27.1503, Review: Historical Ling; Ling Theories; Phonology: Voyles, Barrack (2015)

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Subject: 27.1503, Review: Historical Ling; Ling Theories; Phonology: Voyles, Barrack (2015)

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Date: Thu, 31 Mar 2016 13:43:17
From: Nicholas Zair [naz21 at cam.ac.uk]
Subject: On Laryngealism

 
Discuss this message:
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Book announced at http://linguistlist.org/issues/26/26-4746.html

AUTHOR: Joseph  Voyles
AUTHOR: Charles  Barrack
TITLE: On Laryngealism
SUBTITLE: A Coursebook in the History of a Science
SERIES TITLE: LINCOM Coursebooks in Linguistics 23
PUBLISHER: Lincom GmbH
YEAR: 2015

REVIEWER: Nicholas Zair, University of Cambridge

Reviews Editor: Robert Arthur Cote

SUMMARY

The book “On Laryngealism” by Joseph Voyles and Charles Barrack is about the
‘laryngeal theory’, and a brief summary of the main points of this theory is
required before turning to the review itself. The theory posits the
reconstruction of three phonemes in Proto-Indo-European (PIE) which do not
survive as such in any of the Indo-European languages. They are conventionally
represented as *h1, *h2 and *h3; the name ‘laryngeals’ is also conventional
and does not imply any particular phonetic characteristics. The most direct
evidence for the laryngeals comes from the Anatolian language family, where
one or perhaps two appear written as < h > in some phonetic environments. The
evidence for the existence of three of them comes partly from their colouring
effects on an adjacent *e, such that *h1e- gives *e , *h2e- gives *a- and
*h3e- gives *o-. However, at the price of accepting a rather haphazard system
of morphophonological ablaut in PIE, many of these apparent instances of
colouring could instead be explained as instances of phonemic /a/ and /o/
rather than coloured *e. Perhaps the best evidence for the existence of three
laryngeals comes from Greek, where the reflexes of laryngeals between
obstruents, and laryngeals following syllabic sonorants, result in three
different vowels. For example, the verbal adjectives *dhh1-to-,*sth2-to- and
*dh3-to- give Greek thetos ‘placed’, statos ‘standing’, and dotos ‘given’
respectively. Again, it is possible to find explanations for this variation,
especially using analogy, but there are a number of examples of the differing
vowels, which are synchronically isolated such that analogy is not a plausible
explanation. On the basis of this and similar evidence, the existence of three
laryngeals is now the mainstream view among Indo-Europeanists (a good brief
introduction is provided in Clackson 2007: 53-61).
 
To quote the back cover, “[t]his book is a much-needed refutation of the
laryngeal theory of Proto-Indo-European ... phonology”. According to the
preface, it is aimed at both linguists and non-linguists interested in the
theory and history of science, presumably primarily undergraduate or graduate
students. It contains six chapters, each of which is followed by exercises and
a key to the exercises. Chapter 1, ‘Terminology and Method’ defines the terms
and view of phonological and morphological theory to be used in the book, with
examples. Chapter 2, ‘The Indo-European Background’, provides a brief
description of the major Indo-European language families and an overview of
the phonological system and (morpho)phonological rules assumed by the authors
to operate in Proto-Indo-European. A key point is that the authors posit the
existence of a single phoneme /h/, which equates in many instances to the
laryngeals reconstructed by Indo-Europeanists. Chapter 3, ‘Laryngealism’,
explains some of the reasoning behind the proposal of three laryngeals in the
late 19th century, starting with the work of Saussure, and provides brief
summaries of the views of later scholars, with special notice being paid to
their reconstructions of the phonetics of the laryngeals. Brief comments are
made about their views. Chapter 4, ‘Two Examples of Laryngealist Method’,
provides two examples of issues connected with laryngeals dealt with in
Lehmann (1955) - one in Proto-Germanic and one in a posited earlier stage of
pre-PIE - and argue against them, suggesting alternative analyses. In Chapter
5, ‘The Case of Hittite’, the authors provide a historical phonology and
morphology of Hittite, and in Chapter 6, ‘Logic and Laryngealism’, they
compare the laryngeal theory with other past scientific theories, no longer
accepted, and highlight defects that they observe in the laryngeal theory.


