Re: Tolkien's notion of biology

From:    Benct Philip Jonsson <bpj@...>
> A friend commented thus on the link
> that started this thjread:
>
> >  I didn't quite see the linguistic element in
> > this critique of "ethnicity" in Middle-earth.
> > Given that we have Dunedain (and some Hobbits)
> > speaking Sindarin, while Elves, Dwarves, Orcs,
> > Hobbits and Rohirrim are speaking Common Speech,
> > and that neither "Elf" nor "Orc" maps neatly onto
> > a single language, and "Hobbit" doesn't map at all,
> > I have to wonder whether the author is confusing
> > Tolkien with Dungeons and Dragons.  Hm.
Far be it from me to speak for the author of the blog-entry,
but I would stop to point out two things:

(1) It's quite possible that Mr. Liberman was unaware of
that any mixing of language and race existed at all in
Tolkien's world.
(2) Even if he is thus aware, it is surprising that there
is not significantly more mixing of races and language.
The so-called races that exist in this world are thoroughly
and completely mixed: the indigenous people of America can
be sorted into three distinct genetic grouping (cf. Cavalli
Sforza 1997?), and yet they are, pace Greenberg, divided into
no less than many dozens of completely unrelated language
families. The inverse can also be true:  while Africa is
home IIRC to five of the six major genetic subgroupings of
_Homo sapiens sapiens_, it is home to no more than four
major language phyla (Afro-Asiatic, Niger-Congo, Khoisan,
Nilo-Saharan).  Given the length of time humans have inhabited
Africa, this is perhaps somewhat surprising.

.. the point to take home being that Tolkien's world does not
have such a profound mismatch.

 =========================================================================
Thomas Wier            "I find it useful to meet my subjects personally,
Dept. of Linguistics    because our secret police don't get it right
University of Chicago   half the time." -- octogenarian Sheikh Zayed of
1010 E. 59th Street     Abu Dhabi, to a French reporter.
Chicago, IL 60637

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