The Neolithic Hypothesis (Standardization)

[Miguel Carrasquer Vidal]

X99Lynx at aol.com wrote:

>In a message dated 3/19/99 2:14:58 AM, you wrote:

><<Part of the "state" effect is optical.  Dialects still exist, but
>people write in the official language.  Of course the Roman
>Empire had a unifying effect for quite a long time.  Whether the
>rate of change of Latin itself was affected (other than
>optically) is a different matter.  I doubt it.  So the "state
>effect" means we have less variation in space, but probably the
>same variation in time.>>

>The fact that Latin was or wasn't optical is irrelevant in the context of my
>original point.

Not the language, the lack of change and variation is "optical".
The Romance languages seem to pop up practically ex nihilo
because of the masking effect of the standard language.

>And finally I have searched in vain for ANY historical instance where the
>adoption of agriculture resulted in a change of language in an indigenous
>population.

What about Bantu and Austronesian?

=======================
Miguel Carrasquer Vidal
mcv at wxs.nl
Amsterdam