LL-L "Grammar" 2011.03.17 (02) [AF-EN]

Fri Mar 18 01:51:28 UTC 2011

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L O W L A N D S - L - 17 March - Volume 02
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From: Mike Morgan <mwmbombay at gmail.com>
Subject: LL-L "Grammar" 2011.03.16 (04) [EN]

Hmm, Ron, a good question (and like all good questions, maybe one with NO
answer... or one with MANY answers???)

An old prof of mine, a certain Carleton Hodge, wrote a paper once upon a
time (I forget at present where it was published or even when) looking at
the morphological development of Egyptian -- from earliest records through
late Coptic... and he saw the development as being cyclical rather than
linear... with maybe a period of morphological simplification followed by
one of increasing complexity / moving from analytical to synthetic and back
again....

not being an Egyptologist (though i did at one time study Coptic), I am not
sure if in its long history we can find an indesputable counter example or
not...

mwm || U C > || mike || мика || माईक || マイク || மாய்க் (aka Dr Michael W
Morgan)

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Senior Consultant
BA Programme in Applied Sign Linguistics
IGNOU-UCLan New Delhi, India
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"I have become my own version of an optimist. If I can't make it through one
door, I'll go through another door - or I'll make a door. Something terrific
will
come no matter how dark the present." (R. Tagore)

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From: Mark and Ruth Dreyer <mrdreyer at lantic.net>
Subject: LL-L "Grammar" 2011.03.16 (05) [EN]

Dear Ron, Sandy, Luc & Co.

Subject: LL-L "Grammar"

Ron wrote:

I wonder if any of you can come up with examples in which languages
developed the other way around, namely by acquiring more complex
morphologies with time. I personally can think of no such example.

I can't, but I recall mentioning an observation on the subject that I read
somewhere in Bodmer's 'The Loom of Language'.

Well, I have hunted up the passage, & here goes:

He quotes Sir George Grierson who had charge of The Linguistic Survey of
India, who says:

  "The Outer Sub-branch (of Indo-Aryan venaculars) have gone a stage further
in linguistic evolution. They were once, in their Sanscrit form, synthetic;
then they passed through an analytic stage - some are passing through that
stage only now, and are, like Sindhi and Kashmiri, so to speak caught in the
act - and have again become synthetic by the incorporation of the auxiliary
words, used in the analytical stage, with the main words to which they which
they are attached...

p.411

The Loom of Language, *A Guide to Foreign Languages for the Home Student.*

*by *Frederick Bodmer

*edited & arranged by *Lancelot Hogben

George Allen & Unwin Ltd. *London** *1944

So the long experience of dialects evolved from Sanscrit show a cyclic
process, passing from synthetic, & by ablation becoming analytic followed
again by synthetic as the auxiliary words are incorporated into new forms,
to be absorbed, lost & replaced again by other auxiliary words. & so it
goes.

Yrs

Mark

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From: "dealangeam" <atdelange at iburst.co.za>

Subject: LL_L "Grammar" [EN]

Beste Laaglanders,

Sandy Fleming asked early in this thread:

“If languages always simplify over time, then are the earliest human
languages the most complex morphologically?”

I do not think so. I have had discussions with the San in Namibia on their
petroglyphs (10,000 years old), trying to make out what messages it
conveyed. As i understand it, it contains no grammar, but suggests a
diversity of semantics based on a central theme.

I think that grammar in signs emerged and become more complex to make sure
that one of the many messages persist.

Then, later, Ron wrote:

“However, I am under the impression that under most circumstances language
contacts promote simplification. The Scandinavian languages are great
examples of this, if you compare them with Old Norse and Icelandic. It is
quite likely that this was triggered by massive Middle Saxon influences and
the eventual absorption of large numbers of Saxon speakers.

With regard to my response to Sandy’s point in the previous post, please let
me add the thought that these days we are unable to witness the birth and
early development of natural languages other than those whose geneses are
those of language contact, or “linguistic confluence,” so to speak.

Now, it may well be that in such cases we do get glimpses of early
“morphologicalizing” processes, such as in the numerous pidgins and creoles
of the world, most of which developed as a result of colonization.”