EVALUATION

The presentation and rhetoric of this book is extremely misleading. In its
subtitle, it is described as a ‘coursebook’, and it is indeed equipped with
the apparatus of a coursebook. In fact, it is a polemic. The theory of
‘laryngealism’ is regularly criticised in terms such as “[this] hypothesis is
bereft of any empirical confirmation and is clearly false” (p. 34); “the
Saussurean version of laryngealism ... based only on an esthetically pleasing
formalism devoid of any empirical underpinnings” (p. 41); “[l]aryngealism has
been posited solely on the basis of a purely formal and nonempirical
axiomatic” (p. 41); and “it is simply not in the same league as genuine
scientific theories” (p. 43). In Chapter 6, the theory is compared with those
of phlogiston in chemistry, ether in physics, and geocentrism in astronomy.
Such strong censure surely implies that the authors will uphold the highest
scientific standards themselves. In Chapter 4, having provided an extremely
concise survey of the history of the laryngeal theory, the authors sum up by
saying “[o]ur basic disagreement with the laryngealist analyses just described
resides in the fact that they are all derivatives of Saussurean laryngealism,
which itself is based on flawed and empirically vacuous postulates” (p. 44).
What is the major problem with the Saussurean view? It allows the
reconstruction of PIE with only one vowel phoneme, /e/, which would be
typological impossibility (p. 33-34). Remarkably, this seems not to have been
noticed in the intervening years since the publication of Saussure’s theory in
1878. We are told on p. 35 that this is one of the “four basic assumptions”
incorporated by the works mentioned by the authors. They further note that
this view rests on PIE [i] and [u] being allophones of /j/ and /w/, commenting
“[t]his allophonic distribution is never stated explicitly; however it is
clearly assumed”. Turning to just those modern works cited by the authors
which lie to hand, I observe the following views: i) phonemic status of both
the high vowels /i/ and /u/ and /a/ (Cowgill and Mayrhofer 1986: 168-9; Ringe
2006: 7, 9-11); Meier-Brügger (2003: 85) leaves the matter of the phonemic
status of /i/ and /u/ open. ii) Phonemic status of /a/: Sihler (1995: 44-45);
Meier-Brügger (2003: 82-3); and  Fortson (2010: 66-7). Clackson (2007: 36)
reports that “the balance of opinion has settled in favour of reconstructing
*a”. Therefore, directly contrary to the assertion of the authors, none of
these works, despite following in the footsteps of Saussure, reconstructs a
system with only a single vowel phoneme. Only Lindeman (1997: 27-8) and Beekes
(2011: 141-3) posit a vowel system without either /a/ or /i/ and /u/. 
 
This remarkable style of argumentation, whereby all subsequent scholars are
tainted by a sort of ‘original sin’, is pervasive. Of Winter (1960), the
authors observe “the lack of explicitness in most of the presentations”,
adding

“[w]e cannot evaluate most of these essays as to their accuracy or merit.
Indeed, even to read them often assumes a rather detailed knowledge of their
languages’ histories and writing systems. We only note that one is often
confronted with opaque and virtually incomprehensible sequences like this one”
[followed by an example of text from the work] (p. 39).

Indeed, the authors are so affronted by this work that they return to it in
Chapter 6, under the heading “Lack of Precision” and repeat the same example
accompanied by another, commenting woefully “[i]nterpretation of these
passages is difficult” (pp. 100-101).  This volume is the - now very dated -
proceedings of a conference involving some of the greatest scholars of the
time, clearly aimed at specialists, which attempted to discuss the evidence of
the theory in the individual Indo-European languages. It hardly seems
remarkable that reading it should require a “detailed knowledge of their
languages’ histories and writing systems”. Of course, any scientific theory
one chose could be discredited in this fashion if all that was required was
that books of more than half a century ago, which were not aimed at lay
people, could not now be understood by them at first glance.
 
Chapter 4, “Two Examples of Laryngealist Method” provides two analyses of
aspects of Indo-European and Proto-Germanic taken from Lehmann (1955)
involving laryngeals, which the authors “consider to be clearly and
egregiously wrong” (p. 61). So do I, but I am fortunate enough to have sixty
years of hindsight, so I do not feel that the work of a single scholar long
ago suffices to damn an entire field. The authors take a different view:

“[w]e have cited them because they were proposed by a respected scholar and
were - and perhaps by many still are - taken seriously. They also instantiate
two of the major errors of laryngealism ... These two flaws  - non-empirical
postulation and inexplicit formulation - are endemic to virtually all
laryngealist explanations.”

The authors having earlier criticised another scholar’s work for lack of
references (p. 35), the absence of justification for that “and perhaps many
still are” is striking.
 
