Ed and Hassan, (01)
We agree on the issues that are most relevant to ontology. (02)
There are many side issues that could be discussed indefinitely.
I'll comment on some that I can't ignore. (03)
EJB
> [Arabic] did not replace established languages, except thosethat
> typically had no written form and had only small clusters of speakers. (04)
The Phoenicians established the alphabet that evolved into nearly all
the alphabets used in the world today. The closely related Aramaic
language and alphabet (in various dialects, such as Syriac) dominated
the region north of the Arabic peninsula for centuries. In fact,
Arabic uses a cursive variant of the Aramaic alphabet. (05)
Egyptian hieroglyphic is among the oldest writing systems in the
world. Its phonetic part was adopted for simplified scripts,
which the Phoenicians adapted for their alphabet. The Coptic
language and alphabet, which survives as a liturgical language,
was the dominant language of Egypt, which had and still has
the largest population in the region. (06)
EJB
> In 50 B.C., Gallic France was a collection of separate tribes,
> each of which had a handful of fortified towns as commercial centers. (07)
Many historians believe that the major strategic mistake by the Gauls
was to unite with a single army to fight the invaders. That enabled
Julius Caesar to defeat them all at once. If they had remained
separate, they could have fought repeated skirmishes (guerrilla wars)
for centuries. The Roman armies marched into Germanic territories,
but they were never able to defeat them all in one decisive battle. (08)
EJB
> Romanized Spain... actually had an established Semitic culture
> along the coast... and a Gaul-like hodgepodge of Celtic and Iberian
> tribal centers in the river valleys. (09)
That was another example where the Romans could focus their attention
on one centralized force. The Semitic culture (Phoenician) led by
Hannibal's brother Hasdrubal controlled the region. The Romans won
some crucial battles, and the Celtic tribes who fought with Hasdrubal
switched sides. Meanwhile, Hasdrubal with his army and elephants
joined his brother in the famous invasion of Italy. (010)
EJB
> As we have both observed, written languages are pragmatically powerful
> in displacing unwritten languages. (011)
No. Written languages help unify a collection of tribes. But neither
the Greeks, the Phoenicians, nor the Persians -- all of whom controlled
large territories for centuries -- were able to spread their languages
outside of small colonies. And note Hassan's comments (copy below). (012)
EJB
> Chinese has been stable longer than Japanese. (013)
I'll accept that point. But it's independent of the other issues. (014)
EJB
> a term like 'endpoint' or 'home insurance' is a purely English kind
> of coinage, using a Germanic mechanism to construct a term from
> a Germanic word and a Romance word. (015)
I agree. But it is also the simplest method. It's similar to the
Chinese method, which the Japanese adopted: string the lexical units
together without any explicit syntactic markers. (016)
EJB
> the language is not poorer because one family came to dominate the other.
> Rather, the language is richer for the combination. (017)
I claimed that the simpler method came to dominate. The other methods
-- both Germanic and Romance -- have more complex morphology or syntax. (018)
HAK
> what other languages were used in North Africa (namely, Morocco+Algeria
> +Tunisia) before the Arabs came? (019)
The Phoenicians had a colony in Carthage (modern Tunisia), which
the Romans conquered. But neither language seems to have had much
impact outside the port cities. (020)
JFS
>> How easy is it for Berbers to learn Arabic? (021)
HAK
> Very difficult in fact! There is a popular (deriding) Kabyle saying
> that goes: "Twist your mouth as that'll sound Arabic!" (022)
Thanks for that point and your answers to the other questions. (023)
Although the Berber languages are classified with the Afroasiatic
(or Hamito-Semitic), they seem to have diverged from the main
group from 5000 to 8000 years BP (Before Present). For a map,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Expansion_of_Afroasiatic.svg (024)
That's more than enough time for them to develop significantly
different grammar, vocabulary, and pronunciation. That would
explain the difficulty of learning Arabic as a second language
-- despite the coexistence of Arabic and the Berber languages
for over a millennium. (025)
That is a very sharp contrast with the rapid adoption of Arabic
by speakers of Aramaic. (026)
John (027)
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