Austro-Asiatic languages

The Austro-Asiatic languages are a large language family of Southeast Asia, India and Bangladesh. The name comes from the Latin word for "south" and the Greek name of Asia, hence "South Asia". Among these languages, only Vietnamese, Khmer, and Mon have a long recorded history, and only Vietnamese and Khmer have official status (in Vietnam and Cambodia, respectively). The rest of the languages are spoken by minority groups.

Austroasiatic languages have a disjunct distribution across India, Bangladesh and Southeast Asia, separated by regions where other languages are spoken. It is widely believed that the Austroasiatic languages are the autochthonous languages of Southeast Asia and eastern India, and that the other languages of the region, including the Indo-European, Tai-Kadai, and Sino-Tibetan languages, are the result of later migrations of people. (There are, for example, Austroasiatic words in the Tibeto-Burman languages of eastern Nepal.) Some linguists have attempted to prove that Austroasiatic languages are related to Austronesian languages, thus forming the Austric superfamily.

Classification

Linguists traditionally recognize two primary divisions of Austroasiatic: the Mon-Khmer languages of Southeast Asia, Northeast India and the Nicobar Islands, and the Munda languages of East and Central India and parts of Bangladesh. Ethnologue identifies 168 Austroasiatic languages, of which 147 are Mon-Khmer and 21 are Munda. However, no evidence for this classification has ever been published.

Each of the families that is written in boldface type below is accepted as a valid clade. However, the relationships between these families within Austroasiatic is debated; in addition to the traditional classification, two recent proposals are given, neither of which accept traditional Mon-Khmer as a valid unit. It should be noted that little of the data used for competing classifications has ever been published, and therefore cannot be evaluated by peer review.

Gérard Diffloth (1974)

This is the widely cited classification used in the Encyclopædia Britannica. Several languages that were not known of at the time are missing.

Munda
- North Munda
  - Korku
  - Kherwarian
- South Munda
  - Kharia-Juang
  - Koraput Munda
Mon-Khmer
- Eastern Mon-Khmer
  - Khmer (Cambodian)
  - Pearic
  - Bahnaric
  - Katuic
  - Vietic (includes Vietnamese)
- Northern Mon-Khmer
  - Khasi (Meghalaya, India)
  - Palaungic
  - Khmuic
- Southern Mon-Khmer
  - Mon
  - Aslian (Malaya)
  - Nicobarese (Nicobar Islands)

Ilia Peiros (2004)

Peiros is a lexicostatistic classification, based on percentages of shared vocabulary. This means that a language may appear to be more distantly related than it actually is due to language contact, so it is only a starting point for a proper genealogical classification.

Nicobarese
Munda-Khmer
- Munda
- Mon-Khmer
  - Khasi
  - Nuclear Mon-Khmer
    - Mangic (Mang + Palyu) (perhaps in Northern MK)
    - Vietic (perhaps in Northern MK)
    - Northern Mon-Khmer
      - Palaungic
      - Khmuic'
    - Central Mon-Khmer
      - Khmer dialects
      - Pearic
      - Asli-Bahnaric
        Aslian
        Mon-Bahnaric
        Monic
        Katu-Bahnaric
        Katuic
        Bahnaric

Gérard Diffloth (2005)

Rather than counting cognates, Diffloth compares reconstructions of various clades, and attempts to classify them based on shared innovations.

Munda languages (India)

Koraput: 7 languages
Core Munda languages

Kharian-Juang: 2 languages
North Munda languages

Korku

Kherwarian: 12 languages

Khasi-Khmuic languages

Khasian: 3 languages of eastern India and Bangladesh.
Palaungo-Khmuic languages

Khmuic: 13 languages of Laos and Thailand.

Palaungo-Pakanic languages

Pakanic or Palyu: 2 languages of southern China

Palaungic: 21 languages of Myanmar, southern China, and Thailand, plus Mang of Vietnam.

Nuclear Mon-Khmer languages

Khmero-Vietic languages

Vieto-Katuic languages

Vietic: 10 languages of Vietnam and Laos, including the Vietnamese language, which has the most speakers of any Austroasiatic language. These are the only Austroasiatic languages to have highly developed tone systems.

Katuic: 19 languages of Laos, Vietnam, and Thailand.

Khmero-Bahnaric languages

Bahnaric: 40 languages of Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia.
Khmeric languages

The Khmer dialects of Cambodia, Thailand, and Vietnam.

Pearic: 6 languages of Cambodia.

Nico-Monic languages

Nicobarese languages: 6 languages of the Nicobar Islands, a territory of India.

Asli-Monic languages

Aslian: 19 languages of peninsular Malaysia and Thailand.

Monic: 2 languages, the Mon language of Myanmar and the Nyahkur language of Thailand.

There are in addition several unclassified languages of southern China.

References

Peiros, Ilia. 1998. Comparative Linguistics in Southeast Asia. Pacific Linguistics Series C-142. Canberra, Australian National University.

External link

Ethnologue classification