LINGUIST List 5.992

Fri 16 Sep 1994

Disc: Altaic

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Message 1: Binary Comparison

Date: Thu, 08 Sep 1994 06:30:42 Binary Comparison
From: Matthew Dryer <LINDRYERubvms.cc.buffalo.edu>
Subject: Binary Comparison

Last week, Richard Alderson asked the following questions, which I think have only been partially answered in the discussion on LINGUIST: "Who are these linguists whom G & R see as the enemy and the anti-Altaicists see as supports? And how have they concluded that a binary comparison is reasonable?"

Unlike the situation with Altaic, where some people have specifically advocated examining only two languages at a time, the situation in the Americas is simply one of actual practice rather than ideology. Namely, the earlier literature on the classification of languages in the Americas is full of instances of binary comparisons, either between two languages (cf. Silver 1964 on Shasta and Karok; Jacobsen 1958 on Washo and Karok), or between one language and a postulated group (cf. Haas 1965 on Kutenai and Algonquian; Newman 1965 on Zuni and California Penutian; Radin 1916 on Huave and Mixe), or between two postulated groups (cf. Haas 1958 on Algonquian and Gulf; Freeland 1930 on Mixe and Penutian; Olson 1964, 1965 on Chipaya and Mayan) (all references here from the bibliography to Greenberg's book). In none of these cases were people advocating binary comparison; rather, it was the case that they simply had access to or expertise in the pairs in question. It is this binary tradition in the Americas that Greenberg (and Ruhlen) have been critical of. Their argument is that such comparisons are analogous to comparing Swedish and Bulgarian, or Swedish and South Slavic, or North Germanic and South Slavic: the relevance of such pairs only makes sense within the context of comparison of Indo-European languages as a whole. From the perspective of Greenberg's classification, a number of these comparisons have led to classificatory errors, such as Chipayan as a branch of Penutian, or pseudo-groupings, like so-called Macro-Algonquian (consisting of Algonquian-Ritwan and Gulf), both of which made their way into Voegelin and Voegelin (1977) and the latter of which is still cited occasionally in typological studies as the family to which some language belongs. Greenberg's argument is that the resemblances noted in these binary comparisons may be valid but they may only reflect higher level groupings to which the items compared ultimately belong but that in at least the two cases just noted do not reflect genetic groups.

While arguments can be given that the comparisons in question are not quite analogous to hypothetical cases like Swedish and South Slavic, the main point is that the practice of binary comparisons in the Americas that Greenberg is critical of is quite distinct from the ideology of binary comparison apparently espoused by some anti-Altaicists. In fact, I doubt that few if any of Greenberg's detractors today would argue with Greenberg's point about binary comparison, particularly as it applies to Chipayan as a branch of Penutian or "Macro-Algonquian" since neither of these are hypotheses that anybody that I am aware of still believes. Their primary argument with multilateral comparison is not whether it is necessary, but whether it is sufficient.

Matthew Dryer

Message 2: Altaic (End of the Controversy)

Date: Thu, 8 Sep 94 21:24:23 EDTAltaic (End of the Controversy)
From: <amrjupiter.cs.wayne.edu>
Subject: Altaic (End of the Controversy)

In reviewing the discussion on Altaic, I just noticed that no one seems to have responded to a question posed early on by John Koontz, who points out that Comrie supposedly says somewhere that Turkic, Mongolic, and (Manchu-)Tungusic do not form a unit but may perhaps belong together with IE, Uralic, etc., in a grouping larger than Altaic, namely, Nostratic.

I have not read the relevant passage of Comrie's, but if he meant thereby to deny the validity of the Altaic reconstruction, then I think he was wrong. On the other hand, as noted by Vovin in our discussion, the true Altaic situation seems to be that Turkic, Mongolic, and (Manchu-)Tungusic do nOT form a unit on their own but only with Japanese and Korean.

As to the relation to Nostratic, the main advocate of this theory, Vladimir M. Illich-Svitych, did express some doubts about Altaic as a unit himself, suggesting that perhaps Turkic, Mongolic, and (Manchu-)Tungusic were daugthers of Nostratic. This was because his reconstrtructions of Altaiuc and Nostratic were very similar.

However, if we accept the new look of Nostratic proposed in Manaster Ramer (in press), then we ipso facto must assume that Nostratic and Altaic phonologies were different (Nostratic would have had initial clusters which survived in Proto-IE and Proto-Kartvelian but were reduced elsewhere, incl. Proto-Altaic), and I think other arguments for Altaic as a valid intermediate level between Nostratic and the more recent languages can be found. There seem, for example, to be numerous Altaic etyma which probably do not goback to Nostratic.

However, it is perfectly possible for an older stage in a linguistic prehistory to be more certain than a more recent one, and so I would not be unwilling to say that Nostratic is a more certain grouping than Altaic, although in reality I don't think that this is the case. (In case this sounds paradoxical, consider that Indo-European is a more certain grouping than are most of the proposed groupings immediately below it, such as Balto-Slavic).

Having said this, I think that there is little more to say about the Altaic hypothesis. While much remains to be done, I was pleased that no one (on LINGUIST anyway) seems to want to defend the tired old pseudo-arguments against it, so the discussion would seem to be over. I do believe, as I pointed out some time ago and as John Koonts (sorry, Koontz) also seems to suggest, that there is a connection with Nostratic in the sense that the same people tend to object to both theories, and I of course would be open to a discussion of Nostratic--about which even stranger tales are told than about Altaic. -- Manaster Ramer, A. in press. Clusters or affricates in Nostratic and Kartvelian? Diachronica.