cleve callison’s blog

This is pretty cool:

New Zealand researcher Quentin Atkinson has published evidence that all human language may have originated in Africa, following the model of human population spread shown here. According to BusinessWeek, Atkinson’s study in Science

…analyzed the phonemes — distinct units of sound that differentiate words — used in modern speech and found that their pattern mirrors that of human genetic diversity.

As humans migrated out of Africa and began colonizing other regions, genetic diversity decreased. According to the study, phoneme diversity tended to decrease, too.

In other words, the farther languages developed from Africa, the fewer phonemes they possess. Think of the clicks and pops of the languages of southern Africa today versus the pretty much vowels-only speech of native Hawaiians.

We’ve known for well over a century about the origin and distribution of the Indo-European family of languages shown here, including English, a member of the Germanic branch. We know that Sanskrit pitar, Latin pater and English father all come from the same original. But efforts to connect other groups together by sound or word correspondences have been tenuous at best.

Atkinson’s research takes a completely different approach and so far many linguists — a pretty skeptical bunch on the whole — have praised the results as a breakthrough.

Images from Wikimedia Commons.