#Indo-Aryan languages

[molkolsdal]

The Inku Language

"Inku is an Indo-Aryan language spoken, at least historically, throughout Afghanistan by four of the country's nomadic communities: the Jalali, the Pikraj, the Shadibaz and the Vangawala.

Each of the four groups speaks a variety with slight differences compared to the others. According to their local tradition, their ancestors migrated in the 19th century from the Dera Ismail Khan and Dera Ghazi Khan regions of present-day Pakistan. Such an origin suggests that Inku may be related to the Saraiki language spoken there, though nothing is conclusively known.

The total population of the four Inku-speaking groups was estimated to be 7,000 as of the end of the 1970s. There is no reliable information about their present state, though it is unlikely that many have survived the subsequent upheavals in the country, and according to the entry in Ethnologue, which however may not necessarily refer to this language, the last speakers "probably survived into the 1990s".

Linguistic materials about the varieties spoken by the Shadibaz, Vangawala and Pikraj were collected by Aparna Rao in the 1970s, but they have not been published or analysed yet.

The following is an extract of a text narrated in 1978 by a man of the Chenarkhel subgroup of the Vangawala:

#the way i can understand most of this... #anyways this is all from wikipedia i havent had a chance to look at the references yet but there are a lot #i just couldnt contain my excitement at learning about a new language so i had to copy it all here for now #language #inku #afghanistan #indo aryan #dera ismail khan #saraiki #seraiki

[undedkat]

Do you ever think about how we have completely bastardized what the terms “Caucasian” and “Aryan” are supposed to mean?

#Caucasian is from the region of Caucasia which is Georgia Azerbaijan and Armenia #aryan is the ancient indo iranians #language evolves whatever this is evolving in a bad way #unded rambles #language

[eremin0109]

Learning Telugu as a Maharashtrian be like;

Mi means "I or me" in Marathi while it means "you or your" in Telugu.

*gives up immediately*

#JK I'm determined to learn this damn language #Na Peru Sakshi #SEE I'm fucking fluent #😭😭😭😭 #send help pls #Like aren't we supposed to be neighbours why are our languages so different!!???? #(ik it's because Marathi is an Indo-Aryan lang while Telugu is Central-Dravidian) #But STILL

[alvallah]

Iranians’ and Indian Muslims’ different relationships to European philology explain why the two conceived of their languages in such contrary ways. This divergence reveals the historical contingency of the two narratives. It was not inevitable that Iranian nationalism would adopt the philological model of linguistic continuity, which is made clear by comparison with Indian Muslims’ conception of Urdu as a mixed language.

This history leads to several conclusions.

First, what appears today as national culture – unique and discretely bounded – is the product of exchange with others from beyond the borders of the nation-state. This is certainly true of modern Iran. Nationalism, and what I call ‘Persianate modernity’, is the veneer that hides the very conditions of cosmopolitan cooperation and exchange that generated national culture in the first place. This suggests something about culture: it has no inherent politics, no predetermined trajectory.

Culture is an empty vessel that can be attached to all kinds of political projects. Cross-cultural exchange similarly can serve reactionary ends just as well as progressive ones. At the turn of the 20th century, exchange between Iranians and Indians served to alienate Indians from the history of Persian literature. More recently, the idea of Indian Muslims’ cosmopolitan origins has marked them as outsiders to India – a narrative adopted by India’s prime minister Narendra Modi and other Hindu nationalists to help marginalise and disenfranchise millions of Indian Muslims.

Nor is ‘indigeneity’ inherently progressive, a fact also illustrated by India’s Hindu nationalists. They now describe themselves as an indigenous population besieged by Muslim allochthones, ie foreign intruders. Indeed, we find the language of indigeneity taken up by ethno-nationalists elsewhere in the contemporary world – from the European Right, claiming to defend its indigenous culture against foreign refugees, to Jewish supremacists in Israel, who insist on their own indigenous roots in the land.

#persian #farsi #urdu #indo-iranian #indo-aryan #languages #asia #culture #south asia #west asia #islam #iran #india

[kahin]

"indian is such an ugly language" 1. not a language 2. you are a tar pit

#if u've ever heard like. any of the dravidian or indian indo-aryan languages. u wld know that is not true #fisher's lake!

