A second language family which is somewhat expansive, though Southeast Asia focused, is Austro-Asiatic. It includes Cham, Jarai, Rade (Rhade), Chru, Roglai, and Haroi and represents an ancient migration of Indonesian peoples into southern Indochina. They've colored the bar components to match the ethno-linguistic classes (e.g., red = Austro-Asiatic, an Austro-Asiatic modal component). I hypothesize that the spread of the Austronesians was facilitated by a more effective form of agriculture which could squeeze more productivity out of marginal land. The Negritos of inner Malaysia, who are genetically and physically distinctive, speak Austro-Asiatic languages. The first figure shows a phylogenetic tree of the relationships of the populations in their database, color-coded by ethnolinguistic group. In the east of island Southeast Asia the admixture occurred with a Melanesian population. In the east of island Southeast Asia the admixture occurred with a Melanesian population. These registers have a variety of historical origins; for some languages (such as Mon) they are a fairly recent innovation, but for others (such as Pearic) they may be very ancient, perhaps dating to the ancestral language called Proto-Austroasiatic. Before we hit the genetics, let's review a little of the ethnography of Southeast Asia, as this may allow us to tease apart the meaning of some of the results. Sign up for our email newsletter for the latest science news, Want More? Though there's. Both alphabets were in turn used as models by other peoples for writing their own languages, the Thai speakers using Khmer letters and the Burmese speakers using Mon letters. In contrast, among the Mon-Khmer hill tribes of Thailand, who are presumably representative of groups which were present before the Thai migrations, it is absent. There has long been debate about whether these Indian tribes, the Munda, are the original Indians, to be supplanted later by Dravidian and Indo-Aryan speakers, or intrusive to the subcontinent. Presents an updated and improved argument for Sino-tibetan-austronesian, including lexical, morphological and phonological evidence. The important issue in relation to this data set is that, it has a thick coverage of Southeast Asia, which is not well represented in the, . Java is today the most densely populated region of Indonesia because of its fertility. Finally there are the ethno-linguistic clusters of Burma and Thailand (and Laos). I believe this is so because they were part of the leap-frog dynamic where societies were transplanted from suitable point to point by water (the Malagasy language seems to be a branch of dialects of southern Borneo!). The rest are languages of nonurban minority groups written, if at all, only recently. Speakers of most other Austroasiatic languages are under strong social and political pressure to become bilingual in the official languages of the nation in which they live. This feature, which is fairly rare the world over, is found, for example, in Mon, Wa, and Kuay, which distinguish breathy from clear vowels; in some Katuic languages, which distinguish creaky vowels from clear ones; and in the Pearic branch, which cumulates both distinctions. The most ancient inscriptions extant are in Old Mon and Old Khmer in the early 7th century. I will hazard to guess that the Malagasy of Madagascar are Austronesians who have very little of the Austro-Asiatic element in their ancestry. I believe it is because they are late arrivals who have admixed in sequence with whoever was resident in their target zones. Despite the notional ethnic chasm between the Thai and the Khmer of Cambodia, the broad cultural similarities due to the common roots in the society of the. 3) Then Austronesian populations sweep south along water routes, and marginalize the Austro-Asiatics in island Southeast Asia, though the not on the mainland. Relative to Java the Malay peninsula, Borneo, and Sumatra, are agriculturally marginal. There is usually no copula equivalent to the English verb be. Thus, an equational sentence will consist of two nouns or noun phrases, separated by a pause. I believe this is so because they were part of the leap-frog dynamic where societies were transplanted from suitable point to point by water (the Malagasy language seems to be a branch of dialects of southern Borneo!). The Negritos of Malaysia are somewhat different, but note that one of the populations exhibits Austro-Asiatic, but. And it is notable to me that not only does Austro-Asiatic exhibit fragmentation in relation to Thai and Sino-Tibetan, but it does so to some extent with relation to Austronesian! One thing that needs to be mentioned when talking about the genetics and prehistory of Southeast Asia are the "Negritos." The sound systems of Austroasiatic languages are fairly similar to each other, but Vietnamese and the