Chpt. 7 Language Flashcards
Culture
The arts of human intellectual achievement regarded collectively
Language
Human ability to use complex systems of communication
Mutual Intelligibility
A relationship between languages where speakers of related varieties can understand
Standard Language
Public used language
Dialects
Form of language used in a particular region
Dialect chains
Set of dialects that are similar
Isogloss
Geographic boundary within a linguistic feature
Language families
Languages with fairly similar origins
Subfamilies
Commonalities or origins are more definite
Sound shift
Slight change in a word across languages within a subfamily
Proto-Indo-European
Language that’s traveled and changed through dialects
Backward Reconcontruction
The tracking of sound shifts “backward” toward the original language
Extinct Language
A language without any native speakers
Deep reconstruction
Using vocab from an extinct language in an attempt to rebuild it
Nostratic
Ancestral language to Kartnelian language of Southern Caucasus
Language Divergence
The splitting of one language into two languages
Language Convergence
The collapsing of two languages into one
Renfrew Hypothesis
Three languages in the Fertile Crescent
Conquest Theory
The Proto-Indo-European language spread on horseback
Dispersal Hypothesis
The tracking of the Proto-Indo-European languages to SE Asia
Romance Language Examples
French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Romanian.
Germanic Language Examples
English, Swedish, German, Norwegian, Danish.
Slavic Languages
Russian, Czech, Slovak, Bulgarian.
Lingua Franca
Frankish language applied in the Mediterranean for trading
