Talk:Oto-Manguean languages

Question
I've been copyediting the article and I can't figure out the intended meaning of the following: "in Chatino in which the last syllable of polysyllables have stress tone is also only distinguished on the last syllable". Does it mean the stress tone is only distinguished in the last syllable? In that case, I'd change it to something like "in Chatino in which the last syllable of polysyllables has a stress tone which is only distinguished on the last syllable". I'm not familiar with the topic so if I've changed the meaning of anything, just tell me. Graham 87 06:11, 4 January 2007 (UTC)
 * You did well. Thanks for caring. Maunus 09:06, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

Tone System
I made a change to the article and wanted to explain why. Previously the article said: "Many other systems have only three tones registers. Some allow level tones and contour tones (for example Tlapanec) and others only contour tones (for example Texmelucan Zapotec)." However, the image included that explains the Texmelucan Zapotec system shows that it does have a level tone (tone 3). So I have changed the wording to: "Many other systems have only three tones levels, such as Tlapanec and Texmelucan Zapotec." Moreover I changed "register" to "level" because I believe it is more appropriate here. Also, no reference is included for where the data on Texmelucan came from. I could look around for a source if need be. Blillehaugen (talk) 19:00, 17 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the corrections. The Source fortexmelucan zapotec and tone systems in general is Suárez 1983.·Maunus· · ƛ · 20:11, 17 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Great, thanks! Blillehaugen (talk) 21:05, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

350
With only 350 words said to be held in common, this group might be largely or entirely phoney. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 109.154.0.236 (talk) 13:21, 19 March 2012 (UTC)
 * In fact 350 established cognates are a quite high number for a well established language family - note also that Kaufman's critique is not that the group may be invalid but that too few reconstructions have been made - not that it would be difficult to make them. No linguists I know of are sceptical of this language family.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 13:28, 19 March 2012 (UTC)
 * In the Semitic group, cognates have been established for about 18,000 words, out of about 20,000. This is with strict sound and semantic laws. The Dravidian group also has the same large number of cognates. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 109.154.0.236 (talk) 13:38, 22 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Yes, but for many well established families, that do not include the worlds most spoken languages, the number of reconstructed cognates is considerably less than that. That does not mean that the grouping is likely to be invalid, but that little work has been done. Which is Kaufman's point. ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 13:45, 22 March 2012 (UTC)

Naming: Otomanguean or Oto-Manguean?
I just realized that major sources such as Lyle Campbell and The Ethnologue both use the spelling without the hyphen, whereas the hyphenated spelling originally was mostly used by Maurice Swadesh and Joseph Greenberg. The non-hyphenated spelling is also still in the lead at google ngrams, though the hyphenated spelling has been steadily increasding since the millenium (perhaps this article cleated in 2005 contributed to that development). Should we move the article to the non-hyphenated spelling? (This question was suggested to me by the linguist Michael Swanton who specializes in the languages of the family)User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 00:19, 31 January 2014 (UTC)

Doubt about status
An ip editor keeps inserting text to the effect that Otomanguean is not a generally accepted family, but without accompanying with citations - only vaguely suggesting that Cecil H Brown doubts it. All major authorities on Native American historical linguistics who have published on the issue, (including Lyle Campbell, Terrence Kaufman, Mauricio Mixco, William Poser) accept Otomanguean as a valid family and have done so since Suarez solid demonstration of Tlapanec's relation to the rest of the languages. Brown has not published anything substantial throwing the unity of Otomanguean into doubt, and refers to it as a family in his most recent publications (and he is not generally known as conservative in accepting family relations, in contrast to Campbell, Poser etc). So dont reinsert this without some very strong sources suggesting that the family is not well accepted.·maunus · snunɐɯ· 20:58, 18 May 2015 (UTC)