[indo-europeans]

The first letter change from 'a' to 'i' in the words Andra to Indra and Aryan to Iran is a common phenomenon in Indo-Iranian languages called "Satemization." Satemization refers to the shift in pronunciation of the Proto-Indo-European (PIE) velar consonants (/k/, /g/, and /gʰ/) to palatal or postalveolar sounds (/s/, /ʃ/, and /ʒ/) in the Indo-Iranian branch of the language family. This change occurred in the Indo-Iranian language branch around 1500 BCE, which led to the development of the satem languages (such as Sanskrit and Persian) from the earlier centum languages (such as Latin and Greek).

#satemization #linguistics #sanskrit #iranian #avestan #hindi #indo european languages #languages #indo iranian #indo aryan

[meluhha]

#indo aryan #magahi #magadhi #bhojpuri #hindustani #languages #map #history #linguistics #buddhism #bihar #bengal #chattisgarh #orissa #asoka #sramana #samana #meluhha #india #south asia

[languagexs]

Exploring the Richness of Sinhala: Sinhalese Language of Sri Lanka

Unveiling the Captivating World of the Sinhala Language The Sinhalese language is a linguistic gem with deep roots in Sri Lanka’s vibrant culture and history. With its melodious tones and ancient origins, this Indo-Aryan language has fascinated linguists and culture enthusiasts alike. This article explores the fascinating intricacies of the Sinhala language, exploring its development, its…

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#accessibility #Colloquial Sinhalese #Cultural Significance #Indo-Aryan Language #Language Access #Language Evolution #Language Services #Language Shift #LanguageXS #Linguistic Diversity #Literary Sinhala #Pali Influence #Sanskrit Influence #Sinhala Alphabet #Sinhala Interpretation #Sinhala Language #Sinhala Script #Sinhala Translation #Sinhalese Speakers #SOV Word Order #Sri Lanka Heritage #Sri Lankan Culture #Subject-Object-Verb #Syllabic Script #Vedda Language

[landscapesscenerypeopleplaces]

tumblr_nj03ev2YAk1qz6f9yo1_1280

#language #linguistics #language families #germanic #indo european #indo iranian #indo aryan

[decolonize-the-left]

I think as a society we need to remember Nazis are something specific.

Their ideology is largely the debunked theory that races have inherent qualities (and thus one could objectivly be superior), pan-germanism, and then blended with a bit of American white supremacists.

We know this. It's recorded.

"As the Nazi Party's chief racial theorist, Alfred Rosenberg oversaw the construction of a human racial "ladder" that justified Hitler's racial and ethnic policies. Rosenberg promoted the Nordic theory, which regarded Nordics as the "master race", superior to all others, including other Aryans (Indo-Europeans).[93] Rosenberg got the racial term Untermensch from the title of Klansman Lothrop Stoddard's 1922 book The Revolt Against Civilization: The Menace of the Under-man." Source.

The result was an ideology that uplifted Aryan Germans and persecuted others (like Jewish ppl) similarly to how American soldiers persecuted the natives.

It's merely a subset of white supremacy.

I think we as a society would do a lot better if y'all stopped calling every white supremacist a Nazi because while every Nazi is a white supremacist not every white supremacist is a Nazi.

There are subsets of it and each BIPOC people from every single country on this planet will tell you that white supremacy is there, it might just be a little different for each of us isn't that right? And your white supremacists think they're better than ours don't they; that they're better than Everyone else, aren't they? That their uniquely justified in hating everyone else, yeah?

Language does matter and as the court case goes on and people are really seeing both sides for the first time, we are seeing the very powerful relevance of language.

Let's not be a people that started calling Zionists and especially Jewish Zionists Nazis; not since it was specifically that brand of white supremacy that's responsible for the Holocaust. Zionism isn't Nazism. It's incorrect, antisemitic, and disgusting to say it is. I just didn't know how to articulate why before.

We can denounce white supremacy and white supremacists without being antisemitic. I think using language like that would be better for solidarity worldwide as well, anyway. To link our oppression this way rather than saying it Needs to look a specific way to be valid or count as bigotry to someone else.

The article linked for white supremacy says non-white people can and do believe it in it btw. This is no surprise for a lot of us but some of my haters audience might benefit from knowing that.

