TheAustric languagesare a proposed language family that includes theAustronesian languagesspoken inTaiwan,Maritime Southeast Asia,thePacific Islands,andMadagascar,as well asKra–DaiandAustroasiatic languagesspoken inMainland Southeast AsiaandSouth Asia.A genetic relationship between these language families is seen as plausible by some scholars, but remains unproven.[1][2]
| Austric | |
|---|---|
| (proposed) | |
| Geographic distribution | Southeast Asia,Pacific Islands,South Asia,East Asia,Madagascar |
| Linguistic classification | Proposed language family |
| Subdivisions |
|
| Language codes | |
| Glottolog | None |
 | |
Additionally,Hmong–Mien languagesare included by some linguists, and evenJapanesewas speculated to be Austric in an early version of the hypothesis byPaul K. Benedict.[3]
History
editThe Austric macrofamily was first proposed by the German missionaryWilhelm Schmidtin 1906. He showedphonological,morphological,andlexicalevidence to support the existence of an Austric phylum consisting ofAustroasiaticandAustronesian.[4][a]Schmidt's proposal had a mixed reception among scholars of Southeast Asian languages, and received only little scholarly attention in the following decades.[5]
Research interest into Austric resurged in the late 20th century,[6]culminating in a series of articles by La Vaughn H. Hayes, who presented a corpus of Proto-Austric vocabulary together with a reconstruction of Proto-Austric phonology,[7]and by Lawrence Reid, focussing on morphological evidence.[8]
Evidence
editReid (2005) lists the following pairs as "probable" cognates betweenProto-AustroasiaticandProto-Austronesian.[9]
| Gloss | ashes | dog | snake | belly | eye | father | mother | rotten | buy |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Proto-Austroasiatic | *qabuh | *cu(q) | *[su](l̩)aR | *taʔal/*tiʔal | *mə(n)ta(q) | *(qa)ma(ma) | *(na)na | *ɣok | *pə[l̩]i |
| Proto-Austronesian | *qabu | *asu | *SulaR | *tiaN | *maCa | *t-ama | *t-ina | *ma-buRuk | *beli |
Among the morphological evidence, he compares reconstructed affixes such as the following, and notes that sharedinfixesare less likely to be borrowed (for a further discussion of infixes in Southeast Asian languages, see also Barlow 2022[10]).[11]
- prefix *pa- 'causative' (Proto-Austroasiatic, Proto-Austronesian)
- infix *-um- 'agentive' (Proto-Austroasiatic, Proto-Austronesian)
- infix *-in- 'instrumental' (Proto-Austroasiatic), 'nominalizer' (Proto-Austronesian)
Below are 10 selected Austric lexical comparisons byDiffloth(1994), as cited inSidwell&Reid(2021):[12][13]
| Gloss | Proto-Austroasiatic | Proto-Austronesian |
|---|---|---|
| ‘fish’ | *ʔaka̰ːʔ | *Sikan |
| ‘dog’ | *ʔac(ṵə)ʔ | *asu |
| ‘wood’ | *kəɟh(uː)ʔ | *kaSi |
| ‘eye’ | *ma̰t | *maCa |
| ‘bone’ | *ɟlʔaːŋ | *CuqelaN |
| ‘hair’ | *s(ɔ)k | *bukeS |
| ‘bamboo rat’ | Khmudəkən | Malaydəkan |
| ‘molar’ | Khmerthkìəm | Malaygərham |
| ‘left’ | p-Monic*ɟwiːʔ | *ka-wiʀi |
| ‘ashes’ | Stieng*buh | *qabu |
Extended proposals
editThe first extension to Austric was first proposed Wilhelm Schmidt himself, who speculated about including Japanese within Austric, mainly because of assumedsimilarities between Japanese and the Austronesian languages.[14]While the proposal about a link between Austronesian and Japanese still enjoys some following as a separate hypothesis, the inclusion of Japanese was not adopted by later proponents of Austric.
