Comparative method

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The '''comparative method''' is a procedure used in historical [[linguistics]] to determine whether two or more languages are related, and to reconstruct their common ancestor. The comparative method involves demonstrating the existence of sound correspondences by which certain sounds in one language regularly correspond to other sets of sounds in the other. Though the comparative method is the foundation of historical linguistics, many [[Pseudolinguistics|pseudolinguists]] have never even heard of it.

==History==
The comparative method grew possibility of a relationship between the several languages of the [[Indo-European]] family, which was noticed early on by comparing word lists; but given the possibility of borrowing, onomatopoeia, and chance resemblances, comparing lists of words is an insufficiently rigorous method of determining language classifications.  The comparative method attempts to add testable [[hypotheses]] and greater certainty to the uncovering of language families.  It depends on an insight from a group of late 19<sup>th</sup> century philologists called the {{wpl|Neogrammarians}} such as Karl Brugmann, who observed that sound changes were '''regular''' and could be reconstructed as the application of phonetic laws on the original forms.
==Methodology==
The application of the comparative method in the reconstruction of a proto-language entails several steps.<ref name="campbell"/>{{rp|111-132}}

First, gathering a list of possible cognates from the languages in question (usually basic vocabulary, as these have a lesser tendency to be borrowed).

Second, analyzing the words to determine whether there are any systematic sound correspondences (or sound laws) between the two sets.

Third, reconstructing the original forms (or proto-sounds) of the sounds being compared. This may take several factors into consideration, including directionality (the idea that some sound changes tend to occur in a given direction, but not vice-versa), the numbers of languages in which the sounds are found (a sound found in most of the languages in question is more likely to be the original proto-sound), and economy (postulating a reconstruction that would involve the smallest number of phonetic changes in its descendants<ref group=note>E.g., rather than reconstructing an original <nowiki>*</nowiki>ʃ becoming /k/ in three languages and remaining /ʃ/ in another, reconstructing the phonetic evolution of the proto-sound as an original <nowiki>*</nowiki>k evolving into /ʃ/ in only one language and remaining unchanged in the rest.</ref>).

Fourth, analyzing any similar correspondence sets. For instance, one sound correspondence may have an original sound <nowiki>*</nowiki>p remaining /p/ in three languages and evolving into /b/ in the remaining language, while another may have a proto-sound <nowiki>*</nowiki>p remaining /p/ in two languages, becoming /b/ in another, and /v/ in the last one. In such cases, it must be determined whether the difference is due to conditioning (e.g., <nowiki>*</nowiki>p changing into /v/ only before certain vowels), or due to there being in fact two separate phonemes in the proto-language.

Fifth, determining whether the phoneme inventory of the reconstructed proto-language is plausible. Languages tend to have symmetrical phonologies, and a symmetrical reconstruction would be preferred. For instance, it would be unlikely for a language to possess the voiceless stops /p/, /t/, and /k/, but only two voiced counterparts /b/ and /g/. Additionally, some types of phoneme inventories never occur (for instance, there are no languages without vowels).

Sixth, using the reconstructed proto-sounds to reconstruct morphemes or words in the proto-language.

==The regularity of sound change==
The comparative method is based on the assumption that sound change is regular. That is, at various points in a language's history, sounds in languages undergo sound changes (which may be influenced by the environment around the sound, a phenomenon known as ''conditioning''). An example might be all instances of a proto-sound <nowiki>*</nowiki>k before the phoneme /a/ becoming /tʃ/ in a daughter language. Such regularity allows historical linguists to determine whether certain languages are related, as well as to establish etymological connections between words in different languages. For instance, the [[Latin]] consonant sequence /ct/ regularly corresponds to /t͡ʃ/ in Spanish, /tt/ in Italian, and /pt/ in Romanian. Thus, the Latin no'''ct'''em is no'''ch'''e in Spanish, noa'''pt'''e in Romanian, and no'''tt'''e in Italian; o'''ct'''o corresponds to o'''ch'''o,<ref>[http://etimologias.dechile.net/?leche Leche]</ref> o'''pt''', o'''tt'''o; co'''ct'''us corresponds to co'''ch'''o,<ref>[http://www.acanomas.com/Diccionario-Espanol/71555/COCHO,-CHA.htm Cocho]</ref><ref>[http://www.etimonlau.com/monlau.php?word=cocho Cocho]</ref><ref>[http://es.wiktionary.org/wiki/cocho cocho], es.wiktionary.org.</ref> co'''pt''', co'''tt'''o; fa'''ct'''us corresponds to he'''ch'''o, fa'''pt''', and fa'''tt'''o;<ref>[http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/factus#Descendants Factus], Wiktionary.org.</ref> and pe'''ct'''us corresponds to pe'''ch'''o, pie'''pt''', and pe'''tt'''o.<ref>[https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/pectus pectus], en.wiktionary.org.</ref>

