Why is English Related to Other Languages?
English is a part of the Indo-European language family.
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Language family- a collection of languages related through a common
ancestor that existed long before recorded history.
Indo-European Branches
In a language family, there are language branches
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A language branch is a collection of languages with a common ancestor
from the last several thousand years.
Differences in a language branch are not as diverse or ancient as with
language families. Certain evidence can confirm relations to various
language families.
Indo-European is separated into 8 branches
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The first 4- Indo-Iranian, Romance, Germanic, and Balto-Slavic- are
spoken by many people.
- Indo-Iranian is clustered in southern Asian
- Romance is mostly in southwestern Europe and Latin America
- Germanic is in northwestern Europe and North America
- Balto-Slavic languages in eastern Europe.
There are 4 less popularly used language branches:
- Albanian
- Armenian
- Greek
- Celtic
Germanic Branch
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German may be hard for many English speakers to grasp, but the two
languages are surprisingly similar.
- Both belong to the Germanic branch of the Indo-European language
family
- They are related because of the Germanic tribes that invaded
England 1500 years ago.
A language group is a collection of languages within a branch that
have similar origins in recent past.
- Example: West Germanic is a group within the Germanic language
branch.
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English and German are in this group because they have similar
structure and common words.
1. West Germanic is then divided into high Germanic and low
Germanic subgroups. They are named this because of the areas
they are found in of low and high elevation.
2. English is classified into the Low Germanic subgroup. Other
languages in this subgroup like Dutch, Flemish (a dialect of
Dutch), Afrikaans, and Frisian.
The Germanic language branch includes North Germanic languages
(spoken in Scandinavia):
1. Swedish
2. Danish
3. Norwegian
4. Icelandic
These are all derived from the Old Norse language, which was the
national language in Scandinavia before 1000 A.D. These languages
emerged because of migration and political organizations.
Indo-Iranian Branch
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The Indo-Iranian branch has the most speakers in the Indo-European
language family.
- This branch includes over 100 individual languages, with 1 billion
speakers.
- This branch can be divided into 2 subgroups: Indic (eastern), and
Iranian (western).
Indic
- The popular languages of India and Pakistan belong to this group.
- 1/3 of the Indian population (majority in the north) speaks Hindi.
Hindi has many dialects and ways of speaking it; so many consider
it a collection of languages. However there is only one way to write
Hindi (Devanagari). There are many dialects to speak it because
many of its speakers could not read or write.
- Urdu, the main language of Pakistan, is very much like Hindi, but,
it is written in the Arabic alphabet; which reflects on the fact that
most Pakistanis are Muslim. Their holy book, the Quran, is written
in Arabic.
- The largest diversity among Indians is their languages, that
accounts from over one billion residents.
- In 1947 when India was declared an independent state, their
declared their national language as Hindi, but many who spoke
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Dravidian (southern India) disagreed. India’s constitution was
amended and recognizes 18 official languages.
Iranian
- Spoken in Iran and neighboring countries and regions.
- The major languages are Persian (called Farsi in Iran), Pathan
(eastern Afghanistan and western Pakistan), and Kurdish (used by
the Kurds in western Iran, northern Iraq, and eastern Turkey.
- All of these are written in the Arabic alphabet.
Balto-Slavic Branch
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This group contains many languages and speakers.
- Slavic was once a single language, but variations developed in 7th
century A.D. when the indigenous speakers migrated to Asia,
causing isolation between them. As a result, this group can then be
divided into north, south, east, and western groups of Slavic; also a
Baltic group.
East Slavic and Baltic Groups
- The most frequently used Slavic languages are from the east, such
as Russian (spoken by 80% of Russians).
- Russian is one of the 6 official languages of the United Nations.
1. The importance of the language and its understanding grew
with the Soviet Union’s rise to power (after WWII). The
government forced natives of other languages to learn and speak
fluently Russian. This was their way of conserving and
spreading culture. Eastern countries controlled by the Soviet
Union taught Russian as a second language. When those
countries regained independence, they proclaimed languages
other than Russian, although the Russian language remained
major communication between said countries.
- Other than Russian, Ukrainian and Belorusian are the 2 most
important languages in the eastern Slavic language group.
1. Ukraine (in Slavic) means border and Belo- is translated white.
West and South Slavic Groups
- The most popularly spoken west Slavic language is Polish, followed
by Czech and Slovak.
- Czech and Slovak are very similar, even to the point that a speaker
of one can understand a speaker of the other.
- Leaders of Czechoslovakia tried to balance the use of both
languages…
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1. Many times on television in the first half of a sporting event
would announce in Czech, the second half in Slovak.
…these measures were used to try and create unity after the
communist era.
Despite all efforts, in 1993 the Slovaks split from the Czech
government.
The most important south Slavic languages are Serbo-Croatian and
Bulgarian. Serbs and Croats speak the same language, but it is
written differently. Croatian is written with the Roman alphabet
and Serbian is written in Cyrillic.
Generally, there aren’t many differences in the many Slavic
languages; but since cultural preservation is very important
nowadays, those differences are always taken into account.
As time goes on, the differences between Serbians and Croatians
have drastically increased. With the influx of Bosnian Muslims,
Croatians have tried to change “Serbian” words to Croatian or
Bosnian Muslim words.
