Amerind languages

Encyclopedia : A : AM : AME : Amerind languages

Amerind is one of the three main families in Joseph Greenberg's controversial classification of all Native American languages, obtained by his mass lexical comparison method — the other two being the widely accepted Na-Dené and Eskimo-Aleut families. These three groupings represent three distinct waves of migration in Greenberg's theory, with all American languages outside the Na-Dene and Eskimo-Aleut family being part of Amerind. His classification was laid out in a controversial book published in 1987, Language in the Americas.

Greenberg's proposal is generally rejected by historical linguists for two reasons:

The method by which he claims to have demonstrated the relationship, mass lexical comparison, is known to be unsound in that it cannot distinguish chance resemblances from those due to a historical relationship among the languages and in that it provides no means of distinguishing resemblances due to common descent from those due to language contact.
The data on which his claim is based contains an excessively large number of errors. Those who have reviewed his data for languages in which they have expertise typically estimate that fifty percent of the data is in error. In some cases, 100% of his data is erroneous.

A further problem is that he used many old and obscure sources but in violation of normal scholarly standards did not provide citations for the data that he used, making it extremely difficult to check.

The term is also occasionally used to refer (broadly) to the various indigenous languages of the Americas. Some linguists use Amerindian in this sense so as to avoid confusion with Greenberg's proposed language family.

References

Adelaar, Willem F. H. (1989). [Review of Greenberg, Language in the Americas]. Lingua, 78, 249-255.
Berman, Howard. (1992). A comment on the Yurok and Kalapuya data in Greenberg's Language in the Americas. International Journal of American Linguistics, 58 (2), 230-233.
Bonnichsen, Robson; & Steele, D. Gentry (Eds.). (1994). Method and theory for investigating the peopling of the Americas. Peopling of the Americas publications. Corvallis, OR: Oregon State University, Center for the Study of the First Americans. ISBN 0-9129-3309-7.
Campbell, Lyle. (1988). [Review of Language in the Americas, Greenberg 1987]. Language, 64, 591-615.
Campbell, Lyle. (1997). American Indian languages: The historical linguistics of Native America. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-509427-1.
Chafe, Wallace. (1987). [Review of Greenberg 1987]. Current Anthropology, 28, 652-653.
Goddard, Ives. (1987). [Review of Joseph Greenberg, Language in the Americas]. Current Anthropology, 28, 656-657.
Goddard, Ives. (1990). [Review of Language in the Americas by Joseph H. Greenberg]. Linguistics, 28, 556-558.
Goddard, Ives. (1996). The classification of native languages of North America. In I. Goddard (Ed.), Languages (pp. 290-323). Handbook of North Americans Indians (Vol. 17). Washington, D. C.: Smithsonian Institution.
Goddard, Ives (Ed.). (1996). Languages. Handbook of North American Indians (W. C. Sturtevant, General Ed.) (Vol. 17). Washington, D. C.: Smithsonian Institution. ISBN 0-1604-8774-9.
Goddard, Ives; & Campbell, Lyle. (1994). The history and classification of American Indian languages: What are the implications for the peopling of the Americas?. In R. Bonnichsen & D. Steele (Eds.), Method and theory for investigating the peopling of the Americas (pp. 189-207). Corvallis, OR: Oregon State University.
Golla, Victor. (1987). [Review of Joseph H. Greenberg: Language in the Americas]. Current Anthropology, 28, 657-659.
Golla, Victor. (1988). [Review of Language in the Americas, by Joseph Greenberg]. American Anthropologist, 90, 434-435.
Greenberg, Joseph H. (1960). General classification of Central and South American languages. In A. Wallace (Ed.), Men and cultures: Fifth international congress of anthropological and ethnological sciences (1956) (pp. 791-794). Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.
Greenberg, Joseph H. (1987). Language in the Americas. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
Greenberg, Joseph H. (1987). Language in the Americas: Author's précis. Current Anthropology, 28, 647-652.
Greenberg, Joseph H. (1989). Classification of American Indian languages: A reply to Campbell. Language, 65, 107-114.
Greenberg, Joseph H. (1996). In defense of Amerind. International Journal of American Linguistics, 62, 131-164.
Kimball, Geoffrey. (1992). A critique of Muskogean, 'Gulf,' and Yukian materials in Language in the Americas. International Journal of American Linguistics, 58, 447-501.
Matisoff, James. (1990). On megalo-comparison: A discussion note. Language, 66, 106-120.
Mithun, Marianne. (1999). The languages of Native North America. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-23228-7 (hbk); ISBN 0-521-29875-X.
Poser, William J. (1992). The Salinan and Yurumanguí data in Language in the Americas. International Journal of American Linguistics, 58 (2), 202-229. [PDF]
Rankin, Robert. (1992). [Review of Language in the Americas by J. H. Greenberg]. International Journal of American Linguistics, 58 (3), 324-351.

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