Transcript Results in Evolutionary Phonology

19th International Conference on Historical
Linguistics. Session - Kinship Terminologies:
Change and Reconstruction
Between a Kinship Terminological System
and a Phonological System:
Methodological Pathways
toward a New Reconstruction of ProtoIndo-European Kinship
German V. Dziebel, Ph.D.
Arnold Worldwide/Great Russian
Encyclopedia
The Genius of Kinship: The Phenomenon
of Human Kinship and the Global Diversity
of Kinship Terminologies, by German
Dziebel (2007)
Qu ickT ime ™ a nd a
TIF F (U nco mpre ssed ) de com pres sor
are nee ded to s ee th is pi cture .
Synthetic approach to kinship theory
(anthropology, linguistics, psychology, philosophy)
Detailed typological analysis of
2500 kinship vocabularies
Evolutionary analysis
of existing and emerging kinship typologies
Integration with linguistics
and population genetics
Application to first-order language families
Application to Indo-European
Comparison between IE etymologicalnests
in search of overlooked etymological connection
Comparison between different accounts of PIE phonology
(traditional, laryngeal, glottalic)
Comprehensive bibliography of IE kinship
and etymology of kinship terms
Qu i c k Ti m e ™ a n d a
Qu i c k Ti m e ™ a n d a
(Un c o m p re s s e d ) d e c o m p re s s o r
TIF F (Un c o m p re s s e d ) d e c o m p re s s o r TIFa F
re n e e d e d t o s e e th i s p i c t u re .
a re n e e d e d t o s e e th i s p i c t u re .
Comparison between different reconstructions
of PIE kinship and social organization
Kinship terms and
Indo-European linguistics:
Where’s the intrigue?
-
Linguistic “kinship” as a metaphor of a network of formal resemblances
between a group of languages was originally demonstrated on the basis of
terms denoting kin relations.
- Basic vocabulary widely shared among daughter languages
– Rich textual evidence of usage
– The oldest stratum is morphologically complex
– Often contain phonetic aberrancies (e.g., Arm tal HZ instead of expected
**cal under the influence of taygr HB), possibly due to effects of analogical
leveling, borrowing, speech taboos, etc.
Indo-European kinship terms is a
heavily researched lexical field
Next to the linguistic reconstructions of IndoEuropean homeland, the reconstruction of PIE social
organization is the marquee example of the potential
of linguistics to cast light on extralinguistic realities.
Descriptive and analytical monographs and doctoral
dissertations published between 1848 and 2004
33
Synthetic articles devoted exclusively to the reconstruction of
PIE kinship terms published between 1845 and 2004
15
Linguistic items in the ongoing bibliographic project on IE
kinship terms (www.kinshipstudies.org)
2000
In the eyes of linguists, quantity has translated
into quality
“The kinship system of the Indo-Europeans is fairly well
understood.”
Fortson, Indo-European Language and
Culture: An Introduction, 2004, 18
However the picture becomes more complex when anthropologists
try to match reconstructions of PIE kinship with known typologies.
“To the present, however, neither the
original nature of Indo-European
terminologies nor their relation to
prescriptive systems has been
satisfactorily worked out…. The real nature
of proto-Indo-European kinship has yet to
be ascertained.”
Rodney Needham, 1987
The situation is very familiar to Indo-European
historical phonologists: Scholars voiced a
similar criticism of the traditional reconstruction
of PIE stop series as improbable on typological
grounds.
“...No language adds to the pair /t/ ~ /d/ a
voiced aspirate /dh/ without having its
voiceless counterpart /th/... .”
Roman Jakobson, 1957
Kinship terms is a shared “territory”
between anthropology and linguistics
KINSHIP SYSTEMS
ANTHROPOLOGY
AND
TERMINOLOGIES
LINGUISTICS
The old style of interaction between
linguistics in anthropology
INDIVIDUAL
ETYMOLOGIES
ANTHROPOLOGY
INDOEUROPEAN
KINSHIP
ISOLATED ETHNIC
CUSTOMS AND
INSTITUTIONS
LINGUISTICS
In their attempts to interpret PIE kinship,
linguists either blasted anthropological theories
as speculative or cherry-picked them to support
their ideas.
