Uralic languages

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The Uralic languages (pronounced /jʊˈrælɨk/) constitute a language family of 39 ^[1] languages spoken by approximately 20 million people. The healthiest Uralic languages in terms of the number of native speakers are Estonian, Finnish, and Hungarian. Countries that are home to a significant number of speakers of Uralic languages include Estonia, Finland, Hungary, Romania, Russia, Serbia and Slovakia.

The name "Uralic" refers to the location of the family’s suggested Urheimat (homeland), which was often placed in the vicinity of the Ural mountains. However, there is no reliable proof for this, and modern scientists often place the urheimat more west and more south, close to the urheimat of Indo-European languages.

Family tree

While the internal structure of the Uralic family has been under debate since the family was originally proposed, three subfamilies, Finno-Permic, Ugric and Samoyedic are usually recognized as being distinct from one another. Historically, Finno-Permic and Ugric have tended to be grouped as the Finno-Ugric family, but the genetic similarities between these groups with respect to other members of the Uralic family do not appear to justify this.^{[citation needed]} In any event, all the Uralic languages are thought to have descended, through independent processes of language change, from Proto-Uralic. There is some disagreement in the two views as to whether Proto-Uralic originally split into two or three branches. However, severe doubt has been raised about the validity of most of the higher-order branchings, and the traditional binary tree^[2].

Many efforts have been made to identify the relationship between Uralic and the world’s other major language families, but none have won general acceptance at the present time. The Uralic-Yukaghir hypothesis identifies Uralic and Yukaghir as independent members of a single language family; though often mentioned, it is currently accepted by only a minority of historical linguists. Theories proposing a special relationship with the Altaic languages were formerly popular, based on shared vocabulary as well as grammatical and phonological features (e.g., agglutination and vowel harmony), but are now generally rejected, with such similarities attributed to coincidence and language contact, for most, or to relationship at a deeper genetic level, for a few; in either case, a privileged relationship with Altaic seems improbable.^{[citation needed]}

Theories that include the Uralic family as a node in a proposed macrofamily include the following:

• Uralic-Yukaghir (or Uralo-Yukaghir)
• Indo-Uralic (or Uralo-Indo-European)
• Eurasiatic
• Nostratic
• Ural-Altaic
• Uralo-Siberian

Classification of languages

The traditional classification of the Uralic languages is as follows.^{[citation needed]} Obsolete names are displayed in italics.

Samoyedic

• Northern Samoyedic
  • Enets (Yenets, Yenisei-Samoyed) — Nearly extinct
  • Nenets (Yurak)
  • Nganasan (Tavgy, Tavgi, Tawgi, Tawgi-Samoyed)
  • Yurats
• Southern Samoyedic
  • Kamassian (Kamas) — Extinct (20th century)
  • Mator (Motor) — Extinct (19th century)
  • Selkup (Ostyak-Samoyed)

Finno-Ugric

• Ugric (Ugrian)
  • Hungarian (Magyar)
    • Hungarian
  • Ob Ugric (Ob Ugrian)
    • Khanty (Ostyak)
    • Mansi (Vogul)
• Finno-Permic (Permian-Finnic)
  • Permic (Permian)
    • Komi (Komi-Zyrian, Zyrian)
    • Komi-Permyak
    • Udmurt (Votyak)
  • Finno-Volgaic (Finno-Cheremisic, Finno-Mari, Volga-Finnic)
    • Mari (Cheremisic)
      • Mari (Cheremis)
    • Mordvinic (Mordvin, Mordvinian)
      • Erzya
      • Moksha
    • Extinct Finno-Volgaic languages of uncertain position
      • Merya (17th century)
      • Muromian
      • Meshcherian
    • Finno-Lappic (Finno-Saamic, Finno-Samic)
      • Sami (Samic, Saamic, Lappic, Lappish)
        • Western Sami (Western Samic)
          • Southern Sami
          • Ume Sami — Nearly extinct
          • Lule Sami
          • Pite Sami — Nearly extinct
          • Northern Sami
        • Eastern Sami (Eastern Samic)
          • Kainuu Sami — Extinct
          • Kemi Sami — Extinct
          • Inari Sami
          • Akkala Sami — Extinct (21st century)
          • Kildin Sami
          • Skolt Sami
          • Ter Sami — Nearly extinct
      • Baltic-Finnic (Balto-Finnic, Balto-Fennic, Finnic, Fennic)
        • Estonian
          • South Estonian (including Mulgi and Tartu)
            • Võro (Voro, Võru, Voru; including Seto or Setu)
        • Finnish (including Meänkieli or Tornedalian Finnish, Kven Finnish, and Ingrian Finnish)
        • Ingrian (Izhorian) — Nearly extinct
        • Karelian
          • Karelian proper
          • Lude (Ludic, Ludian)
          • Olonets Karelian (Livvi, Aunus, Aunus Karelian, Olonetsian)
        • Livonian (Liv) — Nearly extinct
        • Veps (Vepsian)
        • Votic (Votian, Vod) — Nearly extinct