So familiarize yourself with it so that at the very least you don't keep saying ignorant things on the internet.

#decolstw #white supremacy #whiteness #solidarity #racism #antisemitism #Islamophobia #antisemitic

[loving-n0t-heyting]

Once in the course of a political project that involves killing and/or imprisoning >0 ppl you start getting very invested in language cladistics you have got to ask yrself, "Am i really about to sacrifice someones life and freedom in the name of a particular theory of the linguistic parentage of sanskrit/formosan/whatever?" It doesnt help the ppl arguing this shit are usually doing it about some crackpot theory where the nationalist tail is clearly wagging the historical linguistic dog but i think prolly 0 ppl deserve to die in the name of hindi being indo aryan either, like it just does not matter that much yk

[knellennui]

Doctor Alto Clef Is Probably Not White

Dear SCP Foundation fandom, Doctor Alto Clef is unlikely to be white, or at least in the main canon and with his original author. The whole Francis backstory is frankly incredibly out of character and feels like a different character that his name was tacked onto for relevance and as a plot twist thing. Francis is generally incredibly well written, but Not At All The Same Guy.

In the main canon, IE the Clef-Kondraki incident, he is heavily implied to be THE BIBLICAL ADAM, in his interactions with the SCP who is clearly the Biblical Eve. She is canonically Middle Eastern, as are many Biblical figures both in the Bible itself and in the SCP canon. Clef converses with Eve in a language akin to Ancient Sumerian, fluently, and as if it is his first and most natural language. He also references Eden in other canon documents by the core Clef author.

PLEASE can we have more art of him as middle eastern! (You could make him lighter skinned going off of the one canon photo, you know, the one with the big ole rifle and his lovely DILF-esque tummy?) He's described as big-nosed and that's a feature that needs so much more love!!!

Often, in heterochromia, as he has, the brown or in his case "hazel" eye is the normal eye, with the blue one being the genetically mutated trait due to whatever condition causes said heterochromia, not to mention his condition likely being more anomalous than the usual genetic causes of heterochromia.

In terms of narrative symbolism, it makes the most sense for his third eye or aberrant secondary iris to be the green one, considering the color green being used in reference to reality benders and general symbolism in Western media as unnatural (when vivid), as magical and potentially villainous, and as ominous. (Think: Maleficent, Bruno Madrigal...etc)

Also! He is canonically fat and I am so so so sick of people erasing that about him. There is no excuse for that sort of erasure or for the 'inability' to draw larger bodies. His race is not explicitly stated in canon and is open to interpretation, however, due to his nature as heavily implied to be a pre-Christian biblical figure (Adam), I think it is most logical (as well as personally enjoyable for myself) to see him as Middle-Eastern Jewish (as opposed to Ashkenazic or Goy). He could easily be interpreted as North African, Middle Eastern, or even Central Asian, West Indian or Indo-Aryan, or an Ethiopian Jew.

#scp #scp fandom #scp foundation #scp fanart #scp shitposting #doctor clef #alto clef #dr clef #dr alto clef #scp doctors #scp dr clef #scp drama #scp dr kondraki

[theelderhazelnut]

Ombra's Biography

Warning: mentions of trauma, death, mental health problems

The image on the left is made with X-girl maker and the one on the right is made in artbreeder.

General Information

Full Name: Atoosa Aryan

Name Meaning:

Atoosa - Daughter of the Cyrus the Great, bestowing very richly

Aryan - Relating to or denoting peoples speaking Indo-European (or specifically Indo-Iranian) languages

Nicknames/Alias:

Ombra - widely used by Metalrealmers and her allies

Boss - given by her comrades

My soul - given by Quan Chi

Age: 33

Date of Birth: November 26th

Zodiac Sign: Sagittarius

MBTI: INTP/INTJ

Sex: Female

Gender: Demigirl

Pronouns: She/They

Sexuality: Demisexual

Species: Half-human, Half-Metalrealmer

Race/Ethnicity: Iranian

Country of Origin: Iran

Current Place of Residence: Metalrealm

Physical Appearance

Skin: Normal. and smooth. Pale ivory.

