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AE links to civilizations in the Americas?
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[QUOTE]Originally posted by XicanConnection: [QB] [QUOTE]Explain how, various letters of Olmec script closely ressemble those found on the Proto-Saharan artifacts![/QUOTE] The linguistic arguments seems to be mixing up two different claims. On the other hand, the argument of numerous correspondences of words is an argument for a genetic relationship between Olmecs and Mande. However, as I'll quote below, random correspondences- no matter how many-- are not probative of genetic relationships. The usual methods used by linguists are either or both 1) a systematic comparison of standard 100 or 200 word lists of words that tend to last a long time compiled by Swadesh; 2) a comparison of similar grammatical structures (systems of pronouns, agglutination, subject -verb orders, declensions, etc.. [i]The followig from a standard textbook on historical linguistics[/i] R. L. Trask. 1996. Historical Linguistics. London: Arnold. p. 219-222. [Problems in identifying genetic resemblances-- borrowing] [Urdu, Swahili, Turkish, Arabic similarities-- due to prestige of Arabic] In this case, the borrowing took place in historical times, and it is trivial matter to identify these numerous loan words and to exclude them from consideration. But loan words are not always so easy to identify. There is no reason to doubt that the borrowing of words has been going on for as long as human beings have had two different languages to speak. Hence, some loan words have been present in the borrowing languages so long that they are almost indistinguishable from native words. Identifying such ancient loans is thus a crucial issue: if we inadvertently accept several dozen ancient loans as native words, we may be fatally misled into seeing a genetic link where none exists. p. 220. The best way of coping with this problem, when searching for possible genetic links, is to confine ourselves to what I called basic vocabulary in Chapter 2: pronouns, grammatical words, body-part names, the lower numerals, and other high frequency items which are not often borrowed, while words like ‘news’, ‘book’, and ‘service’ are far more likely to be borrowed. Hence, if we can’t find any evidence of a genetic link when comparing the basic vocabularies of two candidate languages, we should be rather suspicious if we then stumble across apparent ‘cognates’ with meanings like ‘chariot’, ‘caterpillar’, ‘stocking’, or ‘bronze’: they might very well be ancient loans. There is another potential pitfall, which looks innocuous at first glance. But which has in practice often produced monumental confusion among linguists who were not sufficiently aware. ... Table 8.13 [b]Hawaiian[/b].....[b]ancient Greek[/b] <OL TYPE=1> [*]aeto ‘eagle’..... aetos ‘eagle’ [*]noonoo ‘ thought’..... nous ‘ thought’ [*]manao ‘think’..... manthano ‘learn’ [*]mele ‘sing’..... melos ‘ melody’ [*]lahui ‘people’..... laos ‘ people’ [*]meli ‘honey’..... meli ‘honey’ [*]kau ‘summer’..... kauma ‘heat’ [*]mahina ‘month’..... men ‘moon’ [*]kia ‘pillar’..... kion ‘pillar’ [*]hiki ‘come’..... hikano ‘arrive’ </OL> ... The explanation is this: we are looking at a bunch of pure coincidences. Entirely by chance, Hawaiian and Greek happen to have settled on some words which are very similar in form and meaning. That’s all there is to it: no Greeks in the Pacific, no Hawaiian migrations from Greece, nothing interesting at all- just pure chance. It is possible that you find this very hard to believe. Many people with little experience in comparative linguistics are incredulous when they are told that such impressive-looking lists are the result of sheer coincidence; they protest indignantly, ‘But this just can’t be coincidence. Look at the words for “honey” they are absolutely identical! There must be another explanation.’ .... Well, sorry, but they are wrong. Every language has thousands of meanings to provide forms for , and only a small number of speech-sounds to construct these forms, and hence, by the ordinary laws of probability, any arbitrary languages will always exhibit a number of such coincidences-- maybe only eight or ten, maybe dozens, depending chiefly on how similar their phonologies are and how willing you are to accept some pair of words as similar. ... There are two things you can do. First, we can insist on systematic correspondences and deny the value of mere resemblances. This is what most historical linguists do: aware that mere resemblances can always be the result of chance, they assign full weight only to systematic correspondences, which (once loan words have been excluded) can result only from a genetic relationship. Second, we can apply statistical tests to our data.. To see whether we have anything more than we would expect by chance alone. Both of these are good policies. But, whatever we do, we must not allow ourselves to be persuaded that a mere list of arbitrary and unsystematic resemblances, however long, by itself constitutes persuasive evidence of anything. It is sad to report that a number of linguists have failed to grasp this elementary point and have as a result squandered their careers in collecting lists of resemblances among whichever languages have caught their eye (always with success, or course). They have proudly announced their ‘findings’ and declared them to be evidence of an ancient link between the languages they are looking at, and they are baffled and hurt when no one pays attention. [/QB][/QUOTE]
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