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Language, Classification of

To classify the languages of the world, it is of foremost importance to first decide what constitutes a “language.” Most classification schemata involve spoken languages—alive, endangered, and extinct. The estimated number of spoken languages varies from 3,000 to 10,000, and there are languages spoken by a few societies that are still unidentified. There are some languages that have different names in different cultures, and there are some that have no names. There are languages that are classified as “major” because they are used by numerically large populations of people (for example, English, Polish). There are languages that are used between and among many societies as contact languages besides their individual native or national languages. Sometimes a society will use the term dialectsynonymously with language, and sometimes a name is used to refer to a language group as well as to a single language. If one takes into account that some languages have writing systems or can be identified only historically as written forms, and that some languages have sign forms or are strictly sign languages, the method of classification becomes even more complicated.

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Source: © iStockphoto/Heidi Priesnitz.

Families, Branches, and Languages

One systematic approach to language classification separates spoken languages into “families” by tracing each language to its possible origin or the geographic place(s) where it was historically documented to have branched off of a parent language. The family system of classification began with philologists theorizing and grouping languages first into the Indo-European family. It is believed that the languages in this group are derived from a parent language, “Proto-Indo-European,” that may have been spoken before 3000 BCE. As indicated in the name, the languages in this family were generated throughout Europe and parts of southern Asia. The Indo-European language family branches off into superordinate categories (for example, Germanic), to subordinate categories (for example, East Germanic, West Germanic,North Germanic), and finally to languages (for example, English,Dutch).

In 1997, David Crystal listed 29 world language families in the Cambridge Encyclopedia of Language as well as languages that are termed “isolates” because linguistic analyses of these languages do not show features that are common in any specific schema of the existing families (for example,Basque, Australian Aboriginal).

Criteria for Language Classification

Early philologists and historical linguists of the 18th and 19th centuries explored the similarities and differences between specific target linguistic structures in particular spoken languages and subsequently tried to determine the possible ways in which the languages developed. These early researchers provided a basis for their successors to create language classification systems. The objects of special interest in comparative linguistics are phonology, morphology and words, and syntax.

Purposes for Classification

Scholars have attempted to classify languages with particular purposes in mind. The first purpose is to have a record of all the world's languages, but there are other reasons for classification. One of these purposes is for the demonstration of cultural and cross-cultural patterns given that native languages and commonly spoken languages have previously been classified linguistically.

In 1997, Philip Parker provided a detailed statistical analysis of more than 460 language groups in 234 countries to illustrate issues connecting linguistic cultures to nine areas of concern(such as economics, cultural resources, demography) with key variables for each area (railways, water, telecommunications). His analyses are especially valuable for the development of nations, especially those designated as Third World countries.

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