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Periodical article Periodical article Leiden University catalogue Leiden University catalogue WorldCat catalogue WorldCat
Title:The Use and Misuse of Language in the Study of African History
Author:Schuh, Russell G.ISNI
Year:1997
Periodical:Ufahamu (ISSN 0041-5715)
Volume:25
Issue:1
Pages:36-81
Language:English
Geographic term:Africa
Subjects:language classification
African languages
historiography
History and Exploration
Peoples of Africa (Ethnic Groups)
Abstract:Many inferences about undocumented history can be made by piecing together a puzzle composed of a genetic classification of languages, the present distribution of those languages, and details from those languages, such as the origins of particular vocabulary items. However, not all historical work using linguistic data has dispassionately approached the task, allowing the linguistic data to lead where it will despite external factors such as race, culture, political importance, or preconceived notions of what the history should be. The present author discusses two studies where examination of the linguistic data as it has been used does not support the historical proposals: Carl Meinhof's theory of 'Hamitic' racial and linguistic unity posited in his 'Die Sprachen der Hamiten' (1912), and the Pan-African theory of Cheikh Anta Diop claiming to show the genetic unity of all African languages. Most of the article is devoted to Diop's argumentation in 'Parenté génétique de l'égyptien pharaonique et des langues négro-africaines' (1977), with the author arguing that Diop does not provide any convincing evidence for an Egyptian-Wolof connection, and that he fails to mention several groups of languages of black Africa which share no apparent resemblances to Wolof but which do share features with Egyptian, namely the Chadic languages of West and Central Africa, the Cushitic languages of northeast Africa, and the Semitic languages of Ethiopia and Eritrea. Notes, ref.
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