IE "Urheimat" and evidence from Uralic linguistics

Stanley Friesen sarima at friesen.net
Fri Feb 25 05:52:58 UTC 2000


At 08:05 PM 2/15/00 +0000, petegray wrote:

> I mean that creolisation / language mixing or whatever you call it provides
>us with an example of a language which goes back to two ancestors, not one.

I am not sure that it actually does, though.  I remember reading
(second-hand) about a study done of the English-based creoles of the
various islands in the Pacific.  The result, as it was presented to me, was
that applying standard reconstruction techniques recovered something close
to the dialect of English prevalent among English sailors in the 18th
century - not a hybrid of English and Polynesian.

Does anybody here remember the study? Is my understanding of it correct?

--------------
May the peace of God be with you.         sarima at ix.netcom.com



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