Sino-Uralic languages

Sino-Uralic or Sino-Finnic is a proposed language family consisting of the Sinitic languages (Chinese) and the Uralic languages. Sino-Uralic is proposed as an alternative to the Sino-Tibetan family and thus is in opposition to the mainstream Sino-Tibetan family held by the majority of linguists. The theory is mainly supported by the Chinese linguist Jingyi Gao, but has been proposed by other linguists, most notably by Karl August Hermann. Gao suggested the proto-population could have been lived in Neolithic China and carried the Haplogroup N, claiming that a common proto-language could have been spoken around 5.000-10.000 years ago. However, connections with the Uralic and other language families are generally seen as speculative.

Theory

Gao argued that Chinese has three major layers, he saw the root of Chinese as coming from a common Sino-Uralic source, the second layer coming from Indo-European during the Chalcolithic age or later and the third layer coming from Yeniseian during the Bronze Age. Jingyi Gao presented the theory as an alternative to the commonly accepted Sino-Tibetan language family. Gao argued that there are multiple issues with the Sino-Tibetan language family and that similarities between Sinitic and Tibeto-Burman are better explained as being the result of loaning and mutual influence instead of being one language family as most linguists assert.

Gao argued that the monosyllabic structure of Chinese vocabulary was a later development due to external influences, arguing that the word structure of the Sinitic languages in the past was closer to the Uralic languages. Similarly, Karl August Hermann argued that the monosyllabic word structure in Sinitic is not an obstacle to a linguistic relationship.

History

Before Gao, Morris Swadesh had already theorized about a similar family, proposing a more radical and massive Dené-Finnish grouping which encompasses Athabaskan, Uralic and the Sino-Tibetan languages. Swadesh's theory has been called "radical". A relation between Sinitic and Uralic was still proposed earlier by the Estonian linguist Karl August Hermann in 1895. Karl August Hermann made a comparison of Estonian, Finnish and Chinese, arguing that they were related. However, the earliest known mention of a possible relationship between the Uralic and Sinitic languages was made by Sajnovics in 1770, who raised questions about a possible relation of Chinese and Hungarian, due to apparent lexical similarities. In the modern day its main advocate has been Jingyi Gao, first proposing it in 2005 and later making another book on the topic in 2008 along with making later articles. Estonian academics and linguists such as Ago Künnap, Jaan Kaplinski, Urmas Sutrop and Märt Läänemets along with a few Chinese professors such as Feng Zheng, Li Baojia and Jiang Jicheng have expressed interest over the theory and calling for more studies on the topic, though being cautious and thus not directly endorsing Gao's theory of a direct relationship between Sinitic and Uralic. George van Driem argues that Sino-Uralic along with other theories such as Sino-Indo-European are constructed by using flawed methodologies with inadequate knowledge of historical Chinese and the Trans-Himalayan languages, representing false language families. According to Van Driem, the theory is not supported by proper evidence.

Proposed evidence

Karl August Hermann argued that there are multiple similarities between Sinitic and Uralic, which he used to support his hypothesis on the relation of Sinitic and Uralic. His proposed evidences include:

* The lack of grammatical gender
* Similarities in the use of the genitive
* Common word roots
* Similarities in word structure

Lexical

Some shared cognates proposed by Jingyi Gao:

Gao also compared Finnish tähti 'star' to Mandarin tai 'extremely' and Minnan thai 'extremely'.

Cognates proposed by Karl August Hermann

The following cognates were proposed by Karl August Hermann:

Phonological

Sound correspondences proposed by Jingyi Gao

Gao suggested Minnan át to correspond to Uralic "uu", citing as examples: piát 'other' and muu 'other' and guát 'month' and kuu 'month'.

Another proposed sound correspondence by Gao is Mandarin -uei and Finnish -osi, citing the Mandarin word duei and Finnish tosi

Finnish and Estonian "k", Minnan "g" and Cantonese "j".

Finnish laand Mandarin �n Cantonese �nand Minan n

Finnish /k/ and Mandarin /ŋ/.

Finnic -aja and Mandarin -aŋ

Uralic /p/ and Mandarin /f/

Mandarin -a and Finnish -ota

Mandarin /x/ and Finnic /ʋ/.

Proto-language

See also

*Haplogroup NO
*Uralo-Siberian languages
*Ural-Altaic languages
*Dené–Caucasian languages

References

{{Eurasian languages

Proposed language families