==Borrowing versus inheritance==
Such correspondences can come in handy for determining whether a word is inherited or borrowed. For instance, the Spanish words ''directo'' and ''contactar'' contain the original consonants /ct/ and were borrowed directly from Latin, without undergoing the sound shift of inherited words. (Cf. ''derecho'', which shows the expected change.) Indeed, it is often the case that a language will have both an inherited and a borrowed word from the same original source, as is the case with the Spanish ''dictado''/''dechado'' and ''causa''/''cosa''.<ref>[http://etimologias.dechile.net/?dechado Dechado]</ref><ref>[http://etimologias.dechile.net/?causa Causa]</ref> This may not be immediately apparent either from the meaning or the look of words, as evidenced by the English word "do", which is descended from the same Proto-Indo-European root as the Latin borrowing "fact" (which comes from ''facere'' – to make).<ref>[http://etymonline.com/index.php?term=factitious&allowed_in_frame=0 Factitious], Online Etymology Dictionary.</ref> It is through the comparative method that linguist Heinrich Hübschmann demonstrated that Classical Armenian was not an Iranian language, as commonly thought at the time, but rather a separate, non-Iranian branch of [[Indo-European]] with many Iranian loanwords.<ref>[http://www.utexas.edu/cola/centers/lrc/books/read12.html A Reader in Nineteenth Century Historical Indo-European Linguistics]</ref>

It is nevertheless the case that patterns can appear not because of historical sound changes having acted on an inherited word, but rather because of phonological adaptation of a loanword at the time of borrowing. A language, when borrowing words with phonemes it does not possess, may use the closest available sounds in its phoneme inventory. For instance, Maori lacks many of the sounds of English and predictably transforms certain English sounds into their closest Maori equivalent. Maori also does not allow consonant clusters or syllable-final consonants, and may consequently insert vowels in loanwords.<ref>[https://www.unc.edu/~jlsmith/ling523/datasets/maori-loanwords.pdf Māori loanwords from English]</ref><ref>[http://www.uklo.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/2014.2-Maori.pdf Maori Loanwords]</ref> These factors may sometimes lead to the Maori word differing radically in form from the original English word, as in ''hāhi'' (church), ''haina'' (China, sign), ''hanara'' (sandal), ''haki'' (flag), ''hiraka'' (silk), and ''huka'' (sugar).<ref name="campbell">{{Cite book |last=Campbell |first=Lyle |url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/263493207 |title=Language classification : history and method |date=2008 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |others=William John Poser |isbn=978-0-511-41450-3 |location=Cambridge, UK}}</ref>{{rp|79-81}} Similar phonological factors were behind the transformation of the English "Christmas" into the Hawaiian ''Kalikimaka''.<ref>[http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=2862 Mele Kalikimaka!], Language Log.</ref>

==The comparative method versus pseudolinguistics==
Many pseudolinguistic theories are created by amateur non-linguists who not only have no idea what the comparative method entails, but also are totally unaware of its existence. These pseudoscientists imagine that genetic relationships can be determined by merely listing similar words. This is a flawed methodology, however.

