African weeks
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Daniel F. McCall
Abstract
Hal Fleming and I were colleagues and friends in the Anthropology Department and the African Studies Center at Boston University for years and remained close after retirement. We had even co-taught a course one year trying to establish a diachronic anthropology. The four fields of American Anthropology are the basis for whatever diachronic dimension is attainable in the study of non-literate peoples. Hal is better steeped in Linguistics and Genetics than I, so I will not try to match him there, but this story of a culture-complex that runs through many millennia is one I know he enjoys. He had heard it before, but it has never been previously published.
The planetary week as a culture-complex is traced from its origins in Babylonia, through the cultures of the Mediterranean Basin, and eventually to its development in the Akan cultures of the Guinea Coast of West Africa.
Abstract
Hal Fleming and I were colleagues and friends in the Anthropology Department and the African Studies Center at Boston University for years and remained close after retirement. We had even co-taught a course one year trying to establish a diachronic anthropology. The four fields of American Anthropology are the basis for whatever diachronic dimension is attainable in the study of non-literate peoples. Hal is better steeped in Linguistics and Genetics than I, so I will not try to match him there, but this story of a culture-complex that runs through many millennia is one I know he enjoys. He had heard it before, but it has never been previously published.
The planetary week as a culture-complex is traced from its origins in Babylonia, through the cultures of the Mediterranean Basin, and eventually to its development in the Akan cultures of the Guinea Coast of West Africa.
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Foreword ix
- Acknowledgments xiii
- Photographs xv
- Works of Harold Crane Fleming xix
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Part I. African peoples
- Geography, selected Afro-Asiatic families, and Y chromosome lineage variation: An exploration in linguistics and phylogeography 3
- A dental anthropological hypothesis relating to the ethnogenesis, origin, and antiquity of the Afro-Asiatic language family: Peopling of the Eurafrican-South Asian triangle IV 17
- African weeks 25
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Part II. African languages – synchronic studies
- Gender distinction and affirmative copula clauses in Zargulla 39
- Riddling in Gidole 49
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Part III. African languages – Classification and prehistory
- Lexicostatistical comparison of Omotic languages 57
- The primary branches of Cushitic: Seriating the diagnostic sound change rules 149
- Erosion in Chadic 161
- On Kunama ukunkula 'elbow' and its proposed cognates in Nilo-Saharan languages 169
- The problem of pan-African roots 189
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Part IV. Languages of Eurasia, Oceania, and the Americas
- Some thoughts on the Proto-Indo-European cardinal numbers 213
- Some Old World experience of linguistic dating 223
- The languages of Northern Eurasia: Inference to the best explanation 241
- Slaying the Dragon across Eurasia 263
- Trombetti: The forefather of Indo-Pacific 287
- Otomanguean loan words in Proto-Uto-Aztecan maize vocabulary? 309
- Historical interpretations of geographical distributions of Amerind subfamilies 321
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Part V. Human origins, Language origins, and Proto-Sapiens language
- Current topics in human evolutionary genetics 343
- A wild 50,000-year ride 359
- Can Paleolithic stone artifacts serve as evidence for prehistoric language? 373
- The origin of language: Symbiosism and symbiomism 381
- Some speculations on the evolution of language, and the language of evolution 401
- The age of Mama and Papa 417
- The millennial persistence of Indo-European and Eurasiatic pronouns and the origin of nominals 439
- General index 465
- Index of languages and languages families 471
- Index of scholars discussed 475
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Foreword ix
- Acknowledgments xiii
- Photographs xv
- Works of Harold Crane Fleming xix
-
Part I. African peoples
- Geography, selected Afro-Asiatic families, and Y chromosome lineage variation: An exploration in linguistics and phylogeography 3
- A dental anthropological hypothesis relating to the ethnogenesis, origin, and antiquity of the Afro-Asiatic language family: Peopling of the Eurafrican-South Asian triangle IV 17
- African weeks 25
-
Part II. African languages – synchronic studies
- Gender distinction and affirmative copula clauses in Zargulla 39
- Riddling in Gidole 49
-
Part III. African languages – Classification and prehistory
- Lexicostatistical comparison of Omotic languages 57
- The primary branches of Cushitic: Seriating the diagnostic sound change rules 149
- Erosion in Chadic 161
- On Kunama ukunkula 'elbow' and its proposed cognates in Nilo-Saharan languages 169
- The problem of pan-African roots 189
-
Part IV. Languages of Eurasia, Oceania, and the Americas
- Some thoughts on the Proto-Indo-European cardinal numbers 213
- Some Old World experience of linguistic dating 223
- The languages of Northern Eurasia: Inference to the best explanation 241
- Slaying the Dragon across Eurasia 263
- Trombetti: The forefather of Indo-Pacific 287
- Otomanguean loan words in Proto-Uto-Aztecan maize vocabulary? 309
- Historical interpretations of geographical distributions of Amerind subfamilies 321
-
Part V. Human origins, Language origins, and Proto-Sapiens language
- Current topics in human evolutionary genetics 343
- A wild 50,000-year ride 359
- Can Paleolithic stone artifacts serve as evidence for prehistoric language? 373
- The origin of language: Symbiosism and symbiomism 381
- Some speculations on the evolution of language, and the language of evolution 401
- The age of Mama and Papa 417
- The millennial persistence of Indo-European and Eurasiatic pronouns and the origin of nominals 439
- General index 465
- Index of languages and languages families 471
- Index of scholars discussed 475