Height: 5'10 / 178 cm

Weight: 149 lbs / 68 kg

Eye Color: Abnormal light gray

Hair Color: Dark brown

Hair Texture: Thick, almost curly

Body Type: Muscular, hour-glass figure

Prominent Features:

Square face shape

Iron-jaw

Thick eyebrows

Broad Shoulders

Clothing Style: Ombra’s default outfit includes a black overcoat with a black vest which is secretly bulletproof, black pants and bottom-up shirt underneath the coat, and knee-high punk boots. These items can vary in their gothic and steampunk elements. In general, she prefers her outfits to be gender neutral.

Personality

Positive Traits: Mature, intelligent, understanding, patient, confident, logical, calculating

Negative Traits/Flaws: withdrawn, stoic, bloodthirsty, vengeful, gloomy, impious, stubborn, controlling, easily annoyed, remorseless, radical

Hobbies: playing chess, reading, traveling

Likes: playing chess, solving mysteries, studying, traveling

Dislikes: 98% of the people, dancing, singing, children

Goals: destroying the Cult of The Elder Gods, solving Falkus’s mystery

Fears: losing her political position and power in Metalrealm, losing Quan Chi

Health

Physical Health: Ombra has had an eye surgery as she used to be short-sighted. A few years ago, her jaw was severely broken, so instead of fixing it she replaced it with an iron one.

Mental Health: Ombra embodies symptoms of OCD, depression and ADHD. Due to her past trauma she gradually became murderous and bloodthirsty. Almost everyone is stupid in her view, so that’s another reason, beside being an introvert, why social interactions are usually intolerable for her. Since she was contanstly under control from both her parents and the society in her past, she eventually became a controlling adult. Ombra was born and raised among religious people and in a society ruled by religious beliefs, so the traumas turned her into an impious person who thinks religious people are stupid and close-minded.

Phobias: Thalassophobia

Professional Life

Education: Ombra was close to earning her Ph.D in psychology when she left to live in Metalrealm.

Professions: The president of the Interrealm Forces in the MRD Organization

Fighting Attributes

Abilities/Powers:

Ferrokinesis - Ombra has the ability to manipulate anything of iron or has iron in it. This includes distorting the shape of those materials, and creating iron out of thin air.

Heat and electricity manipulation (very limited) - iron is a heat and electricity conductor, so if Ombra turns her limbs into iron, she can manipulate them to her advantage.

Sound manipulation (very limited) - sound can travel through iron, so Ombra can sometimes make a use of it.

Blood manipulation (very limited) - due to iron existing in blood she can manipulate it to her advantage.

Skills:

Using melee weapons

Using rifles

Martial arts and self defense

Strengths:

Close-combat

Negotiable

Weaknesses:

Ranged-combat

High electricity pressure

Extreme heat

Strong soundwaves

Magnets

Weapons:

Melee weapons she created with her power

A gunblade

Relationships

Family:

Unknown father - deceased

Unknown mother - deceased

Older sibling: Gizem - alive

Friends/Allies:

Quan Chi

Gizem

Shinnok

Kano

Erron Black

Kabal

Noob Saibot

Havik

Shao Kahn

Menace @bisexualjohnnycage

Andrius Nils @scentedcandleibex

Sienna @loverofthewindgod

Zoe @zoetheneko

Dia @darialovesstuff

Enemies:

The Elder Gods

Hanzo Hasashi

Varian Hasashi @middlechildwhoescapedthebasement

Kuai Liang

Jax Briggs

Jacqui Briggs

Nightwolf

Kotal Kahn

Love Interest:

Quan Chi - lovers

Alternate Universe:

Lady Xuna @bisexualjohnnycage

Huepazu @huepazu

Valerie “Gorgon” Watson @poisonedtruth

Leila @takiisieju-moved

Alex Demir @chadillacboseman

Backstory

Atoosa Aryan was born in Hamedan, Iran among religious people whose lives were ruled by a religion centered society. Atoosa's family was considerably functional. She was a gifted kid who gradually became a perfectionist, and also a people pleaser thanks to her controlling mother who cared a lot about what others were thinking about them. Atoosa's powers were revealed when she was a toddler. Her powers were extremely weak, yet her mom constantly warned her to conceal it.

