Re: glossogenesis (was: Indo-European question)

Jesse Bangs wrote:
>
>Tommie L Powell sikayal:
>
> > Those terms -- pidgins, creoles, sprachbunds -- can't apply
> > in this context, because they can't arise until after language
> > becomes substantially differentiated between groups.  Before
> > tribalization, no band -- no seasonally migrating group of from
> > 50 to 150 people -- could have spoken much differently from
> > any other nearby band, since each band had to communicate
> > with each other such band at various food sources where
> > their separate annual migratory circuits overlapped.
>
>You have some good ideas, but unfortunately they don't hold up to facts
>which we currently have.  The situation you describe still exists in many
>parts of the world, and the people use a language every bit as complex as
>the ones we have.  I'm thinking specifically of the Inuit languages, which
>are stretched in a series of languages from Alaska all the way across
>northern Canada (I think).  Each region speaks a dialect nearly identical
>with the dialects around it, but mutual intelligibility decreases linearly
>the further you go from your starting point.  And these languages are some
>of the most complex and difficult languages known (from a European
>perspective.)
Actually, it stretches all the way to Greenland. It's also debateable
whether there's any language border thru' Alaska - you could say the
conintuum goes all the way to Chukchia in that direction.

                                                      Andreas

                                                  Andreas
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