Doubt about status
I, Cecil H. Brown, have inserted the referred text that keeps getting deleted. I have probably not followed the protocol of Wikipedia changes and for this I apologize. In any case, the immediately above paragraph is not at all an accurate summary of that text. I do not assert that Otomanguean is not a generally accepted family, only that its status as a true language family has yet to be documented using the strict comparative methods of historical linguistics (I could cite books and articles in which this method is unambiguously explained). It is true that Campbell, Kaufman, and Poser accept Otomanguean as a family, but in the current article (without my text) there are no citations at all of works in which the comparative method is used in its standard, appropriate, and systematic manner to compile sound correspondences holding across languages of the proposed family. In addition, other than the Suarez article mentioned above which is limited in scope, compelling evidence is not forthcoming for the relationship based on shared grammatical features. In short, in the current Otomanguean wiki article there are NO CITATIONS of books or published papers in which the actual detailed comparative evidence for the Otomanguean family derived through the standard method of historical linguistics is described. This is not surprising since no such articles and books exist (other than the short paper by Suarez dealing with grammar). At the very least, this short-coming should be mentioned in the wiki article. That is what I attempted to do, but to no avail. 72.216.2.47 (talk) 15:53, 25 May 2015 (UTC)Cecil
 * Dr. Brown, you need to publish your doubts somewhere else before we can insert them into the wikipedia page. Otomanguean is accepted by all major authorities and by all specialists in Otomanguean languages. There has not to my knowledge been published a single paper throwing doubt on its status. Wikipedia cannot insert claims that are not already a part of the literature. There are lots of well accepted language families in the world for which there has not yet been published thorough detailed comparative evidence. If Otomanguean should be described as a "proposed" family only, then there would hardly been any established families in the Americas. Furthermore there are published comparisons on the otomanguean level such as those by Josserand and Hopkins, and unpublished ones by Kaufman that circulate among the scholars. ·maunus · snunɐɯ· 16:13, 25 May 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for the response whomever you may be. There is in fact a published paper that throws doubt on the status of Otomanguean. This is: Catherine A. Callaghan and Wick R. Miller. 1962. Swadesh's Macro Mixtecan Hypothesis and English. Southwestern Journal of Anthropology 18:278-285. This paper is in response to the following: Morris Swadesh. 1960. The Oto-Manguean hypothesis and Macro Mixtecan. International Journal of American Linguistics 26:79-111. Swadesh's Macro Mixtecan is an early version of the Otomanguen hypothesis in which all the currently recognized OM languages are proposed to be genetically linked plus Huavean. My objection to the Wikipedia page on Otomanguean is that no sources are cited that develop evidence in support of the proposal based on the standard comparative method of historical linguistics. That is a fact whether or not I have published an article citing it. So what is the Wikipedia article based on? It is clearly based on appeal to authority, i.e., that there are reasonably well-known linguistics, e.g., Campbell and Kaufman, that believe in the proposal and have said so in publications. So it does not take actual evidence supporting an idea before it gets a Wikipedia page. You mention that there are "lots of well accepted language families in the world for which there has not yet been published thorough comparative evidence." If that is so (and I think it is), then that should be mentioned in Wikipedia articles describing such groups. You also mention "published comparisons on the otomanguean level such as those by Josserand and Hopkins." To my knowledge, Hopkins has never published such a work (and I am very familiar with his writing on OM). Josserand's dissertation does systematically compare Mixtec languages to one another and reconstructs Proto-Mixtec vocabulary, but that is hardly a treatment on the "otomanguean level". And yes, there are unpublished papers by Kaufman that have been circulated (but I thought these do not count for Wikipedia). In fact, I carefully analyzed some of the evidence in Kaufman's papers (which do not follow the standard comparative method) and have come up with rough-draft responses that I have circulated to a number of well-known linguists including Kaufman. If Kaufman's unpublished papers are taken into consideration, shouldn't mine as well? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.216.2.47 (talk) 16:10, 26 May 2015 (UTC)
 * Thanks for pointing out that article by Callaghan and Miller, it is however from before Suarez demonstration of the relation between Tlapanec and the rest of the family, and it has not been echoed by the general literature. It is true Kaufman's unpublished papers do not work for wikipedia, in the same way your doubts do not work, because we follow only the published authoritative accounts and none of them are even a little bit shaky on whether to accept Otomanguean. As for what quality of evidence you would personally find convincing I can't really guess, but Hopkins, Josserand, Campbell, Kaufman, Justeson, Wichmann, and everyone who works on Otomanguean languages considers it a demonstrated family, and assumes it as a given in their publications. It is not as with Penutian or other families that have been considered dubious and have generated a large amount of critical literature as well as new evidence. Otomanguean is just assumed to have been demonstrated - perhaps unjustifiedly so but that is really not something Wikipedia can report. Suarez and Kaufman's arguments have clearly convinced the large majority of experts who refer to them in their publications, I have not seen any similar mentions of your rebuttalls. It is quite simple, if the literature does not express doubt about Otomanguean or suggest that the lack of a thorough reconstruction is a problem for its validity, then wikipedia also does not. You are a well respected researcher and it should be easy for you to get your critique of Otomanguean published in a journal. Once you do that then of course we will mention it. ·maunus · snunɐɯ· 17:00, 26 May 2015 (UTC)

Thanks again for the response. Otomanguean reminds me of the Eskimo snow-term myth, i.e., that the language has 100 words for snow (actually Eskimo is really a shallow language family). Someone way back put that in the literature (without supporting evidence), and many people, including well-respected scholars, picked up on it as God's truth and perpetuated it without looking at the actual evidence or, rather, lack of evidence. Finally, someone did look at the evidence and that, more or less, was the end of the myth (except for a few die hards that don't really know anything about Eskimo or lexicalization). The history of the Otomanguean proposal is similar, except that OM may actually someday be demonstrated a valid genetic group (although I doubt it from the evidence I've seen for it so far, including the much touted Suarez paper; it is much more likely to be a Sprachbund). Maybe I will find some time to publish a critique of Otomanguean, but I wish someone else younger and with more time than I have could do the job. The problem is that most people, myself included, really are more inclined to take on research projects with a positive rather than negative goal in mind. In the meantime, I will try to reword (with citations) at least one or two of my objections in such a way that it is acceptable to Wiki people such as yourself. If you can give me your name and email address, perhaps I can run it by you before attempting an edit. My email address is easily found by googling my full name (Cecil H. Brown). 72.216.2.47 (talk) 22:35, 26 May 2015 (UTC)Cecil
 * I think the best source would be Kaufman and Justeson's article in Ancient Mesoamerica where they point out that much reconstruction work is needed for Otomanguean and that the number of cognates and reconstructions is much lower than it should be. This is in fact already included in the article. You actually have my email, as we have been in contact professionally before. I will send you an email later today.·maunus · snunɐɯ· 01:18, 27 May 2015 (UTC)