Mu languages, under the influence of Chinese and Indian languages respectively, have diverged considerably from the original type. The Negritos of inner Malaysia, who are genetically and physically distinctive, speak Austro-Asiatic languages. It is quite conceivable that the complexity of Mu verb morphology is a result of the historical change from an older subjectverbobject to the present subjectobjectverb basic structure. Going back to the chronology above, we know that the Thai came last. Many languagese.g., Khmer, Mon, and Bahnarallow major syllables without final consonants, but no Austroasiatic language allows combinations of two or more final consonants. In Thailand and Laos the Mon-Khmer substrate has been marginalized to isolated residual groups. Most other Austroasiatic languages have been written for less than a century; the literacy rate remains very low with a few exceptions (e.g., Khs). And it is notable to me that not only does Austro-Asiatic exhibit fragmentation in relation to Thai and Sino-Tibetan, but it does so to some extent with relation to Austronesian! (5) Expressive language and wordplay are embodied in a special word class called expressives. This is a basic class of words distinct from verbs, adjectives, and adverbs in that they cannot be subjected to logical negation. Regarding subclassification within Austroasiatic, there have been several controversies. As have been known, the Austroasiatic and Austronesian languages have phonetical and lexical correspondence. Khmer, Mon, and Vietnamese are culturally the most important and have the longest recorded history. 5) The Thai arrive from southern China less than 1,000 years ago, take over the central zone of mainland Southeast Asia, and make inroads to the west in Burma. The mixed group, called Chamic, is now considered to be Austronesian. The first figure shows a phylogenetic tree of the relationships of the populations in their database, color-coded by ethnolinguistic group. The few Austroasiatic languages that are tonale.g., Vietnamese, the Angkuic subbranch, and the Pakanic branchare found in the northern geographic range of the family. The Higher Phylogeny of Austronesian and the Position of Tai-Kadai, SINO-TIBETO-AUSTRONESIAN: AN UPDATED AND IMPROVED ARGUMENT, Austro - Thai and Austroasiatic , Austroasiatic Studies , part I , 1976 . issue it seems to me that the most likely current point of departure of the Austronesian migration is Taiwan. In contrast, among the Mon-Khmer hill tribes of Thailand, who are presumably representative of groups which were present before the Thai migrations, it is absent. First, I pulled down a copy of the Pan-Asian SNP data set. Ergative constructions (in which the agent of the action is expressed not as the subject but as the instrumental complement of the verb) are quite common. The Philippine Negritos seem to have some relationship to the Melanesians. This comports with my supposition that the Austro-Asiatic populations were the first to marginalize these tribes before themselves being assimilated by the Austronesians. Second, after reading Strange Parallels, volume 1 and 2, I know a lot more about Southeast Asian history. Java is today the most densely populated region of Indonesia because of its fertility. But the past may have been more complex than we give it credit for. But other disruptive forces are at work there. Each is regularly taught in schools and is used in mass media and on official occasions. Several Mon-Khmer languagese.g., Khmer, Katu, Mon, and some forms of Vietnameseallow implosive b and d at the beginning of major syllables. For instance, Khmer, Pear, and Stieng, all spoken on Cambodian territory, were all lumped together, although they actually belong to three different branches of the Mon-Khmer subfamily. These two properties combine to give Mon-Khmer words their characteristic rhythmic pattern, rich and complicated at the beginning, simple at the end. Finally there are the ethno-linguistic clusters of Burma and Thailand (and Laos). (1) Except in Nicobarese, there are no suffixes. These populations admixed with the indigenous substrate, more or less. The issue I wonder about is the relationship of the Austronesians and Austro-Asiatic groups. Some Indonesian groups, such as the Mentawai who live on the island of the same name off the western coast of Sumatra, cluster with the Taiwanese, as if they transplanted their society in totality. but note that one of the populations exhibits Austro-Asiatic, but not Austronesian, admixture. In morphology (word formation), Mu and Vietnamese again show the greatest deviations from the norm. As is clear from the charts above these people are not particularly genetically close to Africans. On the other hand, Vietnamese has practically no morphology. (the northern East Asian groups being a subset of the southern).

