LINGUIST List 9.1032

Wed Jul 15 1998

Disc: Comparative Linguistics

Editor for this issue: Martin Jacobsen <martylinguistlist.org>

Directory

1. Ralf-Stefan Georg, Re: 9.1024, Disc: Comparative Linguistics
2. Rick Mc Callister, Re: 9.1015, Disc: Comparative Linguistics

Message 1: Re: 9.1024, Disc: Comparative Linguistics

>There are several million bytes of data at my website, which I hope
>some of you may care to visit.

I have visited the said website, without finding an answer to my
question: which evidence is the "PL" "reconstruct" p?fo/p?fe
precisely based on, in terms of empirical reconstruction? On the
site, one can find the claim that such a morpheme is said to exist (or
rather to be assumed for the ancestor language of every other known or
unknown language of this planet), without any data this may or may not
be based on. Maybe it will be possible to present us after all with
this data in plain-text-format?


St. G.

Stefan Georg
Heerstrasse 7
D-53111 Bonn
FRG
+49-228-69-13-32

Message 2: Re: 9.1015, Disc: Comparative Linguistics

	Onomatopeoia, baby talk and technical loanwords are
proto-world. Yes, it's sounds silly, but it cuts the Gordion knot and
I suppose that the fact that we do pick up onomatopoeia and babies do
have the same basic set of phonemes does indicate a certain sort of
Proto-World. Not necessarily the same thing that Ryan and others have
in mind.
	So how about: mama, papa, bubble, gurgle, television,
assinine, etc.