For one thing, lexical similarities are statistically ''certain'' to occur by chance. Because all languages have countless thousands of words, if you compare ''any'' two languages, even ones that have ''nothing to do with each other whatsoever'', many words will be similar just by chance. Similarly, if you take a given word (like "or"), it is to be expected that of the many thousands of different languages in the world, some or even many will express the same concept with a coincidentally similar pronunciation. Since languages (entities with countless thousands of words each) evolve, a word may split into different and often unrecognizable forms, and unrelated words may [[Coincidence|coincidentally]] come to resemble each other. It is simply not possible for coincidences not to exist. For instance, in the [[Australia]]n Mbabaram language, the word for 'dog' is ''dog''.  This is not evidence enough of a close relation between Mbabaram and English.  Mbabaram is a part of a language family in which the original word for 'dog' is ''gudaga'', and ''dog'' is its expected outcome in Mbabaram.<ref>[http://languagehat.com/dixon-the-word-for-dog/ Dixon:the word for dog] Language hat, January 12 2006</ref> By contrast, the English word ''dog'' originally referred to a specific kind of dog.  The original word for ''dog'' lives on in English as ''hound'', the ancient word cognate with German ''hund'' and Latin ''canis''.<ref>[[wikt:dog|dog]]; [[wikt:hound|hound]]</ref>

In addition, borrowing (either between the two languages or from a common third one) is another possible reason for lexical overlap. While listing large numbers of similarities in vocabulary, pseudolinguists simply assume that they must all be due to genetic relatedness, and more often than not completely ignore the possibility of borrowing.

Pseudolinguists who are completely clueless about historical linguistics are apt to dismiss [[Etymology|etymologies]] involving dissimilar words because of their perceived implausibility, but in reality, common origin does not necessarily lead to similarity of form, and similarity of form is not necessarily due to common origin. Through the comparative method, relationships can be demonstrated to exist between words that have no sounds in common.  Consider the Portuguese word ''chão'' (meaning "flat" or "floor"). If you look up its etymology up in a dictionary, you will see it comes from the Latin ''planus'' (meaning "flat").<ref>[http://pt.thefreedictionary.com/chao Chão]</ref><ref name=pichador>[https://web.archive.org/web/20091206114851/http://educacao.uol.com.br:80/dicas-portugues/ult2781u1080.jhtm ''Pichador'' deriva de ''piche'']</ref><ref name=palavras>[http://www.chironweb.org/wiki/images/HistoriaDasPalavras.pdf HISTÓRIA DAS PALAVRAS: ETIMOLOGIA], Mário Eduardo Viaro. ([http://docplayer.com.br/7787328-Historia-das-palavras-etimologia-mario-eduardo-viaro-usp.html Alternate source].)</ref>  A pseudolinguist would likely scoff at such a derivation, objecting that the words are completely different and coincide only in meaning; to the pseudolinguist, this proves that linguists are just grasping at straws and that "mainstream" linguistics is a sham.<ref group=note>Imagine someone who is ignorant about mathematics saying that the equations 3(x-2y-1) = 3x-3y+x-3y+3 and x = -6 can't possibly be the same because they "look so different", with "y just disappearing for no reason", and claiming that the willingness of "mainstream" mathematicians to accept such an absurd equivalence as valid is proof that mainstream mathematics is nonsensical [[Scientific dogma|dogma]]. This line of reasoning isn't a million miles away from the arguments of quite a lot of laymen who know nothing about the rules of language change yet claim to have overthrown all of linguistics.</ref> But there is a method to the (apparent) madness. Let us take the consonants of the first syllable. Is pl>ch a known Latin-Portuguese sound correspondence? Why, yes, it is.<ref name=pichador/> Examples of this sound change include '''pl'''uvia>'''ch'''uva (rain),<ref name=palavras/> '''pl'''orare>'''ch'''orar (to cry),<ref name=clclusters>[http://people.cas.sc.edu/deholt01/papers/Holt_WECOL_1996.pdf The role of comprehension, reinterpretation and the Uniformity Condition in historical change: the case of the development of ''Cl'' clusters from Latin to Hispano-Romance], D. Eric Holt.</ref> '''pl'''umbum>'''ch'''umbo ([[lead]]),<ref name=gramatica>[http://www.portuguesxconcursos.com.br/p/ortografia-oficial-gramatica-portuguesa.html Ortografia Oficial]</ref> '''pl'''aga>'''ch'''aga (sore, wound),<ref name=clclusters/> '''pl'''icare>'''ch'''egar (to fold; to arrive),<ref name=clclusters/><ref>See [http://www.nativlang.com/romance-languages/grammar/pronunciation.php Pronunciation of Romance (Phonology)] for examples of Latin-Romance voicing of stops (e.g., c>g).</ref><ref>[http://www.nativlang.com/romance-languages/sound-correspondences.php Sound correspondences among Romance languages]</ref> '''pl'''ūmācium>'''ch'''umaço (cushion, stuffing),<ref>[https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/chumaço#Portuguese chumaço], en.wiktionary.org.</ref> and '''pl'''enum>'''ch'''eio (full).<ref name=gramatica/> The sound shift enus>eio is also exhibited  in the words ali'''enus'''>alh'''eio''' ("of someone else").<ref>[https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/alienus Alienus] Wiktionary</ref> There are also sound correspondences by which the Latin -''anus'' and -''anis'' become  ''ão'' in Portuguese, such as in s'''anus>'''s'''ão''' (healthy), v'''anus'''>v'''ão''' (empty, vain), m'''anus'''>m'''ão''' (hand), c'''anis'''>c'''ão''' (dog), and p'''anis'''>p'''ão''' (bread).<ref name=historiadalingua>[https://www.passeidireto.com/arquivo/6704215/paul_teyssier_-_historia_da_lingua_portuguesa1/8 Paul_Teyssier_-_História_da_Língua_Portuguesa]</ref><ref name=palavras/><ref>[https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/v%C3%A3o vão], en.wiktionary.org.</ref> Hence, if we take Latin-Portuguese sound correspondences into account, we find that ''chão'' is what we would get if Latin had passed ''planus'' on to Portuguese.