With the ethnographic context in place, let's look at the two primary figures which we get from the paper. Both the dominant ethnic groups in Burma and Thailand are intrusive and absorbed Mon-Khmer populations, the latter dynamic being historically attested. Major syllables are composed of one or two initial consonants, followed by one major vowel and one final consonant. Unfortunately there are only ~50,000 markers, which is not optimal for really fine-grained intra-regional analysis in my opinion. But the past may have been more complex than we give it credit for. Relationships with other language families have been proposed, but, because of the long durations involved and the scarcity of reliable data, it is very difficult to present a solid demonstration of their validity. But better than nothing, and definitely sufficient for coarser scale analysis. Mu languages have an extremely complex system of prefixes, infixes (elements inserted within the body of a word), and suffixes.

Relative to Java the Malay peninsula, Borneo, and Sumatra, are agriculturally marginal. In the past, classification was done mainly according to geographic location.

As you can see the Austronesians range from off the coast of South America (Easter Island) to southeast Africa (Madagascar). This is noteworthy, considering that the language families found to the northTai-Kadai, Sino-Tibetan, and Hmong-Mien (Miao-Yao)all have tones. The Sino-Tibetans came before then. At first, and for a long time, the use of this script was limited to Christian contexts, but it spread gradually, and in 1910 the French colonial administration made its use official. As is clear from the charts above these people are not particularly genetically close to Africans. However, whether this is borrowing or inheritance relationship has long been an issue of controversy, because plausible evidence to these points of view is still unavailable. I've added a label for the Papuan populations. By clicking accept or continuing to use the site, you agree to the terms outlined in our. Markers show populations sampled by HUGO Pan-Asian SNP Consortium. In Thailand and Laos the Mon-Khmer substrate has been marginalized to isolated residual groups. Within the Mon-Khmer subfamily itself, 12 main branches are distinguished; glottochronological estimates of the time during which specific languages have evolved separately from a common source indicate that these 12 branches all separated about 3,000 to 4,000 years ago. The Thai abandoned Chinese influenced Mahayana Buddhism for the Indian influenced Theravada Buddhism of the conquered populace. Additionally you have Vietnamese in the east and some tribal groups in northeast India. Interestingly the Austronesian proportions are high not only in island Southeast Asia, but also among many South Chinese groups. Furthermore, derivational processes indicate intransitive, causative, reciprocal, and reflexive forms. For both scripts, the letter shapes and principles of writing were borrowed from Indian alphabets (perhaps those of the Pallava dynasty in South India) that were in use in Southeast Asia at the time. Updates? In this paper, equivalent data from basic. The former nation is dominated by the. I'm going to play with it myself soon. This should not be surprising, it seems that hunter-gatherer groups often switch to the language of resident agriculturalists. About a year and a half ago I reviewed a paper in Science which did a first pass through some of the findings suggested by the HUGO Pan-Asian SNP Consortium data set, which pooled a wide range of Asian populations. Scientist You Should Know: Corinne Le Qur Tries to Stunt Climate Change, 5 Things You Might Not Know About Volcanoes, Minerals Reveal a New Understanding of Original Life on Earth, This Virus Could Clarify the Origins of Complex Life. The second figure shows two PCA panels. The work of classifying and comparing the Austroasiatic languages is still in the initial stages. With the ethnographic context in place, let's look at the two primary figures which we get from the paper. The Sino-Tibetans came before then. Though today Taiwan is predominantly Han Chinese, that is an artifact of relatively recent migration. PC 1 is the largest component of genetic variance in the data set, and PC 2 the second largest. Austroasiatic languages, also spelled Austro-Asiatic, stock of some 150 languages spoken by more than 65 million people scattered throughout Southeast Asia and eastern India. The second figure shows two PCA panels. Much more characteristic of the Austroasiatic stock is a contrast between two or more series of vowels pronounced with different voice qualities called registers. The religious literature in Old and Middle Mon played a very important role in the spreading of Theravda Buddhism to the rest of Southeast Asia. ., Abdulla, M., Ahmed, I., Assawamakin, A., Bhak, J., Brahmachari, S., Calacal, G., Chaurasia, A., Chen, C., Chen, J., Chen, Y., Chu, J., Cutiongco-de