Ron, I remember that in early days of Lowlands, we discussed this topic. I
stressed that Afrikaans is both the youngest of the Germanic languages and
also the least morphologically complex. In those days many argued that
Afrikaans is a pidgin or creole language. That argument is roughly 250 years
old, used by European linguists. Today i do not become mad anymore at such
simple arguments.

The first upsetting fact is that although Afrikaners (Vryburgers,
Grensboere, Voortrekkers, Republikeine) cloud read and write in Dutch, they
preferred to speak in Afrikaans. Even worse, linguists of Europe was blind
to this fact, unable to recognise spoken Afrikaans as a fully fledged
language able to express all thoughts like any European language.

The second upsetting fact is that speakers of European languages (Dutch,
French, German, Portugese), African Languages (San, several Xhoi, few
Banthu) and Asian languages (Malaysian) is that they preferred Afrikaans to
Dutch (before 1800) and later to English (after 1800) to communicate across
cultural complexities. Afrikaans did not only support a Germanic culture,
but also acted as a lingua franca for European, African and Asian Cultures.

Biological evolution into more complexity is not the brain child of Darwin.
It was observed and mentioned by the ancient Greeks and Chinese, the Arabs
in the middel ages and the Europeans during the enlightenment. Linnaeus (the
father of biological taxonomy) was perhaps the pinnacle of that development.
What Darwin did, was also to add a mechanism by which it happened: natural
selection in terms of environmental dangers.

In the evolution of natural languages, it is almost the opposite. The
fittest languages to survive is the simplest ones. Here the utmost goal is
not survival, but agility and interconnectivity. Neither is a spontaneous
phenomenon, but have to be gained by work. In this case Darwinian evolution
is useless since it focus only on spontaneous changes.

There is a far more encompassing viewpoint on how systems develop into more
as well as less complexity. Furthermore, it is based on empirical
observations. It is called Irreversible Self-organization and was introduced
by Ilya Progigine. It involves the law of entropy production, usually called
the second law of thermodynamics.

Very few people know how far beyond thermodynamics it stretches. The reason
is that it is mentally intimidating because of the complexity involved. I
have argued on several sites that it commands/allows both complexity and
simplicity. However, my writings seems to be too dense for most thinkers to
understand it.

Evolution towards complexity is favoured by open systems whereas closed
systems can lead to simplicity. Please note what Luc writes:

“In short, methinks, internal evolution tends to lead to simplification,
whereas external influence necessitates two differing grammars to merge,
possibly creating lots of "exceptions".”

What a great statement by someone who know, perhaps nothing, of (1) the law
of entropy production and (2) irreversible self-organization as its outcome.

As laaglanders wil weet hoe taalbevorming (“language morphology”) deur (1)
en (2) plaasvind, sal hulle maar eers Afrikaans moet leer en daarna met
Google gaan soek wat ek daaroor te skryf het. Gebruik “ontluiker”, “woes” en
“OS” as trefwoorde.

Ek is nie moedswillig nie. Ek is waagmoedig. Eenvoudige Afrikaans is in
staat om die mees ingewikkelde begrippe te weergee. Ek stel nie belang
daarin om ander mense in Engels te bedien nie. Ek het ‘n passie om my eie
taal lewendig te hou.

Mooi loop

At de Lange

(Ontluiker)

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From: R. F. Hahn <sassisch at yahoo.com>
Subject: Grammar

Thank you for sharing your great ideas and thoughts, dear At, Mark and Mike!

Lowlanders, if you want to keep up with this thread and wonder about the
types of language structures we are talking about, please read up on them
here:

Isolating: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isolating_language
Synthetic: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synthetic_language
     Polysynthetic: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polysynthetic_language
     Fusional: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fusional_language
     Agglutinative: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agglutinative_language

Dear At, I tend to agree that “simplified languages” tend to be more
flexible and thereby more viable as intercultural linguae francae, as shown
in the cases of both Afrikaans and English. And their simplification tends
to be the result of contacts. The chicken or the egg?

However, “simplification” is really a very misleading word. The morphologies
may be simplified, but languages compensate, as I remarked on an earlier
occasion. In learning English and Afrikaans as a second language people have
to put a lot of effort into syntax at first and then into idiomatic
expressions.

Regards,
Reinhard/Ron
Seattle, USA

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