Appendix talk:Tungusic Swadesh lists

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Latest comment: 5 years ago by AnonymousMusician in topic Move/merge/split notice
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korean is not altaic, you can see it here.

  • What about any of the other languages makes them 'Altaic'? I do not see why Korean alone should be considered the odd man out.

Arrangement of the languages[edit]

Currently, the languages are arranged from left to right as follows - Turkish, Mongolian, Oroqen, Korean, Manchu, Kyrgyz, Japanese (more or less randomly). Don't you think that it would be better and more convenient if they were arranged according to their generic relations, e.g. Turkish (Oghuz branch), Kyrgyz (Kipchak branch); Mongolian; Oroqen (North Tungusic), Manchu (South Tungusic); Korean; Japanese?

Move/merge/split notice[edit]

I noticed that recently this page has been displaying a message on top of it saying that somebody has suggested to move, merge, or split this Swadesh list. While I understand why one would want to do this (very few linguists view Altaic as a real family anymore), I disagree with the idea of eliminating this list. Much like how the Palæosiberian Swadesh list exists despite it being an areal unit and not a family, it is quite useful. Those languages and families are too small and/or poorly documented to merit their own Swadesh lists, so it makes sense to have a combined one. I think the same can apply here, at least to an extent. Tungusic is currently the only family here without its own Swadesh list on Wiktionary, but that in and of itself should be enough to merit the retention of this list, at least for now, until a Tungusic list is created. Perhaps just add a note at the top saying that Altaic is an areal unit? AnonymousMusician (talk) 01:03, 29 December 2018 (UTC)Reply