Morphology in Sino-Tibetan Languages

Sino-Tibetan is a highly diverse language family, in which a wide range of morphological phenomena and profiles may be found. The family is generally seen as split into two major branches, i.e., Sinitic and Tibeto-Burman, but while Sinitic is a fairly homogeneous group in terms of morphology, the so-called Tibeto-Burman branch of the family includes isolating languages like Karen, languages with transparent and regular agglutinative morphology (Lolo-Burmese, Tibetic, and Boro-Garo), but also paradigmatically complex languages, with elaborate argument indexation and transitivity management systems; while in some languages morphological complexity is mostly a conservative trait (e.g., Rgyalrongic and Kiranti), other languages developed innovative paradigms, with only few vestiges of the archaic system (Kuki-Chin). Some notable morphological phenomena in modern Tibeto-Burman languages are verb stem alternation, peculiar nominalization constructions, and long sequences of prefixes, which in some languages (Chintang) may even be freely permutated without any relevant change in meaning. Also, while Sinitic languages are normally taken to be a prototypical example of the (ideal) isolating morphological type (with virtually no inflection, stable morpheme boundaries, no cumulative exponence, and no allomorphy or suppletion), phenomena of strong reduction of morphemes, blurring of morpheme boundaries and fusion between root and suffix, and nonconcatenative morphology, as well as allomorphy and (proto-)paradigmatic organization of morphology, are attested in some Chinese dialects, mostly concentrated in an area of Northern China (Shaanxi, Shanxi, Henan, Hebei, and Shandong provinces). Moreover, ‘Altaic-type’ agglutinative morphology, including case marking, is found in Sinitic languages of the so-called Qinghai-Gansu Sprachbund; in this case, the development of agglutination, as well as other typological traits (as SOV word order), is clearly the product of intense and prolonged contact between Northwestern Chinese dialects and Tibetic and Mongolic languages of China. On the other hand, Southern Chinese dialects have developed in closer contact with Hmong-Mien, Tai-Kadai, and Austroasiatic languages, and are thus closer to the typology of Mainland Southeast Asian languages, with a very strong isolating profile.

NICOBARESE LANGUAGES AND OLD KHMER: FORMS OF DEPENDENT PREDICATION

The aim of this article is to show that Nicobarese languages Car and Nancowry, which are modern vernacular idioms of the indigenous population of the Nicobar Islands, and Old Khmer — the language of epigraphic inscriptions of 7th–15th A.D., possess a considerable fragment of grammatical system, which coincides in almost every detail. That is the system of forms of dependent predication, i.e. synthetic forms with allomorphs of labial and dental infixes and analytical forms with the marker ta. This fact is somewhat challenging since Nicobarese and Khmer are distant relatives, typologically different, they have different status and temporal affiliation. Data analysis shows that forms with ta in Nicobarese and Old Khmer are used in the same types of dependent predications, i.e. in verb, adjective, noun, pronoun, numeral modifiers, in relative clauses and clauses of time and reason, as well as in sentences with rheme shift. Infixed forms in the languages under comparison underwent lexicalization. However, as a relic they are still used in dependent predications of some types. In the languages compared we find similar examples of variation and dubbing of means marking dependent predication which successively replaced one another on the diachronic scale, i. e. infixed forms and forms with ta, forms with ta and conjunctions. Coincidence of the functional domain of forms of dependent predication in Nicobarese and Old Khmer is unique and cannot be found anywhere else all over the Austroasiatic phylum. In other Austroasiatic languages those forms are either extinct, or preserved as lexicalized units, or else are found in odd relic functions, e.g. the possession suffix ta in Santali.

