The world's languages- where'd they all come from?

[blakerussell]

I'm in a literary criticism course this semester, and our professor made mention of their being 8000 languages in the world. This kind of got me thinking about some things. Yes, I'm an english major, but this question is totally out of my focus.

I suppose my question would be this- how in the world did we get where we are with 8000 languages in roughly 4000 years? I know God confused the languages in babel, and before that, I believe in Genesis 10, there was mention of people forming in groups each with their own languages.

I don't at all know what is constituted as a language either. For all I know, by his definition, a different dialect of one language could be a "distinct" language itself. I would love to hear your guy's thoughts on this though and perhaps create a conversation that tries to understand the development of all these languages in a biblical framework.

-Blake Russell.

 

[Pergamum]

It is hard to appreciate the speed of language change when we have had our own language reduced into writing and standardized to some measure (thus freezing it) for hundreds of years now.

Where languages are not yet reduced into written form, especially in remote or isolated clan areas where many small and hostile groups exist in states of mutual hostility interspersed with some trade and intermarriage, and where these groups are constantly themselves splitting due to violence, the rate of language change is pretty steep from generation to generation.

For instance, about 20% of those languages listed in the 8000 are in Melanesia and the island of New Guinea, just two regions. We also see thousands of different clans in these regions as well. There is much geographic division due to rugged valleys, rivers, etc, and there was much clan warfare as well.

After Babel and the dispersion of the races within the first 1,000 years of this confusion of the tongues, mankind would have trekked to India, China, New Guinea, Australia and the Solomon islands and splintered into multitudes of competing and hostile clans who, nevertheless, would have mainained some trade and intermarriage. Then these splinters would have turned into further splinters and then into further splinters.....until 6 to 8,000 different splinters now exist.

Even if we added another two thousand years for safe margin, we have plenty of time to get to 8,000 distinct languages. A Young Earth Creationist view of history is compatible with a plethora of human languages. What is more, languages sprang up fully formed and some of the oldest languages like Sanskrit are also some of the most complex, showing the great wisdom of the ancients and denying evolutionary hypotheses of language formation.

---------- Post added at 04:14 AM ---------- Previous post was at 04:05 AM ----------

p.s. You might want to look into the Ethnologue at Ethnologue, Languages of the World. It is an attempt to compile the world's languages into families and sub-families, an effort that helps yield clues regarding human migration. Couple this with the tracing of human haplo-groups (I think Nat Geo covered this last year and even prodcued an awesome map) and DNA mapping and we can get a sense of the speed and the approx route of human migration. Even secularists seem to start from Mesopatamia and spread outward, a scheme compatible with the Babel story.

 

[Pergamum]

p.s.s. It is true there are about 6,000 languages or so in the world, but also keep in mind that 95% of the world's population only speak the first 100. This shows that many languages rise and fall and become extinct (many have gone extinct this year and I know several groups of 20 speakers or less). These larger languages are more static while smaller languages change quicker (language innovations/changes have less distance to travel in order to fully saturate a smaller demographic).

 

[FenderPriest]

On a technical note, you may find wiki's article on Indo-European Languages helpful. While there are many different languages in the world, there are threads connecting most to a common source. For example, for whatever reason, many cultures have help on to "papa" and "mama" in some form to refer to their parents. Ultimately, the reason there are many different languages (and yet One Lord) is because people are created in the image of God and when on the earth, they inherently create language to image forth their God in responding to the glory (and horror, in a fallen world) of the world around them. I haven't gotten around to reading this book yet, but I think you may find some fascinating discussion in Vern Poythress's In the Beginning Was the Word: Language, A God-Centered Approach.

 

[TimV]

Perg we had one where there were just 9 speakers in Africa and here in the central coast of CA there's one with only 1 speaker.

 

[Skyler]

Ebonics, on the other hand, is a new language rising right here in America. It may well be a language in its own right after only a couple hundred years' development.

 

[Notthemama1984]

It might as well be its own language. I can't understand half of it.

 

[Pergamum]

On a technical note, you may find wiki's article on Indo-European Languages helpful. While there are many different languages in the world, there are threads connecting most to a common source. For example, for whatever reason, many cultures have help on to "papa" and "mama" in some form to refer to their parents. Ultimately, the reason there are many different languages (and yet One Lord) is because people are created in the image of God and when on the earth, they inherently create language to image forth their God in responding to the glory (and horror, in a fallen world) of the world around them. I haven't gotten around to reading this book yet, but I think you may find some fascinating discussion in Vern Poythress's In the Beginning Was the Word: Language, A God-Centered Approach.

