Talk:Austronesian languages
|
|
What about 'wiki'-'wiki'. I thought that meant quicker. In that case, the duplication is not a plural.
Reduplication has a number of functions in most Austronesian languages just as it has in many other languages. Forming plurals is only one of them.
| Contents |
'vowels are quite commen'???
'vowels are quite common'??? What's that supposed to mean?
I'm not sure what the author of the article meant when he/she were writing this, but I think this must refer to the syllabic structure of the languages in the group. In Malay, for example, you can only have the structure "CV" or "CVC", like in the word tidur (tee-door). In Hawaiian, "CV" is even the only possible syllabic structure. <Barra>
I've reverted this because the links must go to the language - not the island. ie to Tongan not Tonga. Secretlondon 11:25, Dec 3, 2003 (UTC)
"low entropy"?
and, "the text is quite repetitive in terms of the frequency of sounds"? I'm wondering what this is supposed to mean. Perhaps it's saying that Austronesian languages typically have smallish inventories of phonemes? If so, why not say it like that?
You're right on the smallish phoneme inventory. But low entropy here, in my opinion, can as well mean smallish number of possible syllables. In English you can have "drum", "drab", "dream", "drown", "drive", "drop", etc. i.e. so many possible syllables can be formed from a single consonant cluster. Chinese, in contrast, have small syllabic repertoire. There are "xin", "xian", "xiao" but no "xa", "xo", or "xui". The same can be said with the majority of Austronesian languages. <Barra>
- Sorry, but "entropy" is a meaningless word linguistically. Saying Chinese has low "entropy" because its phonotactics allow xia but not xa is like saying English has low entropy because it allows [hæŋ] but not *[ŋæh]. kwami 11:20, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC)
Austronesian subgrouping
Austronesian was never 'formerly referred to as Malayo-Polynesian'. Austronesian consists of two subgroups, Malayo-Polynesian languages and Formosan languages, the latter being spoken within Taiwan. It was only when it was realised that the Formosan languages group with the Malayo-Polynesian that it was decided to have a new top-level name to refer to these two groups, but Malayo-Polynesian was never used to refer to what is now known as Austronesian.
Malayo-Polynesian is in turn divided into Western and Central-Eastern. The Western subgroup is not also known as 'Continental' (there are only a very few Austronesian languages found in continental Asia), and the Central-Eastern is not also known as Oceanic, that's a separate subgroup at a lower level.
If no-one minds, I'll try to fix this up sometime. -Dougg
From the article: "All of the said languages except Hawai'ian have official status in the countries and territories of the Pacific Ocean." However, the article Hawaiian states that the Hawaiian language is an official language of the State of Hawaii. What exactly this means, of course, is up to some question. --FOo 07:29, 25 Jan 2004 (UTC)
How about Melanesian languages? These are also Austronesian, aren't they? Meursault2004 18:53, 17 Mar 2004 (UTC)
No. They're in another group entirely. <Barra>
- Of course they're Austronesian. The vast majority of Austronesian languages were formerly called Melanesian, though the term has no genealogical significance today. kwami 11:23, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC)
- I do confirm that they are Austronesian. It's strange to stress on that even at the beginnings of linguistics, a lot of specialists considered (wrongly) the melanesians as quite different from the other Austronesians. Mostly racism. Enzino 19:49, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC)
No, Melanesian languages are those spoken in Melanesia: this is not a linguistic genetic grouping, although it may reflect biological genetics (see below). Melanesia refers to New Guinea and the nearby islands to the east, where people have noticeably darker skin ('melanesia' = 'black islands') and includes Fiji, New Caledonia and Vanuatu (all having Austronesian languages only), the Solomons (both Austronesian and Papuan languages) and the other islands westwards up to and including New Guinea and a couple of islands further east (a mixture of Austronesian and Papuan languages, the latter in a number of groupings). This term was applied in the 19th century, along with the other terms Polynesia (many islands) and Micronesia (small islands). (by Jules Dumont d'Urville, a French explorer, in 1831, Enzino)
It may be that the reason for people across this contiguous area having similarly darker skin (than their Polynesia and Indonesian neighbours) is due to the pre-existing Papuan population. On the other hand, it may be something environmental, or something else. Dougg
- It is not currently accepted as a cladistic node, but it once was. If I remember correctly, the c. 1950 Columbia Encyclopedia divided Malayo-Polynesian into Western and Eastern, with Eastern divided into Melanesian, Micronesian, and Polynesian. Linguistic classifications followed racial classifications for centuries.
- As for the earlier point about AN and MP never being synonymous, even the 15th edition (1980) of the Encyclopedia Britannica starts its article with "The Austronesian language family, also called Malayo-Polynesian". It divides the languages into Western AN, or Indonesian (including the Formosan languages as a sub-sub-subgroup: the Formosan languages have been recognized as AN for centuries; and all of modern Western and Central MP), and Eastern AN, or Oceanic (modern Eastern MP). It gives an alternate classification, where Western AN is broken up into Atayalic, Hesperonesian, and various Eastern Indonesian branches, but Oceanic is still a primary branch. At least Melanesian is no longer recognized by this point. --kwami 07:20, 20 Apr 2005 (UTC)
- Melanesian is not a branch. The former subgroupings were exactly based on Jules Dumont d'Urville (racial) classification. The colour of Melanesian and its origin is a (racial) legend. All the Austronesian have been in contact with Papua, including Polynesians and Micronesians, please for more details, have a look on The Lexicon of Proto-Oceanic, Ross, Pawley and Osmond, Pacific Linguistics 545, ANU, Canberra 1998 (vol I) and 2003 (vol II).Enzino
Theories of migration
Aren't there competing theories of how the languages have spread? If so, it'd be better to present alternatives. Right now only one is presented and with rather strong emphasis (e.g. word such as confirmed). I prefer "supported" rather than "confirmed". 67.242.100.213 00:16, 23 Jun 2004 (UTC).
Of course, there are competing theories. One good book on this matter is On the road of the winds (An Archaelogical History of the Pacific Islands before European Contact, of Patrick Vinton Kirch, University of California Press, 2000). It describes the different theories. But the indicated theory is the good last one... Enzino 09:22, 30 Apr 2005 (UTC)
A new stub category has been created
A new stub category has been created specifically for Austronesian languages: Template:Tl. Use {{au-lang-stub}} rather than {{stub}} or {{lang-stub}} to label stubs on Austronesian languages as such.
Stub categorizing is a convenient way to keep track of Austronesian-related stubs and additionally helps in keeping the category of language stubs usable. Whoever feels like it, is invited to browse Category:Language stubs to sift out any Austronesian language stubs... Thanks!
For discussion see: WP:WSS/Stub types#Language and literature and WP:WSS/Criteria#Split of lang-stub. — mark ✎ 23:20, 4 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Banyumasan
The so-called 'Banyumasan language' is just a dialect of Javanese, not an independent language. There are far too many similarities with other variants of Javanese to be called a separate language in its own. See also my comment in the talk page of the Banyumasan language. Meursault2004 09:22, 6 Jun 2005 (UTC)