The term Volgaic, used to denote a branch previously believed to include Mari and Mordvinic, has now become obsolete.^{[citation needed]} Modern linguistic research has shown that it was a geographic classification rather than a linguistic one. The Mordvinic languages are more closely related to the Finno-Lappic languages than they are to the Mari languages.^{[citation needed]}

Typology

Structural characteristics generally said to be typical of Uralic languages include:

• extensive use of independent suffixes, a.k.a. agglutination.
• a large set of grammatical cases (13–14 cases on average; mainly coincidental: Proto-Uralic had 6 cases) , e.g.:
  • Erzya: 12 cases
  • Estonian: 14 cases (and one is still under some debate)
  • Finnish: 15 cases
  • Hungarian: 18 cases (and some more case-like suffixes)
  • Inari Sami: 9 cases
  • Komi: in certain dialects as many as 27 cases
  • Moksha: 13 cases
  • Nenets: 7 cases
  • North Sami: 6 cases
  • Udmurt: 16 cases
  • Veps: 24 cases
• unique Uralic case system, from which all modern Uralic languages derive their case systems.
  • nominative singular has no case suffix.
  • accusative and genitive suffixes are nasal sounds (-n, -m, etc.)
  • three-way distinction in the local case system, with each set of local cases being divided into forms corresponding roughly to "from", "to", and "in/at"; especially evident, e.g., in Hungarian, Finnish and Estonian, which have several sets of local cases, such as the "inner", "outer" and "on top" systems in Hungarian, while in Finnish the "on top" forms have merged to the "outer" forms.
  • Uralic locative suffix exists in all Uralic languages in various cases, e.g., Hungarian superessive, Finnish essive, North Sami essive, Erzyan inessive, and Nenets locative.
  • Uralic lative suffix exists in various cases in many Uralic languages, e.g., Hungarian illative, Finnish lative, Erzyan illative, Komi approximative, and Northern Sami locative.
• vowel harmony (recently lost in standard Estonian, but exists in dialects).
• a lack of grammatical gender.
• negative verb, which exists in almost all Uralic languages, e.g., Nganasan, Enets, Nenets, Kamassian, Komi, Meadow Mari, Erzya (in the first preterite, the conjunctional, optative and imperative moods, sometimes there are alterations in choice of negative verb stems), North Sami (and other Samic languages), Finnish, Estonian, Karelian, etc. (Some innovative languages have lost this feature, e.g., Hungarian.)
• palatalization of consonants; in this context, palatalization means a secondary articulation, where the middle of the tongue is tense. For example, pairs like [ɲ] - [n], or [c] - [t] are contrasted in Hungarian, as in hattyú [hɒccuː] "swan". Some Sami languages, for example Skolt Sami, distinguish three degrees: plain <l> [l], palatalized <'l> [lʲ], and palatal <lj> [ʎ], where <'l> has a primary alveolar articulation, while <lj> has a primary palatal articulation. Original Uralic palatalization is phonemic, independent of the following vowel and traceable to the 6000-year-old Proto-Uralic. It is different from Russian palatalization, which is of more recent origin. Baltic-Finnic languages have lost palatalization, but eastern varieties have reacquired it, so Baltic-Finnic palatalization (where extant) was originally dependent on the following vowel.
• lack of phonologically contrastive tone.
• lots of postpositions (prepositions are very rare).
• basic vocabulary of about 200 words, including body parts (e.g., eye, heart, head, foot, mouth), family members (e.g., father, mother-in-law), animals (e.g., viper, partridge, fish), nature objects (e.g., tree, stone, nest, water), basic verbs (e.g., live, fall, run, make, see, suck, go, die, swim, know), basic pronouns (e.g., who, what, we, you, I), numerals (e.g., two, five); derivatives increase the number of common words.
• possessive suffixes.
• no possessive pronouns.
• dual, which exists, e.g., in the Samoyedic, Ob Ugrian and Samic languages.
• plural markers -j (i) and -t (-d) have a common origin (e.g., in Finnish, Estonian, Erzya, Samic languages, Samoyedic languages). Hungarian, however, has -i- before the possessive suffixes and -k elsewhere. In the old orthographies, the plural marker -k was also used in the Samic languages.
• no verb for "have". Note that all Uralic languages have verbs with the meaning of "own" or "possess", but these words are not used in the same way as English "have". Instead, the concept of "have" is indicated with alternative syntactic structures. For example, Finnish uses existential clauses; the subject is the possession, the verb is "to be" (the copula), and the possessor is grammatically a location and in the adessive case: "Minulla on kala", literally "I_on is fish", or "I have a fish (some fish)". In addition, Finnish can also employ possessive suffixes, e.g. "Minulla on kalani", literally "I_on is fish_my", or "I do have my own fish". In Hungarian: "Van egy halam", literally "Is a fish_my", or "I have a fish".
• expressions that include a numeral are singular if they refer to things which form a single group, e.g., "négy csomó" in Hungarian, "njeallje čuolmma" in Northern Sami, "neli sõlme" in Estonian, and "neljä solmua" in Finnish, each of which means "four knots", but the literal approximation is "four knot". (This approximation is inaccurate for Finnish and Estonian, where the singular is in the partitive case, such that the number points to a part of a larger mass, like "four of knot(s)".)
• the stress is always on the first syllable, except for the Mari, Udmurt and Komi-Permyak languages. The Erzya language can vary its stress in words to give specific nuances to sentential meaning.