The term “Serbo-Croatian” now actually offends many Croatians
and Bosnians.
Romance Branch
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Evolved from Latin (extinct language), which was spoken by the
romans 2000 years ago. the 4 main romance languages still spoken are:
1. Spanish
2. Portuguese
3. French
4. Italian
- The regions in which these are spoken in the modern states of
Spain, Portugal, France, and Italy. Mountains serve a boundaries
between these countries/ regions.
1. France is separated from Italy by the Alps and from Spain by the
Pyrenees.
2. Several mountain ranges separate Spain and Portugal
3. These serve as intervening obstacles.
- The 5th most important Romance language is Romanian, which is
spoken in Romania and Moldova. They are separated by Slavic
speaking people.
- Other than the 4 previously mentioned countries, there are 2
smaller languages; Romansh and Catalán.
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1. Romansh is one of the 4 main languages of Switzerland, even
though only 25,000 people speak it.
2. Catalán is a dialect of Spanish, is the official language of
Andorra. But it is also spoken by about 6 million people, mostly
around Barcelona.
3. There is a 3rd romance language, Sardinian; it is a mixture of
Spanish, Arabic, and Italian. It was once the official language of
the Mediterranean island of Sardinia.
Origin and Diffusion of Romance Language
- Spanish, Portuguese, French, Italian, and Romanian are part of the
same branch because they all came from Latin. As the Roman
Empire rose, their language diffused.
1. At the height of the 2nd century, the roman empire had expanded
across the Black Sea, because of that, the local culture was
suppressed and the roman language was forced upon them.
2. Even during their reign, Latin began to vary. It took several
hundred years to conquer all their territory, so as each region
was occupied, the language changed. This was known as Vulgar
Latin. Example: The word horse in Latin is equus, which is
where we get equestrian. In vulgar Latin, the word for horse
was caballus, which is where words such as caballo comes from.
3. After the collapse of the Roman Empire, communication began
to decline, therefore creating more deviations in the Latin
language. As more people migrated and land was conquered,
many people switched to the language of their successor.
Romance Language Dialects
- The Roman language didn’t just appear, it evolved over time like
with all other languages. Many dialects exist in many different
regions and provinces, but it all relates back to the same basic
language.
- The dialect of Île-de-France was only found in a certain region, but
since that region included Paris, it became the standard. The most
important surviving dialects are from the north (langue d’oïl) and
the south (langue d’òc). The names of these 2 reveal pieces of their
origin.
- Spain contained many dialects in the medieval times. Some dialects
grew so much that they eventually became the national language
(Example: Castilian).
- Spanish and Portuguese have received international importance
because of the exploration and colonization. Approximately 90% of
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the speakers of these languages live outside of Europe, mainly in
Latin America. In 1943, Pope Alexander VI gave the western
portion of the “New world” to Spain and the east portion of the
“New World” to Portugal (Treaty of Tordesillas, put the agreement
in writing).
Every week, 46 members of the Spanish Royal Academy meet in
Madrid to clarify rules on vocabulary, grammar, and
pronunciation. In their official dictionary, they publish many new
words that have originated from different dialects.
In 1994 Brazil, Portugal, and other Portuguese speaking countries
in Africa agreed to standardize the written language. Many are
upset because the new way neutralizes some accents used in the
“old way”. This is a reflection of globalization and space-time
diffusion.
There are difficulties in telling whether or not 2 languages are
separate or just different dialects. Moldovan is the official language
of Moldova, but it is also considered a dialect of Romanian. Flemish,
the official language of northern Belgium, is technically a dialect of
Dutch.
Romance languages spoken in former colonies may also be
classified as separate languages because of substantial differences
from the original (Example: Creole).
Origin and Diffusion of Indo-European
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In the Indo-European language family, they are all descendants of one
ancestral language (Proto-Indo-European). But this cannot be proved
indefinitely. The evidence of such a language is derived from physical
qualities of the words themselves. Linguists believe root words that
represent things experienced in everyday life. But some words cannot
be traced back to one ancestor in common. Therefore, they might have
been added later.
- Some Indo-European words for winter and snow are the same, but
not ocean, so we assume the Proto-Indo-Europeans lived in a cold
climate, or had a harsh winter climate.
- Most accept that the Proto-Indo-Europeans existed, but it is
commonly disagreed upon when and where it originated and its
diffusion process.
- A popular hypothesis (Marija Gimbutas) that language originated
with the Kurgan people, who lived between present day Russia and
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Kazakhstan. The earliest evidence of the Kurgans date back to 4300
B.C.
1. The Kurgans were nomadic herders. They were among the first
to domesticate cattle and horses. The search for grass for their
animals led them westward through Europe and eastward to
Siberia. They conquered many regions on horseback and claimed
much land.
Other scholars disagree and say that the language originated 2000
years before the Kurgans (Colin Renfrew), from eastern Anatolia
(present day Turkey). He believes they diffused westward toward
Greece.
The Indo-Iranian branch originated either through migration from
Anatolia, or indirectly through Russia north along the Black and
Caspian seas. Renfrew thinks they migrated because of
agricultural opportunity, not military pursuit. The language
succeeded because of the vast number of speakers growing more
successful. No matter how it came to be, the fact still remains that
after thousands of years there are many, distinct languages.