LINGUIST List 5.963

Tue 06 Sep 1994

Disc: Altaic

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Message 1: Altaic, Pronouns, and Mischsprachen

Date: Sun, 4 Sep 94 16:18:25 EDTAltaic, Pronouns, and Mischsprachen
From: <amrzeus.cs.wayne.edu>
Subject: Altaic, Pronouns, and Mischsprachen

Boy, you really have to be careful on Linguist. In trying to clarify my position on Altaic pronouns, I have now run afoul of the fans of Mischsprachen,. who note that such examples as Copper Island Aleut and Shelta could be treated as mixed languages, and so the term borrowing may be inappropriate there. True enough! The point, however, is that there is no indication at all that the relatedness b etween the pronominal systems of Turkic, Mongolic, (Manchu-) Tungusic, Korean, and Japanese (or shall we say Nipponic?) is due to at least four of these being Mischsprachen or mixed languages (OR having borrowed said pronouns in the conventional sense) anymore than there is any such indication in the case of the various Indo-European or Semitic or Austronesian or Mon-Khmer or Uralic .... pronominal systems. This is so even if we are willing to admit that borrowing of pronouns and the phenomenon of mixed languages are both possible in general. The point is simply that to believe in Altaic you do NOT have to reject such borrowing/mixing possibilities a priori. There is simply no evidence for them in this case, and none has ever been cited to my knowledge. Plus the sound correspondences among these languages are no different in the case of pronouns than in the case of lexical items generally (although there may be some irregularities such as we find in the pronouns of ANY language family).

I hope that statement does finally satisfy every objection, but am prepared for the next batch just in case, whatever they may be.

Borrowing of Pronouns

I have also received a bunch of mail about my remarks on the borrowing of pronous, pointing that borrowed pronouns ( or at any rate words referring to the speaker and the hearer, whether they really are pronouns or not) are quite common in SE Asia. What I meant when I said borrowing of pronouns, while attested, is rare is that the replacement of native pronouns by borrowed ones is rare. As far as I know (and this was pointed out in the 1960's by Dolgopolsky) the typical SE Asian situation involves borrowing of foreign forms (which are typically NOT pronouns at least in the source language) but retention of the native ones as well (with differentiation along social, pragmatic, etc., lines) as in Malay-Indonesian where Sanskritic saya is used for 'I' but the native Austronesian forms also continue to flourish. So even in SE Asia I think that total replacement of native pronouns by borrowed stuff is quite rare.

Message 2: Altaic Network

Date: Tue, 6 Sep 1994 07:30:51 -Altaic Network
From: "Reinhard <rhahnu.washington.edu>
Subject: Altaic Network

I am reposting my proposal, because the questionnaire part at the end did not get copied in the edited version. To assure consistency of information, please use the "form." Thank you. Below is a repeat of the entire message.

There has been talk of a "turning tide" and a "reemergence of interest" in the course of our discussion about the Altaic Hypothesis. Now that the public part of our discussion seems to be dying down, it might be a good time to try and gauge the extent and depth of interest in Altaic linguistics "out there," starting with people who have access to e-mail. I am proposing a networking attempt with the ultimate aim of linking as many people interested in Altaic linguistics as possible. This may eventually result in a number of specialist discussion groups as well as in a general group, formal or informal, public or private.

To get the ball rolling, I am willing to compile a general list of interested persons. I will distribute the list (with periodical updates) only to those who wish to be listed themselves. To assure the highest possible level of anonymity and discretion, I will only enter people's names, e-mail addresses, interests and language specializations. If you wish to be a part of the network, please "fill out" the following and return it to rhahnu.washington.edu by September 30, 1994 (at which time I hope to finalize and send out the first version of the list). Any suggestions are welcome.

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PROPOSED ALTAIC LINGUISTICS E-MAIL NETWORK

I supply the following as shared information to be used in a list to be distributed to other persons interested in participating in discussions and in sharing information about "Altaic" (Turkic, Mongolic, [Manchu-] Tungusic, Korean, Japanese, and possibly other) languages with the Altaic Hypothesis as the common focus.

Given Name(s)/First Name(s): Surname/Last Name: E-Mail Address:

Special Interest(s):

Expectation(s):

Relevant Language(s) Studied:

Preferred Language(s) of Communication: