34.2719, Calls: The Limits of the Comparative Method: Innovative Approaches to Understanding Orphan Languages

Fri Sep 15 15:05:02 UTC 2023

LINGUIST List: Vol-34-2719. Fri Sep 15 2023. ISSN: 1069 - 4875.

Subject: 34.2719, Calls: The Limits of the Comparative Method: Innovative Approaches to Understanding Orphan Languages

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Date: 15-Sep-2023
From: Abbie Hantgan [abbie.hantgan-sonko at cnrs.fr]
Subject: The Limits of the Comparative Method: Innovative Approaches to Understanding Orphan Languages

Full Title: The Limits of the Comparative Method: Innovative
Approaches to Understanding Orphan Languages
Short Title: ORPHAN

Date: 15-Sep-2023 - 06-Nov-2023
Location: Helsinki, Finland
Contact Person: Abbie Hantgan
Meeting Email: abbie.hantgan-sonko at cnrs.fr

Linguistic Field(s): Genetic Classification; Historical Linguistics;
Linguistic Theories; Typology

Call Deadline: 06-Nov-2023

Meeting Description:

The Comparative Method (CM) stands as one of the most impactful
methodologies in historical-comparative linguistics, revolutionizing
our understanding of the development of language families. Its
enduring relevance in modern linguistics attests to its efficacy.
However, the CM comes with a significant limitation: it requires
comparanda—distinct languages suspected to share a lineage. This
constraint renders it inapplicable for studying language isolates and
many small language families, which, in reality, make up the majority
of language families. We refer to these linguistically unique or
small-scale genealogical units as 'orphan languages'.

Call for Papers:

While we join others in recognizing the importance of these 'orphan
languages' to historical linguistics, they are often conspicuously
absent from discussions that critique the limitations, or offer
alternatives, to the Comparative Method. That is, the focus in terms
of remnants of linguistic diversity remains on single languages
classified as 'isolates'—those with no known genealogical relatives.
Language isolates in particular have been extensively cataloged and
analyzed from various angles—including comparative, typological, and
diachronic approaches (Georg 2015, Epps & Michael 2023, Salaberri et
al. 2020, Campbell 2017)—as well as from geographic perspectives
(Urban 2021). Emerging research is adopting cross-disciplinary
methods, utilizing statistical patterning (Van Gijn et al. 2022) and
Natural Language Processing (NLP) in corpus linguistics (Gamallo et
al. 2020). Recent investigations actively merge linguistics with
genetics (Matsumae et al. 2021, Laurent et al. 2023) to tackle the
tough questions of the origins the speakers of language isolates, but
not necessarily the broader category of language orphans.

Furthermore, despite advancements, the limitations of the (classical)
CM are still evident: it cannot effectively trace the history of
language orphans and their speakers and there is no alternative method
with proven results that can take its place. Additionally, many
potential language orphans may exist in under-explored regions, or
some languages might be wrongly assumed to have affiliations with
their neighbors.

The Orphan Languages workshop aims to address these challenges by
exploring innovative methods for reconstructing the proto-stages of
language isolates and unaffiliated language groups, circumventing the
limitations of the classical comparative method.

Topics include, but are not limited to, the following:

- Exploring how interdisciplinary methodologies can advance our
understanding of orphan languages and their speakers;

- Investigating how chronological methods, such as internal
reconstruction and genetic timelines, can help establish connections
or separations between speakers of orphan languages and other groups;

- Researching language contact between speakers of orphan languages
and other groups through trajectories of loan words or grammatical
features or constructions;

- Demonstrating how big data, computational linguistics, and machine
learning are offering new insights into speakers of language orphans’
histories;

- Emphasizing the importance of insights gained from ethnography,
historical narratives, and archaeology;

- Investigating what geographic information systems (GIS) and spatial
analyses can reveal about the movement and settlement of speakers of
language orphans;

- Examining how globalization and migration impact language orphans
and what methodologies can help track these changes.

Conveners

Abbie Hantgan: LLACAN, Paris, France abbie.hantgan-sonko at cnrs.fr
Rik van Gijn: Center for Linguistics, Leiden University
e.van.gijn at hum.leidenuniv.nl

Abstracts of 300 words max. should be sent to both workshop convenors
by 6 November, 2023.

References Campbell, Lyle. (ed.). 2017. Language Isolates. London and
New York: Routledge. Epps, Patience & Lev, Michael (eds.). 2023.
Language Isolates I: Aikanã to Kandozi-Shapra: An International
Handbook (Amazonian Languages). Vol. 1. 2 vols. Berlin, Boston: De
Gruyter Mouton. (https://www.degruyter.com/serial/hskal-b/html)
Gamallo, Pablo & Pichel, José Ramom & Alegria, Iñaki. 2020. Measuring
Language Distance of Isolated European Languages. Information 11(4).
(doi:10.3390/info11040181) (https://www.mdpi.com/2078-2489/11/4/181)
Georg, Stefan (ed.). 2015. Language isolates (4 volumes). London,
England: Routledge. Laurent, Romain & Szpiech, Zachary A & da Costa,
Sergio S & Thouzeau, Valentin & Fortes-Lima, Cesar A &
Dessarps-Freichey, Françoise & Lémée, Laure et al. 2023. A genetic and
linguistic analysis of the admixture histories of the islands of Cabo
Verde. eLife. eLife Sciences Publications, Ltd 12. e79827. (Ed.
Huerta-Sanchez, Emilia & Przeworski, Molly & Huerta-Sanchez, Emilia &
Zhang, Xinjun.) (doi:10.7554/eLife.79827) Matsumae, Hiromi & Ranacher,
Peter & Savage, Patrick E. & Blasi, Damián E. & Currie, Thomas E. &
Koganebuchi, Kae & Nishida, Nao et al. 2021. Exploring correlations in
genetic and cultural variation across language families in northeast
Asia. Science Advances. American Association for the Advancement of
Science 7(34). eabd9223. (doi:10.1126/sciadv.abd9223) Salaberri, Iker
& Krajewska, Dorota & Reguero, Urtzi & Zuloaga, Eneko & Duhalde,
Maitena (collaborator) & Uribe-Etxebarria, Oxel (collaborator) &
Monforte, Sergio (collaborator) & Santazilia, Ekaitz (collaborator) &
Ariztimuño, Borja (collaborator) & Ulibarri, Koldo (collaborator).
2020. Investigating language isolates: typological and diachronic
perspectives. Zenodo. (doi:10.5281/zenodo.3985030) Urban, Matthias.
2021. The geography and development of language isolates. Royal
Society Open Science

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