a refuge in the Andes Mountains of South America • In the Rocky Mountains of northern New Mexico, an archaic form of Spanish survives due to isolation that ended in the early 1900s

40. Examples of linguistic refuge areas • The Dhofar, a mountain tribe in Oman, preserve Hamitic speech that otherwise has vanished from Asia • Tundra climates of the far north have sheltered certain Uralic, Altaic, and Inukitut (Eskimo) speakers • On Sea Islands, off the coast of South Carolina and Georgia, some remnant of an African language, Gullah, still are spoken

41. Switzerland • Switzerland has four recognized national languages: French, German, Italian, and Romansch. • Romansch, a language of Latin origin, is spoken by only 1.1% of the population.

42. Switzerland • Nevertheless, it has survived in the alpine linguistic refuge of the upper Rhine and Inn Rivers and was given official recognition in 1938.

43. The environment guides migration • Mountain barriers frequently serve as linguistic borders • In part of the Alps, speakers of German and Italian live on opposite sides of a major ridge • Portions of mountain rim along the northern edge of the Fertile Crescent form the border between Semitic and Indo-European tongues

44. Linguistic Ecology • Today environmental isolation is no longer the linguistic force it once was • Inhospitable lands and islands are reachable by airplanes • Marshes and forests are being drained and cleared by farmers • The world is interactive

45. Ethnolinguistic Groups in the Caucasus Region

46. English dialects in the United States • Dialects reveal a vivid geography • American English is hardly uniform from region to region • At least three major dialects, corresponding to major culture regions, developed in the eastern United States by the time of the American Revolution • Northern • Midland • Southern

48. English dialects in the United States • The three subcultures expanded westward and their dialects spread and fragmented • Retained much of their basic character even beyond the Mississippi River • Have distinctive vocabularies and pronunciations • Drawing dialect boundaries is often tricky

50. English dialects in the United States • Today, many regional words are becoming old-fashioned, but new words display regional variations • The following words are all used to describe a controlled-access divided highway • Freeway — a California word • Turnpike and parkway — mainly northeastern and Midwestern words • Thruway, expressway, and interstate