Abstract
We show that, contrary to long-standing assumptions, syntactic traits, modeled here within the generative biolinguistic framework, provide insights into deep-time language history. To support this claim, we have encoded the diversity of nominal structures using 94 universally definable binary parameters, set in 69 languages spanning across up to 13 traditionally irreducible Eurasian families. We found a phylogenetic signal that distinguishes all such families and matches the family-internal tree topologies that are safely established through classical etymological methods and datasets. We have retrieved “near-perfect” phylogenies, which are essentially immune to homoplastic disruption and only moderately influenced by horizontal convergence, two factors that instead severely affect more externalized linguistic features, like sound inventories. This result allows us to draw some preliminary inferences about plausible/implausible cross-family classifications; it also provides a new source of evidence for testing the representation of diversity in syntactic theories.
Highlights
The Conceptual Roots of Parametric ComparisonA theory of human language aiming to be part of cognitive science should try to argue that the structural representations it proposes are: (i) learnable under realistic acquisition conditions; (ii) historically transmitted under the conditions normally expected for the propagation of culturally selected knowledge
We explore the relationship between the historical signal of different levels of linguistic analysis
We combine some methods of the quantitative revolution in phylogenetic linguistics1 with the deductive approach to syntactic diversity that has emerged since Chomsky (1981), and we ask if formal syntactic differences can serve as effective characters for taxonomic purposes, contrary to a long line of skepticism
Summary
The Conceptual Roots of Parametric ComparisonA theory of human language aiming to be part of cognitive science (see Everaert et al, 2015) should try to argue that the structural representations it proposes are: (i) learnable under realistic acquisition conditions; (ii) historically transmitted under the conditions normally expected for the propagation of culturally selected knowledge. We explore the relationship between the historical signal of different levels of linguistic analysis (referred to as Humboldt’s problem by Longobardi and Guardiano, 2009, and as the problem of the fabric of human history by Gray et al, 2010; see Greenhill et al, 2017) For this purpose, we especially try to assess the historical tree-likeness In pursuing these goals, we combine some methods of the quantitative revolution in phylogenetic linguistics with the deductive approach to syntactic diversity that has emerged since Chomsky (1981), and we ask if formal syntactic differences can serve as effective characters for taxonomic purposes, contrary to a long line of skepticism
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