The Definition and Significance of Linguistic Areas: Methods, Pitfalls, and Possibilities (with Special Reference to the Validity of South Asia as a Linguistic Area)

Singh, Rajendra; Dasgupta, Probal

doi:10.1515/9783110245264.205

Cited by 22 publications

(5 citation statements)

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“…The inclusive-exclusive distinction is brought forth, at times, in discussions on "South Asia as a linguistic area" (e.g. Southworth 1974;Emeneau 1980;Masica 1991Masica , 2001. Among the IA languages, at least the following languages have been mentioned in the literature as having this distinction: Marathi, Gujarati, Sindhi, some Rajasthani varieties, and the Tirupati dialect of Saurashtra (Southworth 1974;Emeneau 1980;Masica 1991Masica , 2001Osada 2004).…”

Section: Kinnauri Kinnauri Pahari 1pli Kiʃa Taːmɔri 1ple Niŋo Aːmɔrimentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Southworth 1974;Emeneau 1980;Masica 1991Masica , 2001. Among the IA languages, at least the following languages have been mentioned in the literature as having this distinction: Marathi, Gujarati, Sindhi, some Rajasthani varieties, and the Tirupati dialect of Saurashtra (Southworth 1974;Emeneau 1980;Masica 1991Masica , 2001Osada 2004). In the same vein, it has been pointed out that all three varieties of Marathi, Kannada and Urdu spoken in the Kupwar village exhibit this distinction, where Marathi is suggested…”

Section: Kinnauri Kinnauri Pahari 1pli Kiʃa Taːmɔri 1ple Niŋo Aːmɔrimentioning

confidence: 99%

“…); other ST languages retain their indigenous path of grammaticalization. Returning to Kinnauri and Kinnauri Pahari, once again, we find that while the two languages have become more similar with regard to the mechanism used, to have influenced Kannada and Urdu (Gumperz and Wilson 1971).23 The presence of this distinction in IA is generally assumed to reflect an areal feature, with Dravidian as the most likely source (Masica 1991).24 Further, all the IA languages with the inclusive-exclusive distinction discussed in the literature exhibit the same path in developing this distinction, where they are said to have reanalyzed the reflexive pronoun as the inclusive form (Masica 2001;Osada 2004). LaPolla (2005) presents an overview of the inclusive-exclusive distinction in ST languages based on an examination of 170 languages.…”

Section: 22mentioning

confidence: 99%

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The Linguistic Landscape of the Indian Himalayas

Saxena¹

2022

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Section: Kinnauri Kinnauri Pahari 1pli Kiʃa Taːmɔri 1ple Niŋo Aːmɔrimentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Kinnauri Kinnauri Pahari 1pli Kiʃa Taːmɔri 1ple Niŋo Aːmɔrimentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: 22mentioning

confidence: 99%

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The Linguistic Landscape of the Indian Himalayas

Saxena¹

2022

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“…a system of definite and indefinite articles (English 'the' versus 'a', Spanish 'el/la' versus 'un(a)', Hungarian 'a(z)' versus 'egy') [10]. Detecting such areas is challenging and problem-ridden [2,3,[11][12][13], as they are the result of a number of complex historical processes that are difficult to reconstruct. How can we find geographical areas where languages have been in contact using empirical data and statistical inference?…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Contact-tracing in cultural evolution: a Bayesian mixture model to detect geographic areas of language contact

Ranacher

Neureiter

Gijn

et al. 2021

J. R. Soc. Interface.

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When speakers of different languages interact, they are likely to influence each other: contact leaves traces in the linguistic record, which in turn can reveal geographical areas of past human interaction and migration. However, other factors may contribute to similarities between languages. Inheritance from a shared ancestral language and universal preference for a linguistic property may both overshadow contact signals. How can we find geographical contact areas in language data, while accounting for the confounding effects of inheritance and universal preference? We present sBayes , an algorithm for Bayesian clustering in the presence of confounding effects. The algorithm learns which similarities are better explained by confounders, and which are due to contact effects. Contact areas are free to take any shape or size, but an explicit geographical prior ensures their spatial coherence. We test sBayes on simulated data and apply it in two case studies to reveal language contact in South America and the Balkans. Our results are supported by findings from previous studies. While we focus on detecting language contact, the method can also be used to uncover other traces of shared history in cultural evolution, and more generally, to reveal latent spatial clusters in the presence of confounders.

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“…a system of definite and indefinite articles (English "the" vs "a", Spanish "el/la" vs "un(a)", Hungarian "a(z)" vs "egy") [36]. Detecting such areas is challenging and problem-ridden [45,10,59,5,66], as they are the result of a number of complex historical processes that are difficult to reconstruct. How can we find geographical areas where languages have been in contact using empirical data and statistical inference?…”

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confidence: 99%

Contact-tracing in cultural evolution: a Bayesian mixture model to detect geographic areas of language contact

Ranacher

Neureiter

Gijn

et al. 2021

Preprint

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When speakers of two or more languages interact, they are likely to influence each other: contact leaves traces in the linguistic record, which in turn can reveal geographic areas of past human interaction and migration. However the complex, multi-dimensional nature of contact has hindered the development of a rigorous methodology for detecting its traces. Specifically, other factors may contribute to similarities between languages. Inheritance (a property is passed from an ancestor to several descendant languages), and universal preference (a property is universally preferred), may both overshadow contact signals. How can we find geographic contact areas in language data, while accounting for the confounding effects of inheritance and universal preference? We present sBayes, an algorithm for Bayesian clustering in the presence of confounding effects. The algorithm learns which similarities in a set of features are better accounted for by confounders, and which are due to contact effects. Contact areas are free to take any shape or size, but an explicit geographic prior ensures their spatial coherence. We test the clustering method on simulated data and apply it in two case studies to reveal language contact in South America and the Balkans. Our results are supported by ---mostly qualitative--- findings from previous studies. While we focus on the specific problem of language contact, the method can also be used to uncover other traces of shared history in cultural evolution, and more generally, to reveal latent spatial clusters in the presence of confounders.

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The Definition and Significance of Linguistic Areas: Methods, Pitfalls, and Possibilities (with Special Reference to the Validity of South Asia as a Linguistic Area)

Cited by 22 publications

References 0 publications

The Linguistic Landscape of the Indian Himalayas

The Linguistic Landscape of the Indian Himalayas

Contact-tracing in cultural evolution: a Bayesian mixture model to detect geographic areas of language contact

Contact-tracing in cultural evolution: a Bayesian mixture model to detect geographic areas of language contact

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