LINGUIS 155AC Lecture 18: Asian Languages in Asia and in the U.S.
13 Jan 2017
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Document Summary
Asian languages in asia and in the u. s. Austronesian - southern islands - philippines, mayla, small island people (samoan, Maori, fiji - born to u. s. is hawaiian) Dravidian - 4 languages (25% of language speakers of india) Cultural and political dominance through millennia of china. Japanese, koreans, and vietnamese employ literary chinese as normal form of written expression (thailand and india aswell) Use chinese roots in creating new vocabulary. Cultural and literary traditions overwhelmly influenced from china. Spread of han language (based on norman, 1988) 3000-2000 bc: (han speaking people): ancestral language in n china plain, along banks of yellow river. Next 1000 years: spread north and south. 770-476: (chunqiu period): evidence of dialectal diversity. In explicit references to dialects in texts and in clear dialectal differences. Dialect boundaries coincide more with natural boundaries than with political boundaries. Geographically isolated areas tend to preserve linguistic features. Greater & lesser seal: qin (chin) dynasty (221-207 bce)
