20 replies to this topic

[qrasy]

the history of hmong-mien languages is interesting....

You have some articles about history of the languages? (I guess the true languages were not even recorded)

[teeth]

Indeed it's really obscure. Actually, in the above list, 3 and 6 are similar to Vietnamese, 6 is similar to Burmese.
9 is similar to enough to Chinese (I have added an assumption to what "tj" actually means; I don't know though, if ky and ty confusion exists in Miao).
Anyway, we shouldn't judge by just how it looks like. For example, the French cinque and English five were shown to be related. And then, Indonesian dua and Latin duo are perhaps unrelated.

Indeed it's only some old classifications that classify Miao under Thai-Kadai.
People find little link between them and then started to classify Hmong-Mien as their own language family.

Hmong-mien is now classified as a language between sino-tibetan/mon-kmer.

[qrasy]

Hmong-mien is now classified as a language between sino-tibetan/mon-kmer.

What do you mean by "now classified as"?
Are you referring to mixed languages? Superfamilies?

[crabdonut]

I want to clarify a point about how Chinese linguists place Hmong-Mien under Sino-Tibetan. While I do not want to generalize, many of the older generation of linguists in China were indeed communists. While I'm sure they did put some research, if you could understand how putting Tai-Kadai, Hmong-Mien, and Sino-Tibetan together would work well with the type of country that China was trying to show itself to be during the time and the "equality" that communism propagate, you will understand what I mean. Most of these linguists who put Hmong-Mien under Sino-Tibetan also put Tai-Kadai under Sino-Tibetan. I know that wikipedia says China still rejects the western theory of this subject but the citation is from an encyclopedia from 1988. Most of the modern linguists in China follow the western classifications of Sino-Tibetan, Hmong-Mien, and Tai-Kadai.

Edited by crabdonut, 11 July 2010 - 01:35 AM.

[aocitizen]

Hmong-Mien is not a Tai-Kadai language. Nor is it a Sino-Tibetan language. Neither is it a member of the Austroasiatic or Tai-Austronesian language families. It is its own branch of Austric, which includes Hmong-Mien, Austroasiatic, Tai-Austronesian, Ainu, Ong, and Nihali. Some people are now questioning the concept of Austric, saying that Tai-Austronesian is closer to Sino-Tibetan than Austroasiatic; this theory is still inconclusive. The Hmong-Mien speak of themselves as having a cold northern homeland, which was probably the Huang He valley and adjacent coasts. The Shang people (Dongyi) probably originally spoke a language closely related to Hmong. The Hmong said that when their homeland was invaded, some crossed the "muddy water" (Yangtze) to escape; these were probably Shang people finding refuge with their relatives the Hmong. Others were supposed to have crossed the "clear water" (Yellow Sea) to find a better place (Korea and China). Korean and Japanese are not entirely Altaic languages, but hybrids. I think that the non-Altaic part of Korean is Shang/Dongyi, and that the Shang/Dongyi were an important component of the otherwise Tungusic Yayoi people, who invaded and united Japan around the time of the birth of Christ. Old Chinese itself is a hybrid between the original Tibetic dialect of the Huaxia (related to the Bai language) and the Hmong-related Shang/Dongyi language. So we can see that Hmongic is a very important substrate widespread throughout East Asia.

Edited by aocitizen, 25 January 2011 - 09:49 PM.

[xng]

Hmong-Mien is not a Tai-Kadai language. Nor is it a Sino-Tibetan language. Neither is it a member of the Austroasiatic or Tai-Austronesian language families. It is its own branch of Austric, which includes Hmong-Mien, Austroasiatic, Tai-Austronesian, Ainu, Ong, and Nihali. Some people are now questioning the concept of Austric, saying that Tai-Austronesian is closer to Sino-Tibetan than Austroasiatic; this theory is still inconclusive. The Hmong-Mien speak of themselves as having a cold northern homeland, which was probably the Huang He valley and adjacent coasts. The Shang people (Dongyi) probably originally spoke a language closely related to Hmong. The Hmong said that when their homeland was invaded, some crossed the "muddy water" (Yangtze) to escape; these were probably Shang people finding refuge with their relatives the Hmong. Others were supposed to have crossed the "clear water" (Yellow Sea) to find a better place (Korea and China). Korean and Japanese are not entirely Altaic languages, but hybrids. I think that the non-Altaic part of Korean is Shang/Dongyi, and that the Shang/Dongyi were an important component of the otherwise Tungusic Yayoi people, who invaded and united Japan around the time of the birth of Christ. Old Chinese itself is a hybrid between the original Tibetic dialect of the Huaxia (related to the Bai language) and the Hmong-related Shang/Dongyi language. So we can see that Hmongic is a very important substrate widespread throughout East Asia.

Wow ! Can you put this into a chart as it is quite complicated to read.