In 1942,Paul K. Benedictprovisionally accepted the Austric hypothesis and extended it to include theKra–Dai (Thai–Kadai) languagesas an immediate sister branch toAustronesian,and further speculated on the possibility to include theHmong–Mien (Miao–Yao) languagesas well.[15]However, he later abandoned the Austric proposal in favor of an extended version of theAustro-Tai hypothesis.[16]
Sergei Starostinadopted Benedict's extended 1942 version of Austric (i.e. including Kra–Dai and Hmong–Mien) within the framework of his larger Dené–Daic proposal, with Austric as a coordinate branch toDené–Caucasian,as shown in the tree below.[17]
| Dene-Daic |
| |||||||||
Another long-range proposal for wider connections of Austric was brought forward byJohn Bengtson,who groupedNihaliandAinutogether withAustroasiatic,Austronesian,Hmong–Mien,andKra–Daiin a "Greater Austric" family.[18]
Reception
editIn the second half of the last century,Paul K. Benedictraised a vocal critique of the Austric proposal, eventually calling it an 'extinct' proto-language.[19][16]
Hayes' lexical comparisons, which were presented as supporting evidence for Austric between 1992 and 2001, were criticized for the greater part as methodologically unsound by several reviewers.[20][21]Robert Blust,a leading scholar in the field of Austronesian comparative linguistics, pointed out "the radical disjunction of morphological and lexical evidence" which characterizes the Austric proposal; while he accepts the morphological correspondences between Austronesian and Austroasiatic as possible evidence for a remote genetic relationship, he considers the lexical evidence unconvincing.[22]
A 2015 analysis using theAutomated Similarity Judgment Program(ASJP) did not support the Austric hypothesis. In this analysis, the supposed "core" components of Austric were assigned to two separate, unrelated clades: Austro-Tai and Austroasiatic-Japonic.[23]Note however that ASJP is not widely accepted among historical linguists as an adequate method to establish or evaluate relationships between language families.[24]
Distributions
edit-
Distribution ofAustroasiatic languages -
Distribution ofAustronesian languages -
Distribution ofKra–Dai languages -
Distribution ofHmong–Mien languages
See also
editNotes
edit- ^The terms "Austroasiatic" and "Austronesian" were in fact both coined by Schmidt. The previous common designations "Mon-Khmer" and "Malayo-Polynesian" are still in use, but each with a scope that is more limited than "Austroasiatic" and "Austronesian".
References
edit- ^Reid (2009).
- ^Blust (2013),pp. 696–703.
- ^van Driem (2001),p. 298.
- ^Schmidt (1906).
- ^Blust (2013),p. 697.
- ^Shorto (1976),Diffloth (1990),Diffloth (1994).
- ^Hayes (1992),Hayes (1997),Hayes (1999),Hayes (2000),Hayes (2001).
- ^Reid (1994),Reid (1999),Reid (2005).
- ^Reid (2005),p. 150–151.
- ^Barlow, Russell. 2022.Infix preservation and loss in Southeast Asia: Typological and areal factors.Presentation given at the 31st Annual Meeting of the Southeast Asian Linguistics Society (SEALS 31),University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa,May 18–20, 2022. (slides)
- ^Reid (2005),p. 146.
- ^Sidwell, Paul; Reid, Lawrence A. (2021). "Language macro-families and distant phylogenetic relations in MSEA".The Languages and Linguistics of Mainland Southeast Asia.De Gruyter. pp. 261–276.doi:10.1515/9783110558142-015.ISBN9783110558142.S2CID238653052.
- ^Diffloth, Gérard. 1994. The lexical evidence for Austric, so far.Oceanic Linguistics33(2): 309–322.
- ^Schmidt (1930).
- ^Benedict (1942).
- ^abBenedict (1991).
- ^Cited invan Driem (2005),p. 309
- ^Bengtson, John D. (2006)."A Multilateral Look at Greater Austric".Mother Tongue.11:219–258.
- ^Benedict (1976).