la Paz, E., De Ungria, M., Delfin, F., Edo, J., Fuchareon, S., Ghang, H., Gojobori, T., Han, J., Ho, S., Hoh, B., Huang, W., Inoko, H., Jha, P., Jinam, T., Jin, L., Jung, J., Kangwanpong, D., Kampuansai, J., Kennedy, G., Khurana, P., Kim, H., Kim, K., Kim, S., Kim, W., Kimm, K., Kimura, R., Koike, T., Kulawonganunchai, S., Kumar, V., Lai, P., Lee, J., Lee, S., Liu, E., Majumder, P., Mandapati, K., Marzuki, S., Mitchell, W., Mukerji, M., Naritomi, K., Ngamphiw, C., Niikawa, N., Nishida, N., Oh, B., Oh, S., Ohashi, J., Oka, A., Ong, R., Padilla, C., Palittapongarnpim, P., Perdigon, H., Phipps, M., Png, E., Sakaki, Y., Salvador, J., Sandraling, Y., Scaria, V., Seielstad, M., Sidek, M., Sinha, A., Srikummool, M., Sudoyo, H., Sugano, S., Suryadi, H., Suzuki, Y., Tabbada, K., Tan, A., Tokunaga, K., Tongsima, S., Villamor, L., Wang, E., Wang, Y., Wang, H., Wu, J., Xiao, H., Xu, S., Yang, J., Shugart, Y., Yoo, H., Yuan, W., Zhao, G., & Zilfalil, B. 4) The Bamar arrive from southern China over 1,000 years ago, and marginalize the Austro-Asiatics in Burma. I believe that the Austro-Asiatic element also predates Austronesian in Southeast Asia. Some Indonesian groups, such as the Mentawai who live on the island of the same name off the western coast of Sumatra, cluster with the Taiwanese, as if they transplanted their society in totality. If you live for word associations, derivations, and definitions then youre going to love this quiz! In. Schmidt, who first attempted a systematic comparison, included in Austroasiatic a mixed group of languages containing Malay borrowings and did not consider Vietnamese to be a member of the family.

These replacements may explain why, for instance, the Nicobarese languages, which seem closely related, have few vocabulary items in common. So far I've been talking about the north to south movement. It is rare to find more than one or two affixes (i.e., prefixes or infixes) attached to one root; thus, the number of syllables per word remains very small. The variety of Khmer spoken in Surin (Thailand) distinguishes five degrees of height, plus diphthongs, all of which can be either short or long, for a total of 36 major vowels. Though today Taiwan is predominantly Han Chinese, that is an artifact of relatively recent migration. These populations admixed with the indigenous substrate, more or less. Both the STRUCTURE plot and the PCA show evidence of this sort of two-way admixture. But better than nothing, and definitely sufficient for coarser scale analysis. Superficially, there seems to be little in common between a monosyllabic tone language such as Vietnamese and a polysyllabic toneless Mu language such as Mur of India; linguistic comparisons, however, confirm the underlying unity of the family.

Next to that tree there's a STRUCTURE plot at K = 14, which means 14 ancestral populations.

But it is notable that in both these polities the Mon-Khmer populations set the tone for the civilizational orientation of the conquering ethnicities. A few languages have enclitics, certain elements attached to the end of noun phrases (possessives in Semai, demonstratives in Mnong), but these do not constitute word suffixes. Because Vietnam was a Chinese province for a thousand years, the Chinese language was used and written there for official purposes.

Nasal vowels are sometimes found, but in any one language they do not occur very frequently. There are also taboos on proper names; e.g., after a persons death, his name and all words that resemble it are avoided and replaced by metaphors or circumlocutions. The STRUCTURE is straightforward, but note the linear distribution of the Austronesians in relation to outgroups in the first panel, and implicitly on the second. That is, I believe that an Austro-Asiatic substrate existed before the arrival of Austronesians from the zone between the Philippines and Taiwan. Southeast Asia was settled by a series of distinct peoples. The Negritos of Malaysia are somewhat different. . The indigenous folk of central Malaysia seem to speak a Austro-Asiatic language. In syntax, possessive and demonstrative forms and relative clauses follow the head noun; if particles are found, they will be prepositions, not postpositions (elements placed after the word to which they are primarily related), and the normal word order is subjectverbobject. Interestingly they speak an Austronesian language; again following the trend where marginalized indigenes seem to pick up the language of their farming neighbors. At the end of a word, the inventory of possible consonants is always smaller than at the beginning of the major syllable and is considerably smaller when contact with Tai-Kadai or Sino-Tibetan languages has been extensive. The STRUCTURE is straightforward, but note the linear distribution of the Austronesians in relation to outgroups in the first panel, and implicitly on the second.

