[Xmca-l] Re: no primitive language?
Andy Blunden
ablunden@mira.net
Sat Dec 27 18:46:24 PST 2014
Thank you all for your authoritative responses to my question.
I have a follow up.
Do we know if there any ancient culture which does not have some kind
metaphysics, religion - polytheistic or monotheistic or practical, or
other like system of making sense of the universe?
Andy
------------------------------------------------------------------------
*Andy Blunden*
http://home.pacific.net.au/~andy/
mike cole wrote:
> Perhaps of interest with respect to Piraha?
> mike
>
> ------------------------
> http://www.ascentofhumanity.com/chapter2-7.php
>
> On Sat, Dec 27, 2014 at 2:45 PM, David Kellogg <dkellogg60@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>> Martin:
>>
>> I think you do know more about this than I do, but none of us knows enough.
>> The whole problem with the Piraha debate is that the data is just not
>> accessible to us, because there are so few people who understand Piraha and
>> who understand some other language, and there are--as far as I can figure
>> out--no people who both understand Piraha and some other language and
>> understand that the distinction between morphemes and words is a
>> conventional one based on Standard Average European, and so is the
>> distinction between words and clauses. Even if there were such persons,
>> there are none who understand that the distinction between a clause and a
>> turn in a dialogue is largely an artifact of written language.
>>
>> As far as I know, nobody is claiming that Piraha is not dialogically
>> recursive--that is, nobody is saying that you cannot refer to what someone
>> just said in Piraha. That is enough, for me, to prove that Piraha is
>> recursive: that, had we world enough and time, Piraha can say anything that
>> needs to be said in Piraha. So Piraha is a language which (like Hawaiian)
>> has a rather austere and economical sound system, a lexicon perfectly
>> adapted to its environment, and the ability to produce an infinitely long
>> dialogue we call culture. Can infinity ever be called primitive?
>>
>> David Kellogg
>> Hankuk University of Foreign Studies
>>
>> On 27 December 2014 at 20:57, Martin John Packer <mpacker@uniandes.edu.co>
>> wrote:
>>
>>
>>> David, I know you know more about this than I know.... but the debate
>>> today centers on the Pirahã, no? Do they have color terms? Do they have
>>> number terms? Do they have recursion?
>>>
>>> Martin
>>>
>>> On Dec 27, 2014, at 5:35 AM, David Kellogg <dkellogg60@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>> Well, of course Carol's really right, Andy. We need to say what we mean
>>>>
>>> by
>>>
>>>> primitive. Does it mean that the language is historically young? In
>>>>
>> that
>>
>>>> case, the most primitive language is probably modern Hebrew. Does it
>>>>
>> mean
>>
>>>> that the language is grammatically simple? Which aspect of the grammar?
>>>>
>>>> Let's take case, since this is Vygotsky's model for linguistic
>>>>
>> complexity
>>
>>>> in the Lectures. Annaluisa will tell you about Sanskrit's eight cases;
>>>> modern Tamil has seven; Greek and Latin had about six. Tsez, in the
>>>> mountains of the Caucasus, has 64 cases (mostly locatives).
>>>>
>>>> English is probably the most primitive languages in the world from this
>>>> point of view; it has a distinction between "I" and "me" and "he" and
>>>>
>>> "him"
>>>
>>>> but that's about it.
>>>>
>>>> David Kellogg
>>>> Hankuk University of Foreign Studies
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> On 27 December 2014 at 19:14, Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>> Thanks, Carol. :)
>>>>> I am OK from here then.
>>>>> Much appreciated.
>>>>> Andy
>>>>>
>>>>>
>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>>>>> *Andy Blunden*
>>>>> http://home.pacific.net.au/~andy/
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Carol Macdonald wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>> Syntax, semantics. pragmatics, phonology, discourse orientation: they
>>>>>> just give their own version of these aspects.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> On 27 December 2014 at 12:10, Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net
>>>>>>
>> <mailto:
>>
>>>>>> ablunden@mira.net>> wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Thanks, Carol.
>>>>>> Can those "key characteristics" be given in a few lines?
>>>>>> Andy
>>>>>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>>>>>> ------------
>>>>>> *Andy Blunden*
>>>>>> http://home.pacific.net.au/~andy/
>>>>>> <http://home.pacific.net.au/%7Eandy/>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Carol Macdonald wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Andy
>>>>>>
>>>>>> It's true. Languages all share key characteristics.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Carol
>>>>>>
>>>>>> On 27 December 2014 at 12:02, Andy Blunden <ablunden@mira.net
>>>>>> <mailto:ablunden@mira.net> <mailto:ablunden@mira.net
>>>>>> <mailto:ablunden@mira.net>>> wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I have heard, and I believe it to be the case, that there
>>>>>> is no
>>>>>> such thing as a "primitive language."
>>>>>> I am not talking about the "language" of children raised
>>>>>>
>> in
>>
>>>>>> isolation, or the "home sign" of deaf children, I mean
>>>>>> among the
>>>>>> languages of actual historical peoples.
>>>>>> I would just appreciate that if this is wrong, could
>>>>>> someone on
>>>>>> this list who knows about this kind of thing disabuse me.
>>>>>> Otherwise I will assume this to be factual.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Thanks
>>>>>> Andy
>>>>>> -- ------------------------------
>>>>>> ------------------------------------------
>>>>>> *Andy Blunden*
>>>>>> http://home.pacific.net.au/~andy/
>>>>>> <http://home.pacific.net.au/%7Eandy/>
>>>>>> <http://home.pacific.net.au/%7Eandy/>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> -- Carol A Macdonald Ph D (Edin)
>>>>>> Developmental psycholinguist
>>>>>> Academic, Researcher, and Editor Honorary Research Fellow:
>>>>>> Department of Linguistics, Unisa
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> --
>>>>>> Carol A Macdonald Ph D (Edin)
>>>>>> Developmental psycholinguist
>>>>>> Academic, Researcher, and Editor Honorary Research Fellow:
>>>>>>
>> Department
>>
>>> of
>>>
>>>>>> Linguistics, Unisa
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>
>>>
>
>
>
>
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