Morpheme replacement

[manaster at umich.edu]

----------------------------Original message----------------------------
Actually, Swadesh himself did point out that different parts of teh list
change at different rates. I believe Dyen did some later work on this.
In a diffeent way, by producing an ordering acc. to likelihood of
replacement but without giving any paercentages, Dolgopol'skij addressed
essentially the same question in the early 60's.  But, of course, a
number of examples have been cited which show that there is no single
universal rate, even one by Swadesh himself, though I think he simply
argued that suche xamples are very rare--which may be true.
 
Alexis MR
 
On Mon, 13 Oct 1997, Mikael Parkvall wrote:
 
> If I remember correctly, the items on the Swadesh list were said by Swadesh
> himself to be replaced at a rate of about 15 per milennium. Does anybody on
> the list have any idea regarding the differences between various types of
> items; in other words, would lexical morphemes be replaced at a higher rate
> than grammatical ones (not just those on the Swadesh list, but also bound
> morphemes), or vice versa? Or is there no difference at all between them?
>
>
> Mikael Parkvall
> parkvall at ling.su.se
>
>