The classification of the Plains Algonquian languages
The last broad assessment of Algonquian internal relationships was over a quarter century ago, by Goddard (1994), and most research since adopts his view that the relationships almost
entirely reflect an areal cline rather than subgroups, though that consensus may be beginning to break down. Such work,
though, has seldom paid explicit attention to basic principles of subgrouping, including the foundational one of synapomorphy.
Using a character-based approach to phonological history, I explore evidence for a new subgroup involving languages of the
Great Plains: Cheyenne, Arapaho, and Atsina. This is a small step toward a fuller reorganization of the Algonquian family
tree.
Article outline
- 1.Introduction
- 2.Algonquian subgrouping
- 2.1A consensus
- 2.2A move away from flat structure?
- 3.Synapomorphy and phonological innovations
- 4.The evidence of Plains Algonquian
- 4.1The vowel system
- 4.2Glide merger
- 4.3Loss of *k
- 5.Conclusion
- Author queries
-
Acknowledgements
-
Notes
-
References
This content is being prepared for publication; it may be subject to changes.
References (41)
References
Aubin, George. 1975. A
Proto-Algonquian dictionary. (Canadian Ethnology Service, Mercury Series Paper,
29.) Ottawa: National Museums of Canada.
Biedny, Jerome, Andrea Cudworth, Sarah Holmstrom, Monica Macaulay, Gabrielle Mistretta, Joseph Salmons, Charlotte Vanhecke & Bo Zhan. 2020. A
more structured family tree: Algonquian subgrouping. Paper presented at
the Society for the Study of Indigenous languages in the
Americas. New
Orleans, January.
Biedny, Jeremy, Andrea Cudworth, Sarah Holmstrom, Monica Macaulay, Gabrielle Mistretta, Joseph Salmons, Charlotte Vanhecke & Bo Zhan. 2022. Lexical
relationships in Central Algonquian. Papers of the 51st Algonquian
Conference, 1–18. Lansing: Michigan State University Press.
Blevins, Juliette. 2017. Areal
sound patterns. In Raymond Hickey (ed.), The
Cambridge handbook of areal
linguistics, 88–121. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Bloomfield, Leonard. 1925. On
the sound-system of Central
Algonquian. Language 1. 130–56.
Campbell, Lyle. 2021. Historical
linguistics: An introduction. Cambridge: MIT Press. 4th edn.
Campbell, Lyle & William J. Poser. 2008. Language
classification: History and
method. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Costa, David J. 2013. Borrowing in Southern
Great Lakes Algonquian and the history of Potawatomi. Anthropological
Linguistics 55. 195–233.
François, Alexandre. 2015. Trees,
waves and linkages. In Claire Bowern & Bethwyn Evans (eds.), The
Routledge handbook of historical
linguistics, 161–89. London: Routledge.
Goddard, Ives. 1974. An
outline of the historical phonology of Arapaho and Atsina. International journal of
American
linguistics 40. 102–16.
Goddard, Ives. 1978a. Central
Algonquian languages. In Bruce G. Trigger (ed.), Handbook
of North American Indians:
Northeast, vol. 15, 583–6. Washington: Smithsonian Institute.
Goddard, Ives. 1978b. The
Algonquian languages of the Plains. In Raymond D. DeMallie (ed.) Handbook
of North American Indians:
Plains, vol. 13, 71–79. Washington: Smithsonian Institute.
Goddard, Ives. 1979. Comparative
Algonquian. In Lyle Campbell & Marianne Mithun (eds.), The
languages of Native America: Historical and comparative
assessment, 70–131. Austin: University of Texas Press.
Goddard, Ives. 1994. The
west-to-east cline in Algonquian dialectology. In William Cowan (ed.), Actes
du vingt-cinquième Congrès des
algonquinistes, 187–211. Ottawa: Carleton University.
Goddard, Ives. 2018. Blackfoot
and Core Algonquian inflectional morphology. Papers of the 47th Algonquian
conference, 83–106. Lansing: Michigan State University Press.
Goldenberg, Gideon. 2013. Semitic
languages: Features, structures, relations,
processes. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Gordon, Matthew K. 2016. Phonological
typology. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Hartmann, Frederik. 2023. Germanic
phylogenetics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Hewson, John. 2019
[1993]. A computer-generated dictionary of
Proto-Algonquian. Hull: Canadian Museum of Civilization. [URL]
Hockett, Charles F. 1943. The position of
Potawatomi in Central Algonkian. Papers of the Michigan academy of science, arts, and
letters, 38. 537–42.
Jakobson, Roman & Morris Halle. 1956. Fundamentals
of language. The Hague: Mouton.
Leskien, August. 1876. Die
Declination im Slawisch-Litauischen und
Germanischen. Leipzig: Hirzel.
Levman, Bryan. 2016. The
language of early Buddhism. Journal of South Asian languages and
linguistics 3. 1–41.
Lockwood, Hunter Thompson. 2017. How the
Potawatomi language lives: A grammar of Potawatomi. PhD
dissertation, University of Wisconsin–Madison.
Lockwood, Hunter Thompson. 2019. Revisiting the
position of Potawatomi in (Central) Algonquian. Papers of the 48th Algonquian
conference, 143–58. Lansing: Michigan State University Press.
Oxford, Will. 2015. Patterns
of contrast in phonological change: Evidence from Algonquian vowel
systems. Language 91. 308–58.
Oxford, Will. 2019. Algonquian
languages. In Daniel Siddiqi, Michael Barrie, Carrie Gillon, Jason Haugen, & Eric Mathieu (eds.) The
Routledge handbook of North American
languages, 504–23. London: Routledge.
Pentland, David H. 1979a. Causes of rapid
phonological change: The case of Atsina and its relatives. Calgary working papers in
linguistics 5. 99–138. [URL]
Pentland, David H. 1979b. Algonquian historical
phonology. PhD dissertation, University of Toronto.
Pentland, David H. 2023. Proto-Algonquian dictionary: A
historical and comparative dictionary of the Algonquian
languages. 4 vols. Winnipeg: Algonquian and Iroquoian Linguistics.
Ratliff, Martha. 2015. Tonoexodus,
tonogenesis, and tone change. In Patrick Honeybone & Joseph Salmons (eds.), The
Oxford handbook of historical
phonology, 245–61. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Rhodes, Richard. 2021. The
case for Core Central Algonquian. In Lucy Thomason, David J. Costa & Amy Dahlstrom (eds.), Webs
of relationships and words from long ago: A festschrift presented to Ives Goddard on the occasion of his 80th
birthday, 303–45. Petoskey, Michigan: Mundart Press.
Ringe, Don & Joseph F. Eska. 2013. Historical
Linguistics: Toward a twenty-first century
reintegration. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Salmons, Joseph. 2018. A
history of German: What the past reveals about today’s language. 2nd
edn. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Salmons, Joseph. Forthcoming. Where
German came from. In Joshua Bousquette & Simon Pickl (eds.) The
Oxford handbook of the German
language. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Valentine, J. Randolph. 2001. Nishnaabemwin reference
grammar. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
Van der Spuy, Andrew. 1990. Phonological
relationships between the Southern Bantu languages African
Studies 49. 119–47.
Voegelin, Charles F. 1941. Proto-Algonquian
consonant clusters in
Delaware. Language 17. 143–47.
Weber, Natalie. 2022. Shared
retentions cannot support subgrouping in Algonquian: Against Goddard (2018). Paper
presented at the 25th International Conference on Historical
Linguistics, Oxford. [URL]