While some languages change faster than others, these methods suggest that as you move further into the past, the likelier it becomes that family resemblances drift further; eventually you reach a point where further relationships are no longer recoverable.  Suppose Hannibal had won the Punic War, and founded an empire mightier than Rome's; one that planted Punic everywhere from Iceland to Arkhangelsk to Bengal, and the only Indo-European languages that were left were contemporary spoken Scottish Gaelic and Sinhalese.  It would probably take a while before anybody even wondered whether those two might be related.  The existence of the relationship might still be recoverable, in some rudimentary way; but the elaborate reconstruction of Proto-Indo-European we now have would not be possible, and many actual cognates would be missed because of lack of the ability to recover any intermediate forms.  There comes a point where recovery of genuine relationships becomes impossible. This is why bulk comparison of vocabulary and invitations to see resemblances are, without more elaborate explanations, one of the signature features of [[pseudolinguistics]].

Language change follows certain rules, and the comparative method provides a way to determine what those rules are. To base etymologies simply on superficial similarity, as many pseudolinguists do, is not enough.

==See also==
*[[Indo-European languages]]
*[[Nationalist pseudohistory]]

==External links==
*[http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~jasanoff/pdf/Word%20games.pdf Word Games, The Linguistic Evidence in Black Athena], which includes an overview of the comparative method
*[http://www.ucd.ie/artspgs/langevo/compmethweek3.pdf Comparative method and linguistic reconstruction]
*[http://pkdas.in/JNU/hcl/cm.pdf Comparative method and linguistic reconstruction]
*[https://www.academia.edu/9535884/The_Comparative_Method The Comparative Method], Michael Weiss
*[http://www.elisanet.fi/alkupera/Hungarian.pdf Acquired stupidity epidemic in Hungary: Hungarian not a Uralic language?] by Jaakko Häkkinen, which lists a number of sound correspondences between Hungarian and Mansi
*[https://webdocs.cs.ualberta.ca/~kondrak/papers/cic03.pdf Identifying Complex Sound Correspondences in Bilingual Wordlists]
*[http://www.nativlang.com/romance-languages/sound-correspondences.php Sound correspondences among Romance languages]

==Notes==
{{reflist|group=note}}

==References==
{{reflist}}

[[Category:Assessing pseudoscience]]
[[Category:Language]]

Categories: Assessing pseudoscience, Language