Rate of Change: A Closer Look

Dr. John E. McLaughlin mclasutt at brigham.net
Mon Jul 2 16:59:11 UTC 2001


[[I wrote]] <<Today, there are five main phonological changes that separate
Shoshoni from Comanche and make the two mutually incomprehensible without
extensive practice.>>

[[Steve Long wrote]] I'm sorry because I think you may have mentioned this
before - but how did the separation of the Shoshoni and Comanche work?  Did one
separate and move away or did they both migrate to other places?

The Comanche separated from the Shoshoni in central Wyoming and moved south.
The Shoshoni stayed in place.

[[I wrote]] << So we wind up with 75 years of extensive phonological change and
then 75 years of very little phonological change in the same preliterate
language....>>

[[Steve Long wrote]] Actually, one can see this the other way around.  It's the
linguists in the field with preliterate languages that are becoming literate
who are in the best position to discern a difference between what changes and
at what pace in preliterate versus literate languages.  The "rate of change" in
unrecorded languages that were spoken thousands of years ago is obviously not
subject to direct observation.

The Comanche after 1872 were not "becoming literate" in Comanche.  They were
becoming literate in English.  Comanche literacy is a very recent thing,
only starting in the 1950s.  Several recent sound changes in Comanche are
the result of the process of language obsolescence, so post-1950's Comanche
would not be relevant for this discussion.  As far as the unrecorded
languages "thousands of years ago", our observations of rates of change in
very late prehistoric non-literary languages like Comanche, Nahuatl, etc.
during the periods in which they remained non-literaty are absolutely
relevant to what went on in the distant past.  This is exactly what
archeologists and anthropologists do in their fields--observe late
prehistoric cultures in Australia, Namibia, Brazil, etc.--to understand
cultural items and their use that have been found in the buried record.
It's what paleontologists have been doing with dinosaurs for the last
30-some-odd years--examining the behavior and anatomy of modern animals--to
understand the nature of dinosaur behavior and anatomy in order to correct
the errors and misperceptions of the past two centuries.  Judiciously
extrapolating similar situations in the recent past into the distant past is
a well-established and acceptable scientific method.

Regards,
Steve Long

John E. McLaughlin, Ph.D.
Associate Professor, English
Utah State University

Program Director
USU On-Line Linguistics
http://english.usu.edu/lingnet

(435) 797-2738 (voice)
(435) 797-3797 (FAX)
mclasutt at brigham.net



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