Atoosa used to be a cheerful and quiet energetic child, but growing up in an extremely male dominant country which was also torturing its people with poverty and increasing number of crimes, turned her into a reserved and stoic adolescent with a pretty low self-confidence.

In order to escape, save herself and create an ideal life Atoosa emigrated to Germany. She had been studying psychology for a year when her parents decided to pay her and her older sibling, Gizem, a visit. But the airplane was targeted by two rockets. Atoosa swore to find and punish anyone who was behind that incident.

Meanwhile, without her knowing anything, Metalrealmers were searching the universe for a certain half-metalrealmer to kill who was exactly Atoosa Aryan. Metalrealmers believed that their gene must not become impure as they wanted to preserve their magic. Raiden was also aware of this, so he also began to search only to find out that she lives in Earthrealm, and as its protector it was easier for him to uncover her identity. Raiden saw a great potential in her, so he decided to train her while also protecting her from Metalrealmers. Atoosa found this a great opportunity for her researches. Raiden let her live in the Sky Temple rent free, and asked Sonya Blade to train her.

Atoosa knew that Raiden wanted her to become a defender, and she despised that. She didn’t want to become an obedient soldier who would risk her life for honor and humans. But she took the opportunity to train and make herself stronger.

Eventually, the Metalrealmers discovered her location, and threatened Raiden that they would put up a war with the Sky Temple, if he didn’t give her to them. After a fight, the general of the Metalrealm’s army intervened, and informed Atoosa that if she proves herself to them, they can’t resist her powers which was superior to theirs. The god who was protecting their realm was vanished centuries ago, so they could use anyone who could offer some benefits. Atoosa asked them for equal civil rights, and they hesitantly agreed. Living in another realm and earning immense wealth, she had everything. However, she told Raiden that she only accepted their offer to avert a conflict in the Sky Temple.

After around three years, Atoosa earned the position of the president of the Interrealm Forces with the help of her calculated mind in the missions and the businesses. Although she had to be rightfully dead, she was exactly what Metalrealmers could ever ask for. Most of them hated her, but still showed their respects. They gave her a nickname that almost replaced her true name: Ombra. She basically suggested it herself. She once told them in a TV program that she was like a shadow. She didn’t elaborate because there was no need to. She continued her research until she found out that a cult was behind the airplane incident; a cult well-known to the people all around the world except a few countries including hers.

She was angry. Ombra was angry, and made her final decision to burn them into ashes, so she called her business partner, Kano, to execute her plan. This big step she took will lead her to unearth a harsh truth, and unexpectedly, find love.

#mortal kombat #mk #mk oc #mortal kombat oc #ombra the ironhead #quan chi #shinnok #havik #gizem #kano #erron black #kabal #noob saibot #shao kahn #hanzo hasashi #kuai liang #jax briggs #jacqui briggs #nightwolf #kotal kahn #raiden

[robintherobiner]

Dick and Damian bond over being different to their family.

Jason and Stephanie and Duke were born into the deepest, darkest corners of Gotham, while Tim and Bruce were thrust into galas and secrets and old-but-new money.

But they're all Gothamites at their core. They look up into the gloomy sky and feel at peace, they look down and feel calm, they walk around with the ache of Gotham in their blood, recognized or not.

Damian is half Pakistani. (Nanda Parbat (where the League of Assassins is set) is based on Nanga Parbat, the westernmost major peak of the Himalayas. While Gotham City is traditionally depicted as being located in the U.S. state of New Jersey. (Its look and atmosphere was mainly influenced by New York City, and Bill Finger said that he chose the name "Gotham", and not New York, so that all readers in any city could identify with it.) )

Dick is Romani. (In most cases, he's depicted as either a quarter or half Romani, but no matter how little, he IS Romani. I'm not entirely sure which subgroup he is (i'm not sure if subgroup is the right word, sorry), but according to Wikipedia its a Indo-Aryan ethnic group which most likely originated in India, but then they migrated into Europe so there's so many possible different places he could be from. I'm not entirely sure how this all actually works, so I don't know if theorizing which specific country/subgroup matters or not.)