Berthold Delbrück (1889) dismantled the “prehistoric matriarchy
argument” and argued instead that PIE family was of an
extended patriarchal kind.
Paul Friedrich (1966) used the then-famous anthropological
concept of “Crow-Omaha” kinship to reconstruct “Omaha”
terminological equations and patrilineal social groups for PIE.
Emile Benveniste (1969) explained the terminological merging of
“grandfather” and “mother’s brother” (with a parallel extension of
terms for grandchildren to nephews and nieces) as resulting from
the practice of cross-cousin marriage.
Kinds of etymological solutions
No etymology
Formally safe but
semantically impossible
Semantically possible,
formally difficult
Ancient borrowings,
“Nostratic” retentions or
substratum influences
OHG basa FZ
PIE * swesōr Z < *swe
‘one’s own’) + sōr ‘woman’
(Benveniste 1969)
Arm zok‘anc WM
PIE *snusós SW < *sneu‘to tie’ (Fourbee 1993)
PIE *snusós SW < *sūnu‘son’. Originally a
possessive adjective
*sunusós ‘son’s’
(Pedersen 1893).
PIE *snusós SW < North
Caucasian *nŭsA
‘daughter-in-law’, ‘bride’
(Nikolayev, Starostin
1994, 856).
OHG eidam, OEng āþum
OFris āþom DH
PIE *daiwēr ‘husband’s
brother’ < *dai- ‘to split’
(Knobloch 1992)
Lith láigonas WB < PIE
*daiwēr HB (Liden 1897;
Pulju 1995)
PIE *daiwēr < Nostr.
*tajV (Altaic *taju
‘mother’s brother’)
Slav *siŭr-, Skrt syālá- WB
PIE *dhughəter <
*dheugh- ‘to work’
(Pârvulescu 1993)
Lith úošvis WF
Lat amita as “the beloved
one” (Hamp 1982-1983)
PIE *swesōr Z < North
Caucasian *wēsə ‘bride,
wife’ (Nikolayev,
Starostin 1994: 969)
Slav. *stryjĭ FB < *ptruiios
(comp. Lat patruus < pater
F)
Despite the decades of research,
Proto-Indo-European kinship
reconstructions are inconclusive
•
Both pan-Indo-European (PIE) and language-specific forms remain largely obscure in
their morphological and semantic structure.
•
Independent innovations and common legacy are hard to disentangle (e.g., do “Omahatype” equations recorded in various IE dialects reflect a PIE condition or a series of
independent innovations within daughter branches?)
•
Several highly diagnostic kinship positions (FZ, WM, WF, FZS, FZD, MBS, MBD) lack
unambiguous reconstructions.
•
Apparently due to fast and sweeping lexical change, there’re perceivable gaps in the
distribution of IE kinship inventory. E.g., Gk ’ανεψιός ‘cousin’ is different from its most
obvious kin such as Lat nepōs etc. in having a prothetic vowel. Slav **vŭnŭkŭ (<
*anonko-) ‘grandson’ has the prothetic vowel but lacks the final segments invariably
found in the other IE forms. The Greek form is also different from the rest in its meaning,
which falls outside of the variation within this etymological nest (‘grandson; nephew’).
•
Several forms compete for the PIE status (e.g., *atta F dominates in Anatolian, Slavic,
Baltic and Gothic, while reflexes of *pHter are standard terms for ‘father’ in Indo-Iranian,
Greek, Latin, Celtic and the rest of Germanic).
What’s wrong with the current ways of
handling kin terms in PIE
reconstructions
•
As relational nouns, kinship terms cannot be derived from forms with an absolute meaning: some
aunts are “beloved”, others are not.