So much for the structure of the argument, which proceeds by a combination of
ad hominem attacks and straw men; what about the content of the argument? In
the essentials, the authors follow Szemerenyi (1996: 40-41, 87-92, 121-30,
134-42) in reconstructing a single laryngeal, /h/ (pp. 23-5). This is a
defendable position, and it would have been interesting to see such a defence
made in good faith. But we are provided with almost no hint of why the
three-laryngeal version has been so successful, and apart from the focus on
the single-vowel problem, provided with no in-depth examination of the
evidence for and against it. The authors are aware that there are arguments in
its favour: they note that Cowgill and Mayrhofer (1986) “still espouse it
because it purportedly offers explanations for certain phenomena in Vedic
Sanskrit, Greek and the Anatolian languages” (p. 40), but we never
subsequently find out what these phenomena are nor what the evidence is for or
against them. There is no engagement with the Greek evidence, despite, as
stated above, this being the key ground for the three-laryngeal theory, nor of
the Vedic; these are brushed away, with brief (and, in the case of Sihler
1995: 87, misleading) references to other scholars who have raised problems
with it. Instead, we get Chapter 5 on Hittite, the longest chapter in the book
at 33 pages. The relevance of most of this to the argument for laryngeals is
unclear.  Almost no modern references are provided in this section; apart from
the authors’ own works, the latest reference is from 1988, and there seems to
be no knowledge of recent essential bibliography such as Melchert (1994),
Kimball (1999), Kloekhorst (2006, 2008). In fact, this is true of the book in
general; in the survey of the literature in Chapter 2, for example, the recent
works cited are almost all ‘Introductions’ or ‘Histories’ (nearly all quoted
in the first edition), and there is little reference to works specifically on
the laryngeal theory such as Beekes (1969), Schrijver (1991), Mayrhofer
(2005), Müller (2007), not to mention the hundreds of relevant articles from
recent decades. 
 
In summing up, I should declare an interest: I have worked on aspects of the
laryngeal theory, and I agree with the mainstream idea that there were three
laryngeals. But I would strongly welcome a serious argument for the existence
of a single laryngeal, taking into account modern scholarship and
knowledgeably making use of the evidence from all the Indo-European languages
(but primarily Greek, Vedic Sanskrit, and Hittite), as a spur to further
careful thought about the theory. This book is far from being such a work.
Indo-European scholars are unlikely to pay it much attention, but any student
attending a class taught using this as a coursebook is liable to be
misinformed about the basis for, and arguments about, the laryngeal theory.

REFERENCES

Beekes, Robert S. P. 1969. The development of the Proto-Indo-European
laryngeals in Greek. The Hague and Paris: Mouton

Beekes, Robert S. P. 2011. Comparative Indo-European linguistics: An
introduction. Second edition, revised and corrected by Michiel de Vaan.
Amsterdam and Philadephia: John Benjamins

Clackson, James. 2007. Indo-European linguistics: An introduction. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press

Cowgill, Warren and Manfred Mayrhofer. 1986. Indogermanische Grammatik Band I.
Heidelberg: Winter

Fortson, Benjamin W. 2010. Indo-European language and culture: An
introduction. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell

Kimball, Sara E. 1999. Hittite Historical Phonology. Innsbruck: Innsbrucker
Beiträge zur Sprachwissenschaft

Kloekhorst, Alwin. 2006. Initial laryngeals in Anatolian. Historische
Sprachforschung 119, 77-108

Kloekhorst, Alwin. 2008. Etymological dictionary of the Hittite inherited
lexicon. Leiden and Boston: Brill

Lehmann, Winfred P. 1955. Proto-Indo-European phonology. Austin: University of
Texas Press and Linguistic Society of America

Lindeman, Fredrik Otto. 1997. Introduction to the ‘laryngeal theory’. Second
edition. Innsbruck: Innsbrucker Beiträge zur Sprachwissenschaft

Mayrhofer, Manfred. 2005. Die Fortsetzung der indogermanischen Laryngale im
Indo-Iranischen. Wien: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften

Meier-Brügger, Michael. 2003. Indo-European linguistics. Berlin and New York:
Walter de Gruyter

Melchert, H. Craig. 1994. Anatolian historical phonology. Amsterdam and
Atlanta (GA): Rodopi

Müller, Stefan. 2007. Zum Germanischen aus laryngaltheoretischer Sicht: Mit
einer Einführung in die Grundlagen der Laryngaltheorie. Berlin and New York:
Walter de Gruyter

Ringe, Don. 2006. From Proto-Indo-European to Proto-Germanic. Oxford: Oxford
University Press

Schrijver, Peter. 1991. The reflexes of the Proto-Indo-European laryngeals in
Latin. Amsterdam and Atlanta: Rodopi

Sihler, Andrew. 1995. New comparative grammar of Greek and Latin. Oxford:
Oxford University Press

Szemerenyi, Oswald. 1996. Introduction to Indo-European linguistics. Oxford:
Oxford University Press

Winter, Werner (ed.). 1960. Evidence for laryngeals: Work papers of a
conference in Indo-European linguistics on May 7 and 8, 1959. Austin, Texas:
Department of Germanic Languages, The University of Texas


ABOUT THE REVIEWER

Nicholas Zair is a Research Associate at Cambridge University on the
AHRC-funded project 'Greek in Italy'. His first book, 'The Reflexes of the
Proto-Indo-European Laryngeals in Celtic' was published in 2012. His second,
'Oscan in the Greek Alphabet' will be published in 2016. His research
interests include Latin and Sabellic historical linguistics, especially
orthography, phonology, morphology, language relationships and language
contact, Celtic historical linguistics and Indo-European comparative
linguistics.





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