- ^Reid (2005),p. 134.
- ^Blust (2013),pp. 700–703.
- ^Blust (2013),pp. 703.
- ^Jäger (2015),p. 12754.
- ^Cf. comments by Adelaar, Blust and Campbell inHolman (2011).
Works cited
edit- Benedict, Paul K. (1942)."Thai, Kadai, and Indonesian: A New Alignment in Southeastern Asia".American Anthropologist.4(44): 576–601.doi:10.1525/aa.1942.44.4.02a00040.
- ——— (1976). "Austro-Thai and Austroasiatic". In Jenner, Philip N.; Thompson, Laurence C.; Starosta, Stanley (eds.).Austroasiatic Studies, Part I.Oceanic Linguistics Special Publications. Honolulu: University of Hawaiʻi Press. pp. 1–36.JSTOR20019153.
- ——— (1991). "Austric: An 'Extinct' Proto-language". In Davidson, Jeremy H. C. S. (ed.).Austroasiatic Languages: Essays in Honour of H. L. Shorto.London: School of Oriental and African Studies. pp. 7–11.
- Blust, Robert (2013).The Austronesian Languages(revised ed.). Australian National University.hdl:1885/10191.ISBN978-1-922185-07-5.
- Diffloth, Gerard (1990)."What Happened to Austric?"(PDF).Mon-Khmer Studies.16–17: 1–9.
- ——— (1994). "The lexical evidence for Austric so far".Oceanic Linguistics.33(2): 309–321.doi:10.2307/3623131.JSTOR3623131.
- van Driem, George (2001).Languages of the Himalayas.Vol. 1. Leiden: BRILL.ISBN9004120629.
- ——— (2005)."Sino-Austronesian vs. Sino-Caucasian, Sino-Bodic vs. Sino-Tibetan, and Tibeto-Burman as default theory"(PDF).In Yadava, Yogendra P. (ed.).Contemporary Issues in Nepalese Linguistics.Linguistic Society of Nepal. pp. 285–338.ISBN978-99946-57-69-8.
- Hayes, La Vaughn H. (1992)."On the Track of Austric, Part I: Introduction"(PDF).Mon-Khmer Studies.21:143–77.
- ——— (1997)."On the Track of Austric, Part II: Consonant Mutation in Early Austroasiatic"(PDF).Mon-Khmer Studies.27:13–41.
- ——— (1999)."On the Track of Austric, Part III: Basic Vocabulary Correspondence"(PDF).Mon-Khmer Studies.29:1–34.
- ——— (2000). "The Austric Denti-alveolar Sibilants".Mother Tongue.5:1–12.
- ——— (2001). "On the Origin of Affricates in Austric".Mother Tongue.6:95–117.
- Holman, Eric W. (2011)."Automated Dating of the World's Language Families Based on Lexical Similarity"(PDF).Current Anthropology.52(6): 841–875.doi:10.1086/662127.hdl:2066/94255.S2CID60838510.
- Jäger, Gerhard (2015)."Support for linguistic macrofamilies from weighted sequence alignment".PNAS.112(41): 12752–12757.Bibcode:2015PNAS..11212752J.doi:10.1073/pnas.1500331112.PMC4611657.PMID26403857.
- Reid, Lawrence A. (1994)."Morphological evidence for Austric"(PDF).Oceanic Linguistics.33(2): 323–344.doi:10.2307/3623132.hdl:10125/32987.JSTOR3623132.
- ——— (1999). "New linguistic evidence for the Austric hypothesis". In Zeitoun, Elizabeth; Li, Paul Jen-kuei (eds.).Selected Papers from the Eighth International Conference on Austronesian Linguistics.Taipei: Academia Sinica. pp. 5–30.
- ——— (2005). "The current status of Austric: A review and evaluation of the lexical and morphosyntactic evidence". In Sagart, Laurent; Blench, Roger; Sanchez-Mazas, Alicia (eds.).The peopling of East Asia: putting together archaeology, linguistics and genetics.London: Routledge Curzon.hdl:10125/33009.