Please note that I'm not talking skin colour in this post. Damian (in most cases) is depicted with tan/light brown skin, but Dick is almost always as white as the others. The only person (of my knowledge) in the batfam who is always shown as coloured is Duke. But he's not in this post because he is very much a Gothamite, regardless of his skin colour.

This is because skin colour does not entirely depend on the country you're from. I am white, and my friend is brown, but we are both fully Portuguese because all four of our parents are from Portugal.

I was raised in England, and I feel a strangeness whenever I am with my British friends because despite having the same skin colour, living in the same country, speaking the same language, i am different. But my friends difference is both inward and outward, if that makes sense.

I made this post because as someone who has recently realized this difference i feel, i want these fictional characters to feel it too.

So, sorry for the ramble, but I just want more fanfics where these characters take their difference (I don't know if race or ethnicity is the right word, but by difference I mean the fact that they are not fully Americans) and embrace it, whether they do it together or separately.

Thanks for coming to my ted talk.

#batman #batfamily #batfam #dick grayson #damian wayne #damian al ghul #is it al ghul or wayne? bc technically he has 2 last names but i keep seeing him as just wayne which annoys me deeply #do not deny the boy his heritage Bruce. he is not JUST your blood. #rant post #race and ethnicity #which one am i meaning in this post? I do not know. Someone tell me please!!! #gothamite #gotham #dc comics #dc universe #am i wrong here?

[gwendolynlerman]

Most spoken language in each country

I had to separate the legend from the map because it would not have been legible otherwise. I am aware that the color distinctions are not always very clear, but there are only so many colors in the palette.

The legend is arranged in alphabetical order and languages are grouped by family (bullet points), with branches represented by numbers and followed by the color palette languages within them are colored in, as follows:

Afroasiatic

Chadic (Hausa) — ocher

Cushitic (Oromo and Somali) — light yellow-green

Semitic (from Arabic to Tigrinya) — yellow

Albanian — olive green

Armenian — mauve

Atlantic-Congo

Benue-Congo (from Chewa to Zulu) — blue-green

Senegambian (Fula and Wolof) — faded blue-green

Volta-Congo (Ewe and Mooré) — bright blue-green

Austroasiatic (Khmer and Vietnamese) — dark blue-purple

Austronesian

Eastern Malayo-Polynesian (from Fijian to Wallisian) — dark brown

Malayo-Polynesian (Palauan) — bright brown

Western Malayo-Polynesian (from Malagasy to Tagalog) — light brown

Eastern Sudanic (Dinka) — foral white

Hellenic (Greek) — black

Indo-European

Germanic (from Danish to Swedish) — light blue (creoles in medium/dark blue)

English-based creoles (from Antiguan and Barbudan to Vincentian Creole)

Indo-Aryan (from Bengali to Sinhala) — purple

Iranian (Persian) — gray

Romance (from Catalan to Spanish) — red (creoles in dark red)

French-based creoles (from Haitian Creole to Seychellois Creole)

Portuguese-based creoles (from Cape Verdean Creole to Papiamento)

Slavic — light green (from Bulgarian to Ukrainian)

Inuit (Greenlandic) — white

Japonic (Japanese) — blanched almond

Kartvelian (Georgian) — faded blue

Koreanic (Korean) — yellow-orange

Kra-Dai (Lao and Thai) — dark orange

Mande (from Bambara to Mandinka) — magenta/violet

Mongolic (Mongolian) — red-brown

Sino-Tibetan (Burmese, Chinese*, and Dzongkha) — pink

Turkic (from Azerbaijani to Uzbek) — dark green

Uralic

Balto-Finnic (Estonian and Finnish) — light orange

Ugric (Hungarian) — salmon

* Chinese refers to Cantonese and Mandarin. Hindi and Urdu are grouped under Hindustani, and Bosnian, Croatian, Montenegrin, and Serbian are grouped under Serbo-Croatian.

#langblr #lingblr #spanish #english #french #german #catalan #russian #mandarin #hausa #somali #arabic #albanian #armenian #swahili #ewe #moore #wolof #vietnamese #samoan #palauan #malay #dinka #greek #tok pisin #hindustani #persian #haitian creole #papiamento #greenlandic

[best-non-english-word-torunament]

Statistics time!

