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--></style><title>Farmers and language
dispersals</title></head><body>
<div><font face="Times" size="+1" color="#000000">Dear
All,</font></div>
<div><font face="Times" size="+1" color="#000000"><br></font></div>
<div><font face="Times" size="+1" color="#000000">If you have not yet
seen or heard of it, let me mention Jared Diamond and Peter Bellwood's
"Farmers and their languages: the first expansions" (SCIENCE
vol 300, 25 April 2003) (available also on www.sciencemag.org, at
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/300/5619/597, if you
have access). </font></div>
<div><font face="Times" size="+1" color="#000000"><br></font></div>
<div><font face="Times" size="+1" color="#000000">My hunch is that
many mainstream historical linguists and specialists in various
language families will find much to disagree with in this paper; my
question is, is anyone intending a letter to SCIENCE in response?
(I am not able to respond myself. If anyone is really
interested, a paper of mine responding to major claims is
available on the departmental website here:
http://www.ling.canterbury.ac.nz/lyle-pubs.html</font></div>
<div><font face="Times" size="+1" color="#000000">[In press.
What drives linguistic diversity? <i> Language-Farming
Dispersals</i>, ed. by Colin Renfrew and Peter Bellwood. Cambridge:
McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research.]) I am surprised
and somewhat sorry that Peter Bellwood, one of the authors of the
Science paper and an editor of the volume where my paper will appear,
did not take into account the serious problems pointed out there for
the hypotheses advocated in this Science piece.</font></div>
<div><font face="Times" size="+1" color="#000000"><br></font></div>
<div><font face="Times" size="+1" color="#000000">Best,
Lyle</font></div>
<div><font face="Times" size="+1" color="#000000"><br></font></div>
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