- ——— (2009). "Austric Hypothesis". In Brown, Keith; Ogilvie, Sarah (eds.).Concise Encyclopaedia of Languages of the World.Oxford: Elsevier. pp. 92–94.
- Schmidt, Wilhelm (1906). "Die Mon–Khmer-Völker, ein Bindeglied zwischen Völkern Zentralasiens und Austronesiens ('[The Mon–Khmer Peoples, a Link between the Peoples of Central Asia and Austronesia')".Archiv für Anthropologie.5:59–109.
- ——— (1930). "Die Beziehungen der austrischen Sprachen zum Japanischen ('The connections of the Austric languages to Japanese')".Wiener Beitrag zur Kulturgeschichte und Linguistik.1:239–51..
- Shorto, H. L. (1976). "In Defense of Austric".Computational Analyses of Asian and African Languages.6:95–104.
- Solnit, David B. (1992). "Japanese/Austro-Tai By Paul K. Benedict (review)".Language.68(1): 188–196.doi:10.1353/lan.1992.0061.ISSN1535-0665.S2CID141811621.
Further reading
edit- Blazhek, Vaclav. 2000. Comments on Hayes "The Austric Denti-alveolar Sibilants". Mother Tongue V:15-17.
- Blust, Robert.1996. Beyond the Austronesian homeland: The Austric hypothesis and its implications for archaeology. In: Prehistoric Settlement of the Pacific, ed. by Ward H.Goodenough,ISBN978-0-87169-865-0DIANE Publishing Co, Collingdale PA, 1996, pp. 117–137. (Transactions of the American Philosophical Society 86.5. (Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society).
- Blust, Robert. 2000. Comments on Hayes, "The Austric Denti-alveolar Sibilants". Mother Tongue V:19-21.
- Fleming, Hal. 2000. LaVaughn Hayes and Robert Blust Discuss Austric. Mother Tongue V:29-32.
- Hayes, La Vaughn H. 2000. Response to Blazhek's Comments. Mother Tongue V:33-4.
- Hayes, La Vaughn H. 2000. Response to Blust's Comments. Mother Tongue V:35-7.
- Hayes, La Vaughn H. 2000. Response to Fleming's Comments. Mother Tongue V:39-40.
- Hayes, La Vaughn H. 2001. Response to Sidwell. Mother Tongue VI:123-7.
- Larish, Michael D. 2006.Possible Proto-Asian Archaic Residue and the Statigraphy of Diffusional Cumulation in Austro-Asian LanguagesArchived2018-07-03 at theWayback Machine.Paper presented at the Tenth International Conference on Austronesian Linguistics, 17–20 January 2006, Puerto Princesa City, Palawan, Philippines.
- Ostapirat, Weera. 2018. "Macrophyletic Trees of East Asian Languages Re examined."InLet's Talk about Trees,ed. by Ritsuko Kikusawa and Lawrence A. Reid. Osaka: Senri Ethnological Studies, Minpaku.doi:10.15021/00009007.Archived2024-04-14 at theWayback Machine
- Reid, Lawrence A. 1996. The current state of linguistic research on the relatedness of the language families of East and Southeast Asia. In: Ian C. Glover and Peter Bellwood, editorial co-ordinators, Indo-Pacific Prehistory: The Chiang Mai Papers, Volume 2, pp. 87–91. Bulletin of the Indo-Pacific Prehistory Association 15. Canberra: Australian National University.
- Sidwell, Paul. 2001. Comments on La Vaughn H. Hayes' "On the Origin of Affricates in Austric". Mother Tongue VI:119-121.
- Van Driem, George. 2000. Four Austric Theories. Mother Tongue V:23-27.
External links
edit- Glossary of purported lexical links among Austronesian and Austroasiatic languages
- Austronesian Basic Vocabulary Database:Austronesian,Tai–Kadai,Hmong–Mien,Austro-Asiaticword lists