So, I was procastrinating on finishing up the word descriptions (only 14 left!) and decided to do some statistics on the submitted words instead. I was expecting a lot of Indo-European languages and languages spoken in Europe, which was true. This is a bit sad, since most people on tumblr have the most exposure to Indo-European languages and I wanted to show more diversity. There is diversity, don't get me wrong, it's just heavily skewed. Let's look at some statistics! Image ID:s are in alt text.

As you see, over half of the languages are Indo-European, and three more are creoles where vocabulary is based mostly on Indo-European languages. LSF-ish is a sign language family! There are still 12 language families in 64 words, that's pretty good work!

This chart only showed languages, so let's look at the distribution of words over languages instead. The staples are colour coded with the same key as the last diagram to show language family. The order is different because I had sorted them by area instead of family

Based on this the distribution looks a little bit better: many of the Indo-European ones only have one submission while several languages from other families have more submissions. Six of the seven languages with four submissions are still Indo-European though.

Let's take a closer look at the Indo-European ones!

Only two of them are from the Indo-Aryan branch which makes up the majority of the Indo-Iranian branch, aka the Indo-European languages outside of Europe. Fun fact: Out of the 582 Indo-European languages, 320 of them belong to the Indo-Iranian branch. That is the majority. Why don't we talk about them more? (The answer is eurocentrism. Seriously, I knew they existed but not that they were this many until I started studying linguistics. The MAJORITY of the language family presented as the European one are spoken outside of Europe).

There are 8 Germanic languages in the tournament. This isn't that weird since they apparently make up 18% of Indo-European languages. I didn't know that until I made the maths right now, that's wild.

The Slavic branch is number two, but since they barely make up 4% of Indo-European languages it's a massive overrepresentation. I did not think there was such a big difference between Germanic and Slavic languages. For comparison, Romance languages make up 13%.

While still speaking of the Indo-European languages, is it a big family comparatively? According to Glottolog it's the third largest after Atlantic-Congo languages (1406 languages) and Austronesian languages (1271 languages). Notice how 587 is a much lower number? Anyway, most language families are much smaller so it's a big one.

Ethnologue on the other hand, says that Indo-European languages are number five on the list with 448 languages, after Niger-Congo languages (same as Atlantic Congo), Austronesian languages, Trans-New Guinea languages and Sino-Tibetan languages. Remember that post on what's a language and what's a dialect? This is an example of that, except that it also begs the question of how much proof you need to say a language belongs to a certain family. For example, the Trans-New Guinea family has many languages/language groups that might belong to it but linguists disagree or have too little proof. It's complicated. Honestly, I trust Glottologue more on this, it has sources and a focus on family classification.

Onto other subjects, namely geographical areas: We have established that there are lots of Indo-European languages here. But how about geographical distribution?

54% of languages in the tournament are spoken in Europe. Note that I've classified Portugese as spoken in America in this case, since the words were in the Brazilian Portugese dialect. Almost half the languages aren't spoken in Europe though, so that's still pretty good.

Unless? Let's compare this to data on the distribution of all languages and the distribution of population, data blatantly stolen from my professor's powerpoint:

Yeah. 4% of languages are spoken in Europe, yet 54% of languages in this tournament are from there. I miss African languages in particular, they make up 30% and yet there's only one in the poll (which is extra sad because many are very interesting linguistically speaking). There are also fewer Asian languages than one would suspect based on both number of languages and people. The American number needs comment too: only one of the languages in question is native american (Would that still be a correct term for a language in today's Mexico?).

Another interesting thing about the later two diagrams is Oceania: 1% of the population and 19% of the languages. At least half of New Guinea (Papua New Guinea, the Indonesian half might count as Asia?) should be included in that number, which can be part of why it skyrockets. 1050 of the world's 6500-7500 languages one one island (and the smaller islands surrounding it), most of the languages small. It's a fascinating place.

Anyways, I hope you enjoyed the statistical analysis! This was not meant as an attack on anyone who submitted Indo-European or European words since many of them are banger words, it was merely an observation of an expected outcome, based on the fact that the tumblr userbase is largely Western, so of course European languages will be the native language of many and overrepresented in submissions. Procastrination done, please tell me what you thought

#best non english word tournament #linguistics fun fact time! #info and logistics #please let me get my research motivation back now #i need it