Re: Witzel and Sautsutras (was: Mapping the Origins and Expansion of

At 11:56:47 AM on Friday, October 26, 2012, shivkhokra wrote:

> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Brian M. Scott"
> <bm.brian@...> wrote:

>> At 3:00:03 PM on Thursday, October 25, 2012, shivkhokra
>> wrote:

>>> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Rick McCallister
>>> <gabaroo6958@> wrote:

>>> [..]

>>>> Among items that I offered, Shiv doesn't tell why
>>>> retroflexed consonant sets do not show up in IE
>>>> languages that are not from the subcontinent.

>>> For the same reason:

>>> a) That British after living in India for many years did
>>> not pick up retroflex consonants. See the hindi spelling
>>> of Pune where the n is retroflex and contrast it with
>>> how british wrote it.

>> Not comparable: the British were a superficial layer of
>> Indian society that maintained continuous close ties with
>> England.

> British were invaders and so were Aryans according to your
> school. If Aryans, when they invaded, had no problem in
> "learning"/"acquiring" retroflexes why would the British?

If you can't see the difference between the two situations
even when it's spelled out in the very sentence to which
you're responding, there's no hope for you.

> Furthermore you are suggesting Aryan invaders of India
> kept a place holder for the retroflexes in their
> abecedarie. And by "an amazing coincidence" the
> retroflexes fit perfectly after velars,palatals and before
> dental, labials.

What *are* you babbling about? It's no coincidence that the
Brāhmī abugida and the various South Asian writing systems
derived from it have a place for retroflex consonants: it
was obviously developed to record a language that had them.
So what? It was developed in India, long after these
phonemes had been acquired and even longer after the
Indo-Aryans started moving into South Asia.

> Do you know how ridiculous your AIT school's thesis is?

Yes, I know exactly how ridiculous it is: not at all
ridiculous in its current form.

>>> b) That people in south east asia (thailand/burma/cambodia
>>> etc) who were taught religious texts both in Sanskrit and
>>> Pali did not pick up retroflex consonants.

>> Not comparable: they weren't living amongst large numbers of
>> native speakers of languages with retroflex consonants.

> No. Have you heard of Cholas? Do you know if they ruled
> over Cambodia? Let me just say you are plain uninformed.
> South east Asia was full of Sanskrit and Pali speakers who
> went their as teachers and rulers. Amazing number of
> Sanskrit inscriptions have been unearthed in these
> countries. [...]

I know. And you're hopelessly confused: in effect you're
trying to argue that because apples don't fall up, they
never fell down, either.

>>> c) And most importantly the Gypsies who migrated out of
>>> India lost their retroflex consonants once they got to
>>> Europe.

>> Because they moved into regions occupied by speakers of
>> languages that did not have retroflex consonants. This is
>> precisely the same reason that the Indo-Aryans acquired
>> retroflex consonants.

> You need to get a good book on Indian linguistics. Gypsy
> alphabet lost *all* retroflexes. This implies people who
> moved out of India could easily loose their retroflexes
> because these were tough sounds to utter.

It's great fun to watch you make a case against yourself
without even realizing that you're doing so; clearly you
failed completely to understand what I wrote.

[...]

>>> d) Lastly do retroflex stops in Swedish and Norwegian
>>> count?

>> For what? They're retroflex stops. They have nothing to
>> do with Rick's question, however.

> Sorry you need a book on linquitics now.

I have many, including one that gives me a great deal of
information on the global distribution of retroflex stops.
Do you actually have a meaningful response, or are you just
making noise?