Selected cognates

The following is a very brief selection of cognates in basic vocabulary across the Uralic family, which may serve to give an idea of the sound changes involved. This is not a list of translations: cognates have a common origin, but their meaning may be shifted and loanwords may have replaced them.

See also

• Proto-Uralic language
• Altaic languages
• Ural-Altaic languages
• Japonic languages
• Austronesian languages
• Indo-European languages
• Language family
• List of languages
• Nostratic languages

External links

• Ethnologue’s Uralic Family Tree
• The Untenability of the Finno-Ugrian Theory from a Linguistic Point of View by Dr. László Marácz, a minority opinion on the language family.
• "The Ugric-Turkic Battle": A Critical Review (PDF) by Angela Marcantonio (Rome), Pirjo Nummenaho (Naples) and Michela Salvagni (Rome)
• Linguistic Shadow-Boxing by Johanna Laakso — A book review of Angela Marcantonio’s "The Uralic language family. Facts, myths and statistics"
• The Finno-Ugrics, The Economist, Dec. 20, 2005
• News on the Uralic peoples
• Uralisches Substrat im Deutsch – oder gibt es eigentlich die indo-uralische Sprachfamilie? by Marcelo Jolkesky UFSC 2004.

Bibliography

• Abondolo, Daniel (ed., 1998), The Uralic Languages, London and New York, ISBN 0-415-08198-X.
• Collinder, Björn (1957), Survey of the Uralic Languages, Stockholm.
• Collinder, Björn (1960), An Etymological Dictionary of the Uralic Languages, Stockholm.
• Décsy, Gyula (1990), The Uralic Protolanguage: A Comprehensive Reconstruction, Bloomington, Indiana.
• Hajdu, Péter, (1963), Finnugor népek és nyelvek, Gondolat kiadó, Budapest [Transl. G. F. Cushing as Finni-Ugrian Languages and Peoples (1975), André Deutsch, London].
• Laakso, Johanna (1992), Uralilaiset kansat (Uralic Peoples), Porvoo – Helsinki – Juva, ISBN 951-0-16485-2.
• Rédei, Károly (ed.) (1986-88), Uralisches etymologisches Wörterbuch (Uralic Etymological Dictionary), Budapest.
• Sammallahti, Pekka, Matti Morottaja (1983): Säämi – suoma – säämi škovlasänikirje (Inari Sami – Finnish – Inari Sami School Dictionary). Helsset/Helsinki: Ruovttueatnan gielaid dutkanguovddaš/Kotimaisten kielten tutkimuskeskus, ISBN 951-9475-36-2.
• Sammallahti, Pekka (1988): Historical Phonology of the Uralic Languages In: Denis Sinor (ed.): The Uralic Languages, pp. 478-554. Leiden: E.J. Brill.
• Sammallahti, Pekka (1993): Sámi – suoma – sámi sátnegirji (Northern Sami – Finnish – Northern Sami Dictionary). Ohcejohka/Utsjoki: Girjegiisá, ISBN 951-8939-28-4.
• Sauvageot, Aurélien (1930), Recherches sur le vocabulaire des langues ouralo-altaïques (Research on the Vocabulary of the Uralo-Altaic Languages), Paris.
• Önija komi kyv. (Modern Komi language) Morfologia/Das’töma filologijasa kandidat G.V.Fed'un'ova kipod ulyn. — Syktyvkar: Komi n’ebög ledzanin, 2000. — 544 s. ISBN 5-7555-0689-2.

References

1. ^ Ethnologue report for Uralic
2. ^ Salminen, Tapani (2002): Problems in the taxonomy of the Uralic languages in the light of modern comparative studies

Further reading

• Künnap, A. (2000). Contact-induced perspectives in Uralic linguistics. LINCOM studies in Asian linguistics, 39. München: LINCOM Europa. ISBN 3895869643
• Abondolo, D. M. (1998). The Uralic languages. Routledge language family descriptions. New York: Routledge. ISBN 041508198X
• Collinder, B. (1965). An introduction to the Uralic languages. Berkeley: University of California Press.
• Collinder, B. (1960). Comparative grammar of the Uralic languages. Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell.
• Wickman, B. (1955). The form of the object in the Uralic languages. Uppsala: Lundequistska bokhandeln.