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Connections to South American languages
My deletion of text referring to Jolkesky's 2017 non-peer reviewed proposal for a genetic link between Paez and Zapotecan has been reverted by an anonymous editor. I believe that inclusion of this proposal is WP:UNDUE since its arguments have neither been peer-reviewed nor adopted by other researchers. Nasua Narica (talk) 19:56, 8 July 2020 (UTC)


 * There are hundreds of such proposals on Wikipedia that have not been peer-reviewed, but are reasonably well supported by good arguments. Generally, a proposal can be included if the author shows a good track record of serious academic publications and is not just another random conspiracy theorist on the Internet. Including the proposal does not imply that it is the truth, but rather shows how it is one out of many hypotheses. You can ask and other editors about this. I'm restoring the paragraph for now. —  Sago tree spirit  (talk) 06:23, 9 July 2020 (UTC)

Minor correction: my deletion was not reverted, but instead claims from the same source were added elsewhere to the article. Nasua Narica (talk) 19:58, 8 July 2020 (UTC)
 * I disagree. WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS, but that doesn't matter here. If the proposal is any good, it will sooner or later find its way into reliable sources. Either the author presents it in a peer-reviewed publication himself, or it gets cited by other scholars in peer-reviewed publications, which does happen with some good unpublished manuscripts or conference presentations. As long as this is not the case, I don't see why we should prematurely give such proposals undue prominince. As for considering the author's track record of serious academic publications (per WP:SELFPUB), I suggest only include proposals that have at least some kind of impact. One should keep in mind that occasionally, proposals are abandoned without ever being explicitly retracted. –Austronesier (talk) 08:23, 9 July 2020 (UTC)
 * What now? After Sagotreespirit's revert, the proposal is now still present in the article. I lack the competence to judge its merits, but the whole paper appears pretty outrageous – not only does it put the origin of Oto-Manguean in southern Colombia, but also the origin of Mayan in Peru. Without any indication of how seriously it is being taken in the field, I'd be wary of including it in the article.
 * Even if Jolkesky's hypotheses might one day be considered respectable, it's entirely possible that, at this point, the evidence simply doesn't suffice or add up in the eyes of the seasoned experts, and given that Wikipedia is not a crystal ball, we cannot be held responsible for being sceptical even on the off chance that it might turn out one day that Jolkesky happened to be right (frankly, cases like Alfred Wegener are really rare and in most cases it turns out that a far-fetched sounding hypothesis was really far-fetched after all). We should really be more conservative on this kind of stuff. I would just like to recall the Germanic–Tai debacle ...
 * To be fair, Jolkesky seems to be a serious young researcher, not a crackpot, but we shouldn't engage in recentism; we can afford to wait. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 18:09, 30 October 2020 (UTC)


 * I think WP:FRINGE is applicable here, anyway – without passing judgment on the author, the idea itself can certainly be described as marginal at this point. On the other end, Brown's scepticism whether Oto-Manguean is a family at all can probably be judged similarly, and I think we are putting undue weight on his doubts by mentioning them already in the introduction. There are African macrofamilies where doubt isn't limited to a single researcher, yet still we do not even mention that in the introduction. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 18:28, 30 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Frankly, Brown (the ASJP Brown) in the lede is much more WP:UNDUE than the short mention of Jolkesky (a student of Willem Adelaar) with a short para in the main text. Nevertheless, the time is not ripe for inclusion of the latter. I am very sympathetic to undogmatic novel hypotheses as long they operate in a sound framework, but I don't want to see proposals promoted in WP that have gone almost completely uncited until now. Give us at least one or two citations by peers, before we cite the work here. –Austronesier (talk) 17:58, 31 October 2020 (UTC)

Complex vowels
The Wikipedia article Language acquisition contains the sentence "One such challenge is to explain how children acquire complex vowels in Otomanguean and other language" where "Otomanguean" redirects to the current article. However, if I search for "complex vowels" in the current article, I don't find anything. It would be good to either add a section on "complex vowels" to address the reference, or else update the reference in Language acquisition to be more clear. Thisisnotatest (talk) 00:30, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
 * This is probably mainly a reference to the fact that Otomanguean languages are tonal languages, see . Otherwise, their vowel systems are not necessarily all that complex, but they can be, see . --Florian Blaschke (talk) 20:32, 10 May 2024 (UTC)