Get a Britannica Premium subscription and gain access to exclusive content. Rather, the ancestors of most East Eurasians survived in refugia in China, and a sequence of agriculturally driven expansions have reshaped Southeast Asia more recently. Because of the thicker textual record for mainland Southeast Asia we know that the Austro-Asiatic groups predate the Thai and Sino-Tibetan ones. But at this point I think we've got a chronology like so: 1) First you have hunter-gatherer populations of broad Melanesian affinities in Southeast Asia. Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article (requires login). But it is notable that in both these polities the Mon-Khmer populations set the tone for the civilizational orientation of the conquering ethnicities. The PCA shows clearly that the Austronesians are the genetically most varied of these Southeast Asian groups. The stock is of great importance as a linguistic substratum for all Southeast Asian languages. Classification of the Austroasiatic languages, https://www.britannica.com/topic/Austroasiatic-languages, Academia - Classifying the Austroasiatic Languages: History and State of the Art, Fu Jen Catholic University - Graduate Institute of Linguistics - Austro-Asiatic Language Family. They probably existed in the ancestral language called Proto-Mon-Khmer but have disappeared in many modern languages. The Pith: Southeast Asia was settled by a series of distinct peoples. Genetic Testing Could Help Doctors Choose Antidepressant Prescriptions, Scientists Have Fully Sequenced the DNA of a Pompeii Victim for the First Time. It is entirely possible that modern humans arrived in northeast Asia via a southern route, retreated south during the glaciation, and expanded north, with some groups pushing back south again. Vietnamese, Mon, and Khmer, the best-known languages of the family, came within the orbit of larger civilizations and borrowed without restraintVietnamese from Chinese, Mon and Khmer from Sanskrit and Pli. As indicated by their name these are a small people with African-like features. I believe that the Austro-Asiatic element also predates Austronesian in Southeast Asia. It seems likely that Austro-Asiatic populations were dominant across the western half of Indonesia before the arrival of Austronesians. I hypothesize that the spread of the Austronesians was facilitated by a more effective form of agriculture which could squeeze more productivity out of marginal land. The monuments of Myanmar (Burma), Thailand, and Cambodia have preserved a large number of official inscriptions in these two languages. The composition of the vocabulary of the Austroasiatic languages reflects their history. Andre G. Haudricourt, in his seminal article "De l'origine des tons en vietnamien" (1954), showed masterly that the three tones of Ancient Vietnamese originated from ancient laryngeal finals. You can see the locations on the map above (alas, the labels are too small to read the codes). Now called quoc-ngu (national language), it is learned and used by all Vietnamese. Why is the Austro-Asiatic fraction higher in Java than to the zones in the north? (2009). Mu syntax, once again, is radically different, having a basic subjectobjectverb word order, like the Dravidian languages of India. Someone with a better ethnographic understanding of Southeast Asia than I could probably decode the results above with greater power. E . Tones are not posited for any ancient stage of Mon-Khmer or Austroasiatic. Most groups are too small or too scattered to win recognition, and for many the only chance of cultural survival lies in retreating to a mountain or jungle fastness, a strategy that reflects long-standing Austroasiatic tradition. It is among isolated mountain and jungle groups that this vocabulary is best preserved. I believe that the most recent genetic data points to intrusion from the east into South Asia. Because of their isolation some of these groups have persisted in speaking the languages of the "first farmers" of Malaysia, even after those pioneers were absorbed by newcomers. A series of aspirated consonants, ph, th, ch, and kh, pronounced with a small puff of air, is found in several branches or subbranches of Mon-Khmer (Pearic, Khmuic, South Aslian, Angkuic), but this is not a typical feature of the family, and it probably did not exist in the ancestral language. A typical feature of Mon-Khmer languages, uncommon in the Mu subfamily, is to allow a great variety of two-consonant combinations at the beginning of major syllables. Both the STRUCTURE plot and the PCA show evidence of this sort of two-way admixture. They've colored the bar components to match the ethno-linguistic classes (e.g., red = Austro-Asiatic, an Austro-Asiatic modal component).