Visualizing the Boni dialectswith Historical Glottometry

Abstract

This paper deals with the historical relations between dialects of Boni, a Cushitic language of Kenya and Somalia. Boni forms the subject of Volume 10 of the Language and Dialect Atlas of Kenya (Heine & Möhlig 1982). Heine presents evidence for three subgroups within Boni, as well as several areas of convergence between dialects belonging to different proposed subgroups. In reviewing his evidence, I find that two of the three splits are not supported by the data, and therefore his conclusions on convergence must also be reinterpreted. Given the presence of numerous intersecting isoglosses, the tree diagram is an inappropriate model for describing the relations between Boni dialects, and I turn to Historical Glottometry (Kalyan & François 2018) to provide a visualization of the data.

Kesalingmengertian dalam Rumpun Bahasa Lamaholot di Pulau Lembata

“…Gambar 1. Peta bahasa-bahasa di Pulau Lembata Jika kita telusuri penelitian lain, maka hasil pembagian yang dilakukan Wurm dan Hattori (1983) berbeda dengan Elias (2017) yang menggunakan metode historical glottometry mengelompokkan bahasa-bahasa Lamaholot ke dalam kelompok bahasa yang disebut Kedang-Lamaholot, dengan kelompok besarnya, yaitu Flores-Lembata (Wurm dan Hattori 1983). Kemudian ia secara spesifik membagi Lamaholot menjadi Lamaholot Timur-Barat dan Lamaholot Tengah.…”

“…Mengikuti Wurm dan Hattori (1983) dan Elias (2017), Edwards dan UBB 1 (2018) memetakan bahasa-bahasa di Flores Timur dan Lembata dalam 13 kelompok bahasa dengan kemiripan leksikal lebih dari 80%, menggunakan kosakata yang dikumpulkan oleh Keraf (1978). Adapun bahasa-bahasa tersebut adalah Lamaholot Lewotobi, Pukaunu, Lamaholot Ile Mandiri, Lamaholot Adonara, Kawela, Ile Ape, Lebatukan, Lembata Tengah, Labalekan, Lamalera, Painara, Lamatuka, dan Lewoeleng (Lihat gambar 2) Solor, Adonara, dan Lembata dianggap saling mengerti.…”

“…Pengelompokan dan klasifikasi setiap bahasa yang dilakukan oleh para peneliti sebelumnya yaitu: Wurm dan Hattori (1983), Elias (2017)…”

Interrogating the Egypto-Sudanic Arabic Connection

“…The method accomplishes this by integrating the key dialectological notion of the isogloss with the comparative method's focus on the common innovation, and labors to produce a diachronically interpretable measure of the relative strengths of multiple potential classificatory units revealed by analysis of a given dataset. Such an approach has been called for previously in the study of Arabic dialects (for a forcefully argued articulation, see Magidow 2017), and Historical Glottometry in particular has fruitfully filled this role in the examination of Boni dialect linkages (Elias 2019) and the Sogeram language family (Daniels et al 2019), among others. I offer a preliminary application of the method here not as a route to a definitive classificatory model, but instead as an exploratory exercise into new views which may inform future analysis of the Egypto-Sudanic data, failing the identification of a meaningful macro-level relationship based in shared migration history.…”