The reason for the universality of words that sound like 'mama" or "papa" (or bapa or abba) for mother and father is that these simple sounds are some of the first formed by infants. There is a physiological reason.

 

[travstar]

I thought we'd all be speaking Esperanto by now. And where's my flying car?

 

[blakerussell]

Hey pergamum, thanks for all the information. Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on how you look at it) all the information you gave gives me more questions than answers.
How long does it take for a language to change to the point where it becomes it's own language? From my studies in linguistics and language formation, we assign words to specific objects or words, so it would make sense how one group of people would have different words than others as their experiences vary.

I guess another question would be, do many languages have the same series of pronouns? I'll take your example of tribes splintering in New Guinea. Suppose a tribe splinters off into two sections. Both sections have the same language, but eventually it becomes different like you suggested- would these languages use the same or different pronouns?

And, what is the definition of a language. Are different dialects of the same language, a different language on it's own. Someone mentioned ebonics as an example I think...

Once again, thanks for all the replies. As you can tell, they've been thought provoking.

 

[Pergamum]

Blake,

Those are all good questions that are hard to answer. The Ethnologue lists approx 6,800 languages, but some of these may be dialects. Also, what do we do with things such a Creoles and Pidgins? And what of sign languages (there is not even one universal sign language but a number of them).

What do you mean by same pronouns? Like 1st person singular, 2nd person singular, etc? If so, yes, pronouns seem to be a language universal.

Concerning missions and evangelism and the spread of the Gospel this issue of language is a vital one. If the Gospel must penetrate every dark barrier or obstacle, then language is one of the key boundaries that must be crossed with the Gospel and so missionaries must become acquainted with the importance of linguistic and cultural differences. This is one reason why traditional seminaries are not adequate alone to prepare missionaries to cross linguistic/cultural barriars and why missionary candidates must get add-on training before being sent. Also, if language and identity go hand-in-hand and we are to reach every ethne with the Gospel, then ethno-linguistic boundaries determine missionary strategy, placement of new personnel, etc. Also, if people respond to the Gospel and understand it more clearly when the Gospel is translated into their "heart-language" (the language that is most intimate to the user), then, again, we are to be very concerned about linguistic matters as Christians.

I am not sure when a dialect becomes its own language. Linguists differ. Some different languages within the same language family have similar grammars and sounds and similar words. Also, some dialects that are mutually intelligible are not "owned" by neighboring clans and are considered "foreign" to them ("yes, we can understand them and we can speak their language...but that is not OUR language") and so issues of identity occur much when speaking about language and language issues can become heated (take the issue of the Ebonics Bible, or what if mandatory Spanish language classes were mandated in every US public school).

 

[blakerussell]

Thanks again for the reply. I suppose at what I was getting at with pronouns would be this-
The pronoun we use to designate a male is he.
The french use Il.

Now- to clarify my question. Would these tribes who splintered off use the same group of pronouns they used before they splintered off, or did they come up with entirely new groups of pronouns. For example, the english language has changed a decent amount since the 1700's. One thing that hasn't changed and probably won't change would be our groups of pronouns. Those are kind of concrete. That make more sense?

 

[Pergamum]

I don't have the language data for all languages here, but different languages even within the same language family often or usually have different pronouns.

 

[blakerussell]

Huh. That's interesting. Definitely some things to chew on here.
Just trying to gain some knowledge on the subject for myself. My professor is pretty anti-bible and made some "jokes" about how it wasn't possible for all the languages we have to arise so quickly after the flood.

 

[Pergamum]

Your professor knows nothing of Melanesian languages then, and probably does not know much about linguistics. What course is this in? If studying linguistics clearly revealed the truth of the anti-biblical position, why is SIL and Wycliffe and other missisoanry orgs some of the premiere linguists in the world and often the first to study and chart remote cultures and record their languages? And why does even Noam Chomsky and other atheists attest to a "universal grammar" inherent in humans that would fit very well with the Biblical explanation that God created us as social creatures and language is part of our being made in the image of God? Also, why do even the ancient languages appear to us fully-formed and usually even more complex than our newer languages?