“‘own dear’ svasaras leaning on the helpful arm of ‘supporting’ bhrātaras, or as dutiful dhughtaras
carrying the milk-pail for ‘protecting’ pataras and ‘wise-ordering’ mātaras” (Wheeler 1890, 171).
•
Interpretations involving two-place predicates such as “to bind,” “to tie,” “to share”, “to separate”, “to
give”) stem from ad hoc ideas about what kinship must entail.
•
Kinship terms are not reconstructed as parts of an evolving system but rather as isolated instances of
invention, remarkable retention or accidental borrowing by language users.
•
Kinship terms are treated as simple instances of existing phonetic laws, rather than as a complex
phonetic, morphological and pragmatic matter from which new laws can be extracted.
•
PIE kinship is reconstructed on the basis of attested forms and meanings mechanically projected into
the past. PIE kinship reconstructions based on systematic etymologizing are not available.
•
Comparative method admits circular logic: phonetic laws are inferred on the basis of
similarities and differences found in etymological nests. But then etymological nests are
constructed on the basis of perceived similarities in sound and meaning.
The new style of interaction between
linguistics in anthropology
LINGUISTIC
TYPOLOGY
ANTHROPOLOGY
INDOEUROPEAN
KINSHIP
HISTORICAL
TYPOLOGY OF
KINSHIP
TERMINOLOGIES
LINGUISTICS
What’s the perspective
from logic and linguistic typology
• Kinship terms are relational nouns.
• Kinship terms are similar to personal pronouns in being egocentric,
deictic and speech-act anchored (comp. body parts are more
syntax-anchored); to proper names in being animate and particular
(grammatically, both 1) either lack a plural or share special plural
markers; 2) make use of the same special possessive marker or as
possessors occupy a different position in syntax than other nouns; 3)
make use of special proprial articles and avoid the use of definitive
articles); 4) occupy similarly high positions in animacy hierarchies; 5)
subject to hypocoristic modifications); to verbs in being predicative
and to body part terms in being inalienably possessed and
morphologically complex (Dzhafarov 1981; Dahl & KoptjevskajaTamm 2001, etc.).
What’s anthropological perspective?
•
Kinship terms form systems of classification.
•
Kinship terminological systems are neatly structured on phonetic, syntactic,
morphological and semantic levels.
– papa, tata, mama, yaya are examples of recurrent phonetic patterns.
– ‘little father’ = FB, ‘little mother’ = MZ are examples of recurrent
morphological patterns.
– ‘father’s brother’ (Swed farbror), ‘mother’s brother’ (Swed morbror) are
“descriptive” constructions illustrating recurrent syntactic patterning.
– FF = mSC, MB = MBS, F = FB, etc. are semantic patterns widely attested
in world languages.
•
Kinship terminological systems evolve along specific typological pathways
(e.g., from Bifurcate Merging to Generational, from Symmetric Prescriptive to
Asymmetric Prescriptive, etc.).
•
It’s possible to isolate synchronic and diachronic universals of kinship
terminologies.
Some diachronic universals
•
The decoupling of kinship and affinity in all generations (away from the
“Dravidian” pole)
•
The progressive loss of intergenerational self-reciprocity (or the collapse of
alternate-generation merging)
•
The progressive simplification of sibling sets (from an 8-term maximum to
1-2-term sets)
•
The progressive emergence of descriptive formations for collateral
categories.
•
The transition from Bifurcate Collateral to Bifurcate Merging, if the original
Bifurcate Collateral was linked to cross-generational self-reciprocity.
•
The formation of “Crow-Omaha” generational skewing as a special case of
the collapse of alternate generation merging.
