Swadesh list

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A Swadesh list is one of several prescribed lists of basic meanings and vocabulary developed by Morris Swadesh in the 1940-50s, which is used in lexicostatistics (quantitative language relatedness assessment) and glottochronology (language divergence dating).

1 Usage in lexicostatistics and glottochronology
2 Swadesh list in English
3 References
4 External links
5 See also

[edit] Usage in lexicostatistics and glottochronology

The Swadesh word list may be used in lexicostatistics and glottochronology to determine the approximate date of first separation of genetically related language, though other lists may be used. The closeness of the relationship of the languages is suggested to be roughly proportional to the number of cognate words present in the list. The reason that a fixed set of concepts is used, rather than a list of arbitrary words, is that the basic vocabulary learned during early childhood is assumed to change very slowly over time. Note that the task of counting the number of cognate words in the list is far from trivial, and may be subject to dispute, because cognates do not necessarily look similar, and recognition of cognates presupposes knowledge of the sound laws of the respective languages. For example, English 'wheel' and Hindi 'cakra' are cognates, although they are not recognizable as such without knowledge of the history of both languages. Also, even in cases where the number of cognates is undisputed, use of Swadesh lists for dating is disputed, because of the underlying assumption that the rate of replacement of basic vocabulary is constant over long periods of time. While Swadesh lists are a useful tool to get a rough idea, mainstream historical linguistics is usually very sceptical about claims of relatedness based on Swadesh lists exclusively.

The use of Swadesh lists in glottochronology was most popular during the 1960s and 1970s, after which enthusiasm waned and the discussion of the method's merit became emotional, leading to a temporary demise of the method. Refinements since the early 1970s include the incorporation of a geographical dimension into the equations, accounting for borrowing.

A recent example of the use of Swadesh lists for absolute dating is the study of Gray and Atkinson (2003), calculating a tree of Indo-European languages with absolute dates for its nodes, using Bayesian principles, dating the Proto-Indo-European language to ca. 7000 BC (see Indo-Hittite). The study is based on the 200-word form, already early abandoned by Swadesh for suspect with too many borrowed items. This list has additionally been shown to be very unreliable (cf. Embleton 1995. Swadesh later introduced a 100 item list which he considered more universal and culture-free. Because of the false underlying assumptions, refuted by Historical Linguists (cf. e.g. Campbell 1998:177ff), the work is generally not accepted.

[edit] Swadesh list in English

Below is the Swadesh list of 207 words in the English language. For a Swadesh list that compares English, French, German, Italian, Spanish, Dutch, Esperanto, Swedish, and Latin (with links to other lists in other languages), see Wiktionary:Swadesh list.

I
you (singular)
he
we
you (plural)
they
this
that
here
there
who
what
where
when
how
not
all
many
some
few
other
one
two
three
four
five
big
long
wide
thick
heavy
small
short
narrow
thin
woman
man (adult male)
man (human being)
child
wife
husband
mother
father
animal
fish
bird
dog
louse
snake
worm
tree
forest
stick
fruit
seed
leaf
root
bark
flower
grass
rope
skin
meat
blood
bone
fat (n.)
egg
horn
tail
feather
hair
head
ear
eye
nose
mouth
tooth
tongue
fingernail
foot
leg
knee
hand
wing
belly
guts
neck
back
breast
heart
liver
drink
eat
bite
suck
spit
vomit
blow
breathe
laugh
see
hear
know
think
smell
fear
sleep
live
die
kill
fight
hunt
hit
cut
split
stab
scratch
dig
swim
fly (v.)
walk
come
lie
sit
stand
turn
fall
give
hold
squeeze
rub
wash
wipe
pull
push
throw
tie
sew
count
say
sing
play
float
flow
freeze
swell
sun
moon
star
water
rain
river
lake
sea
salt
stone
sand
dust
earth
cloud
fog
sky
wind
snow
ice
smoke
fire
ashes
burn
road
mountain
red
green
yellow
white
black
night
day
year
warm
cold
full
new
old
good
bad
rotten
dirty
straight
round
sharp
dull
smooth
wet
dry
correct
near
far
right
left
at
in
with
and
if
because
name

[edit] References

Campbell, Lyle. (1998). Historical linguistics; An Introduction. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
Embleton, Sheila (1995). Review of ‘An Indo-European classification: A lexicostatistical experiment’ by I. Dyen; J.B. Kruskal & P.Black. TAPS Monograph 82-5, Philadelphia. in Diachronica 12-2/1992:263-68.
Gray, Russell D.; & Atkinson, Quentin D. Language-tree divergence times support the Anatolian theory of Indo-European origin, Nature, 426.
Gudschinsky, Sarah. (1956). The ABC's of lexicostatistics (glottochronology). Word, 12, 175-210.
Hoijer, Harry. (1956). Lexicostatistics: A critique. Language, 32, 49-60.
Swadesh, Morris. (1950). Salish internal relationships. International Journal of American Linguistics, 16, 157-167.
Swadesh, Morris. (1952). Lexicostatistic dating of prehistoric ethnic contacts. Proceedings American Philosophical Society, 96, 452-463.
Swadesh, Morris. (1955). Towards greater accuracy in lexicostatistic dating. International Journal of American Linguistics, 21, 121-137.
Swadesh, Morris (1972). What is glottochronology? In M. Swadesh, The origin and diversification of languages (pp. 271–284). London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.