 

[blakerussell]

The course is a literary criticism course. Some good questions though.

 

[blakerussell]

His remarks weren't as pointed at the time it would've taken for all the languages we have discovered to arise given the time period of the flood, as much as it was pointed how it silly it seemed to him that all the languages arose from Noah's descendants (he made mention of Shem, Japheth, etc...)

Anyhow, His field of study was linguistics I think. His comments about all the languages arising from a small source didn't stump me as much as the comments about 6000+ languages surfacing in 4-6 thousand years.

That in particular made me go and a little bit of
If you were to average it out, that'd be 1-2 new languages a year. Of course, if languages really do change quickly when people splinter off and isolate themselves, that's not really a problem...

 

[TimV]

Blake just counting Bantu and Melanesian languages (leaving out dialects for now) by themselves you've got about 1200, and to my knowledge no one claims the so called mother language is any older than 3000 years. I agree with Perg and I doubt your teacher has even a good secular background in language history.

 

[blakerussell]

You guys are awesome. Thanks for the replies fellas.

 

[FenderPriest]

On a technical note, you may find wiki's article on Indo-European Languages helpful. While there are many different languages in the world, there are threads connecting most to a common source. For example, for whatever reason, many cultures have help on to "papa" and "mama" in some form to refer to their parents. Ultimately, the reason there are many different languages (and yet One Lord) is because people are created in the image of God and when on the earth, they inherently create language to image forth their God in responding to the glory (and horror, in a fallen world) of the world around them. I haven't gotten around to reading this book yet, but I think you may find some fascinating discussion in Vern Poythress's In the Beginning Was the Word: Language, A God-Centered Approach.

The reason for the universality of words that sound like 'mama" or "papa" (or bapa or abba) for mother and father is that these simple sounds are some of the first formed by infants. There is a physiological reason.

Yes, this is obviously true. However, my point is that there is similarity among many languages even among the formal parental terms "Father" and "Mother". Needless to say, the interesting factor is that most languages do run down into a universal root language, one we can only assume was the language of Noah.

 

[TimV]

Or 4, with Noah's three DILs all speaking different mother tongues.

When I was in PNG a 4 hour walk in either direction meant you had to bring a translator along. Perg will back me on that, I think. These guys looked the same, grew the same food and had relatively similar cultures but literally couldn't understand each other. As I said I've read that the Melanesian languages have a common ancestor 3000 years old, but in my example we're talking something that must have been closer to 300 years since they're part of a sub family of Melanesian.

I remember in German class watching a historical movie set in Germany 300 years ago, and the local magistrate having a translator present during the trial of a local peasant woman. I also once had a book with at least a paragraph of every Bible ever published in any language. The section on English dialects was interesting. They had a few verses of the Song of Songs, and If I recall correctly there were about a dozen examples of English regional translations of about 400 years ago, and they were almost different languages. Which reminded me that if there weren't large States facilitating regional commerce, easier geography and a unifying language England and Germany would be just like Papua New Guinea.

 

[Quatchu]

The evolution of language has allot to do with location as well, for instance Icelandic has remained almost unchanged since it was settled its the closest language on earth to Old Norse. Continental Scandinavian countries languages have changed drastically from old Norse as they have interacted with other languages from Europe. But Iceland because of its isolated location has remained virtually unchanged.

Its like English which really began with Anglo Saxon (also its called Old English) it truly is another language. Almost a thousand years ago the Normans who were French invaded England and over time French, Anglo Saxon and probable a small bit of the Celtic languages merged together to form Middle English (more commonly known as Elizabethan). Hundreds of years then of contact with other countries formed modern English.

In north america we are seeing the beginnings of this merger of language in the US you have Spanglish, in Canada Franglish, i lived in Korea for a time and there you have Konglish. Right now we might say that these are just impurities of regular languages but in time we might see English change drastically from Spanish influence.

I'm constantly amazed at how language is ever changing, and never the same for long.

 

[Pergamum]

Justin: I second everything you say but object to the word "impurities" because I take a descriptive approach to language instead of prescriptive. I take language as it is and I accept that it is ever changing and I do not bemoan those changes (or "impurities").

 

[Pergamum]

Here is another link of interest:


Language Hotspots - Western Melanesia

 

[Quatchu]

Pergamum i completely agree with you and i probable should of been more clear on the impurities comment. I was was speaking about people who may view such changes as impurities.