Morphology in Austroasiatic Languages

The languages of the Austroasiatic (AA) language family share a core set of derivational prefixes and infixes that are largely fossilized. Beyond these, there is a wide range of morphological features throughout these more than 160 languages. Of the 13 branches of AA, there is a geographically central concentration of branches with predominantly isolating morphology (Khmeric, Monic, Vietic, and Pearic), while geographically peripheral branches have more complex morphology (Aslian and Khasic), and some with inflectional morphology (Munda and Nicobaric). Other branches are typologically between, largely lacking inflectional morphology (i.e., systematic, productive grammatical morphology) but having a somewhat more complex range of morphological features (Katuic, Bahnaric, Palaungic, Khmuic, and Mangic), including those with some grammatical functions. Other than Munda and Nicobaric, most AA languages have iambic word-level stress and have only prefixes and infixes while lacking suffixes. This has resulted in a collapsing of older morphological material, while new affixes, with new morphosemantic functions, emerge. Alternating reduplication, in which complete prosodic templates are copied but various segments are alternated, is a common word-formation strategy and sometimes combines with prefixes and affixes. While lexical compounds are common, so are pseudo-compounds with near affix-like semantic, and sometimes phonological, features. Overall, while monomorphemic words are common among the more isolating types of AA languages, ample linguistic descriptions show a substantially wider range of morphological complexity throughout the AA language family.

Counting the paternal founders of Austroasiatic speakers associated with the language dispersal in South Asia

The phylogenetic analysis of Y chromosomal haplogroup O2a-M95 was crucial to determine the nested structure of South Asian branches within the larger tree, predominantly present in East and Southeast Asia. However, it had previously been unclear how many founders brought the haplogroup O2a-M95 to South Asia. On the basis of the updated Y chromosomal tree for haplogroup O2a-M95, we analysed 1,437 male samples from South Asia for various downstream markers, carefully selected from the extant phylogenetic tree. With this increased resolution, we were able to identify at least three founders downstream to haplogroup O2a-M95 who are likely to have been associated with the dispersal of Austroasiatic languages to South Asia. The fourth founder was exclusively present amongst Tibeto-Burman speakers of Manipur and Bangladesh. In sum, our new results suggest the arrival of Austroasiatic languages in South Asia during last five thousand years.

The genetic legacy of continental scale admixture in Indian Austroasiatic speakers

Surrounded by speakers of Indo-European, Dravidian and Tibeto-Burman languages, around 11 million Munda (a branch of Austroasiatic language family) speakers live in the densely populated and genetically diverse South Asia. Their genetic makeup holds components characteristic of South Asians as well as Southeast Asians. The admixture time between these components has been previously estimated on the basis of archaeology, linguistics and uniparental markers. Using genome-wide genotype data of 102 Munda speakers and contextual data from South and Southeast Asia, we retrieved admixture dates between 2000 – 3800 years ago for different populations of Munda. The best modern proxies for the source populations for the admixture with proportions 0.78/0.22 are Lao people from Laos and Dravidian speakers from Kerala in India, while the South Asian population(s), with whom the incoming Southeast Asians intermixed, had a smaller proportion of West Eurasian component than contemporary proxies. Somewhat surprisingly Malaysian Peninsular tribes rather than the geographically closer Austroasiatic languages speakers like Vietnamese and Cambodians show highest sharing of IBD segments with the Munda. In addition, we affirmed that the grouping of the Munda speakers into North and South Munda based on linguistics is in concordance with genome-wide data.

Ancient genomes document multiple waves of migration in Southeast Asian prehistory

Southeast Asia is home to rich human genetic and linguistic diversity, but the details of past population movements in the region are not well known. Here, we report genome-wide ancient DNA data from thirteen Southeast Asian individuals spanning from the Neolithic period through the Iron Age (4100–1700 years ago). Early agriculturalists from Man Bac in Vietnam possessed a mixture of East Asian (southern Chinese farmer) and deeply diverged eastern Eurasian (hunter-gatherer) ancestry characteristic of Austroasiatic speakers, with similar ancestry as far south as Indonesia providing evidence for an expansive initial spread of Austroasiatic languages. In a striking parallel with Europe, later sites from across the region show closer connections to present-day majority groups, reflecting a second major influx of migrants by the time of the Bronze Age.