PIE *mer- ‘brother; affine’
IE *bhrātēr/bhreH2tēr B
Skrt bhrātar B
Lat frāter B, frātria (Festus) BW,
frātrissa (Isidore)
Arm ełbayr B
Goth brōþar B
Slav *bratrŭ B
Gk φρaτηρ ‘a male member of the
clan (φρaτρία)’
Osset aervad ‘brother; clansman’
OIrish bráthair ‘a male member of a
6-generation-deep patrilineage called
IE *mer- ‘affine’
Latv márša (< *martya) BW
Lat marītus H
Lith martì ‘bride, young woman,
daughter-in-law, female affine’
Germ *brūdi- ‘bride’ (< IE *mrūti-)
Alb shemër ‘co-wife, concubine, female
rival’ (< OAlb shemërë < *sm-mer-yā ‘cowife’ or *sub-marīta)
fine’
Diachronic universal
The progressive decoupling of kinship and affinity
*mer- ‘brother; affine’ > *merH2- > *merH2-ter > *mreH2-ter >
*breH2-ter > *bHreH2-ter > *bhreH2-ter > *bhrāter ‘brother’
2
IE *H neptiH- ‘father’s sister; brother’s child (w.s.)’
Lat amita FZ
Lat amita FZ, amitīnus ‘father’s sister’s
son, amitīna ‘father’s sister’s daughter’
Lat. nepōs (< *nepōts) CS (from 4th
century A.D. also ‘nephew’), nepta,
neptis CD
IE *H2nepōt- ‘grandchild; nephew’
Skrt nápāt, náptar CS
Avest napāt, náptar CS, naptī CD
Gk ’ανεψιός ‘cousin’
OLith nepuotis CS, neptė CD,
OIr nia (Gen. niath) ZS, necht ZD
OHG nëvo ZS, nephew’, nift, niftila ‘ZD,
niece’
Slav *netijĭ ‘ZS, nephew’, OCS nestera, Serb
nestera ‘ZD, niece’
Diachronic universal
The progressive loss of intergenerational self-reciprocity
Synchronic universal
Kin terms are subject to hypocoristic reductions common among proper names
*anepta- > *amepta (regressive assimilation) > *amemta (progressive assimilation) >
*ameta (simplification of identical consonants and the removal of a voiced consonant
before a voiceless one) or *ametta (contiguous assimilation) > *ameta > *amita (by Latin
vowel lenition).
Areal isogloss *sukter ‘father’s brother; step-father;
brother’s son; step-son;
Slav *stryjĭ FB
Slav. *stryjĭ FB, *pastrokŭ ‘stepfather,
stepson’/ *pastorka ‘stepdaughter’,
OLith strūjus ‘grandfather, old man’,
strùjus ‘uncle’.
Armenian/Germanic *sukter S, BS
OEng suhterga (-g- stands for a glide) BS,
FBS, Arm ustr S (< *sustr, s- getting lost
before u, i.e. s > h > ø)
PIE *suH2nu- S, Gk υἱός, υἱύς, Toch A se, B
soy S, Skrt sūh ‘parent’, sūsā ‘progenitor’
and Alb gjysh ‘grandfather’
Diachronic universal
The progressive loss of intergenerational self-reciprocity; possibly change
from Bifurcate Collateral to Bifurcate Merging (pater-patruus) in PIE
2
PIE *suk- (comp. *suH - S), *suk-ter > *suk-teriyos > Slav *sustryjĭ,*pa-sustrokŭ > *
Slav *sstryjĭ,*pa-sstrokŭ > *stryjĭ, *pastrokŭ
Conclusions
•
Due to the inherent circularity in the comparative method, new
opportunities may arise from comparing two or more etymological nests
in search of overlooked cognation.
•
Combination of anthropological and linguistic approaches to the historical
changes in kinship terminologies can improve on the criteria used in the
composition of etymological nests.
•
New etymological hypotheses within a selected lexical class can highlight
possible new phonetic laws and morphological regularities.
•
These hypotheses can be further tested across all etymological nests.
•
Ultimately, a successful reconstruction of PIE kinship involves
phonetically, morphologically and semantically plausible etymologies
organized into a systematically evolving system that has its place in
global diachronic and synchronic typologies.
Bibliography
Global Kinship Bibliography:
http://kinshipstudies.org/?page_id=4
Indo-European kinship bibliography
http://kinshipstudies.org/?page_id=7