On Sat, 15 Mar 2003 17:40:31 -0800, "Geraldine Reinhardt"
<
waluk@...> wrote:
>Oh? What about M. Räsänen (Uralo-Altaic)?
Martti Räsänen was a Turkologist, author of a 1965 paper "Über die
ural-altaische Sprachverwandschaft". I haven't read it. Have you?
There are certainly typological similarities between Uralic and
"Altaic", and as far as I know even some indications of cognacy,
especially involving the personal pronouns and a small amount of basic
vocabulary. But this does not prove that Uralo-Altaic is a valid
genetic grouping. English and Lithuanian are doubtlessly related, but
that doesn't imply an Anglo-Lithuanian language family exists. Uralic
and "Altaic" might simply be independent members of a higher taxon
(Nostratic or Eurasiatic, whatever).
The same goes for Altaic itself: it is as yet undemonstrated that the
language families classified as "Altaic" (Turkic, Mongolian, Tungus,
Korean and Japanese) are in fact descended from a single Proto-Altaic
language.
=======================
Miguel Carrasquer Vidal
mcv@...