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Dia korean linguist11/21/2023 The FLDH is now at the centre of a heated controversy in European archaeology (Kristiansen 2005) and linguistics (Chang et al. Then, we discuss the archaeology of Korea to assess the two contrasting linguistic arguments.ĭebate on the spread of farming to Europe We begin by reviewing archaeological studies on migration and diffusion, two key concepts for understanding the nature of the spread of farming. In this paper, we discuss why the two views differ in understanding the dispersal and split of the Koeranic and Japonic languages. The contention between Whitman and Robbeets appears to arise not only from different linguistic views of the proto-Koreanic and proto-Japonic languages, but also from how they apply archaeological research in their studies. Around 800 BCE, she argues, rice farmers in Korea moved to the Japanese Archipelago and brought with them the Japonic language. She also suggests that approximately two millennia later, when rice was introduced to Korea around 1300 BCE, rice farmers from Shandong and Liaodong, China brought the Japonic language to the peninsula. In contrast, Robbeets ( 2017d) argues that proto-Koreanic speakers entered the Korean Peninsula as millet was introduced from Liaoning, China to the peninsula around 3500 BCE and that the Koreanic and Japonic languages initially split during this time. He also suggests that the arrival of Koreanic in Korea was associated with the spread of the Korean-style bronze dagger culture from present-day northeast China to Korea around 300 BCE. Whitman ( 2011) suggests that the Japonic language family was first brought by rice farmers to the Korean Peninsula around 1500 BCE and then to Japan after 950 BCE, as farmers in Korea moved to Japan. However, the timing and processes of the dispersals and divergence of these languages have been a point of contention among linguists. In particular, the spread and split of proto-Koreanic and proto-Japonic are thought to have been critically related to the spread of these cultivars. In the East Asian context, the major focus has been on rice, which originated in South China (specifically, the Yangtze River Basin) and millet from North China. Some linguists have attempted to apply this model to other regions, including East Asia (e.g. The FLDH has had a significant impact on historical linguistics, which relies on prehistoric archaeology to understand the formation, spread and divergence of languages. This hypothesis is called the ‘farming/language dispersal hypothesis’ (hereafter FLDH) (Bellwood 2005). Renfrew and Bellwood argue that the spread of farming into Europe was led by the westward migration of Neolithic farmers from Southwest Asia and that the dispersal of farmers resulted in the spread of the proto-Indo-European language. This tendency largely arises from an interest in Renfrew and Bellwood's archaeological works on the spread of farming to Europe at the beginning of the Neolithic (e.g. In explaining dispersal and divergence of languages in the past, historical linguistics recently has paid special attention to the spread of farming. Media summary: Archaeological records suggest that the spread of millet to Korea around 3500 BCE had little to do with language dispersal. Meanwhile, viewing the introduction of slender daggers to Korea as another dispersal of language to Korea needs more scrutiny. Our evaluation of the ‘millet hypothesis’ and the ‘rice hypothesis’ suggests that rice is a more plausible candidate for explaining the dispersal of proto-Koreanic to Korea. Then we move on to evaluating linguistic hypotheses about the dispersal and split of proto-Koreanic and proto-Japonic. We first review how European archaeologists have understood the spread of farming into Europe, where the farming/language dispersal hypothesis was originally developed, and how archaeology has wrestled with the issues of diffusion and migration. In understanding the appearance of the proto-Koreanic and proto-Japonic languages in Korea, millet and rice, which appeared in Korea around 35 BCE, respectively, have been emphasized by linguists. However, interpretations depend on what prehistoric cultivar is chosen by linguists as having been related with the spread of language. Recently, this hypothesis has been applied towards explaining the dispersal and divergence of East Asian languages. The ‘farming/language dispersal hypothesis’ was originally developed to explain the spread of the Neolithic economy and material culture into Europe.
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