Erosion in Chadic
-
Herrmann Jungraithmayr
Abstract
The Chadic language family in the Central Sudan is comparable to a landscape the surface of which consists of plains, valleys and mountain ridges. Some areas were more resistant than others against the forces of erosion. Different degrees of hardness and resistibility caused languages to preserve or reduce the original substance with regard to lexicon or grammar of an individual language or the entire language group. Chadic with its ca. 130–150 languages is probably the one branch of Hamitosemitic (Afroaasiatic) which has been subject to the strongest transformational processes in which erosion, i.e., attrition of language material in space and time, played a dominant role. The paper presents numerous examples illustrating different stages of progressive erosion which may characterize the nature of Chadic linguistic history.
Abstract
The Chadic language family in the Central Sudan is comparable to a landscape the surface of which consists of plains, valleys and mountain ridges. Some areas were more resistant than others against the forces of erosion. Different degrees of hardness and resistibility caused languages to preserve or reduce the original substance with regard to lexicon or grammar of an individual language or the entire language group. Chadic with its ca. 130–150 languages is probably the one branch of Hamitosemitic (Afroaasiatic) which has been subject to the strongest transformational processes in which erosion, i.e., attrition of language material in space and time, played a dominant role. The paper presents numerous examples illustrating different stages of progressive erosion which may characterize the nature of Chadic linguistic history.
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- 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
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- 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
