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Neter Neb posted an update in the group
4 years agoComparative Negro – Egyptian Linguistics 4 years ago · What in the hell is Christopher Ehret doing with his comparisons of *Proto Semitic and what he calls ‘Egyptian’? Were you joking?
by Neter NebOk, so, here are some of Christopher Ehret’s data on what he calls evidence for reconstructing *proto Afro-Asiatic. If you simply observe he makes numerous historical linguistic mistakes and his data have no base in reality. Why do I say this? I have circled what he is actually using in his comparisons. Let us dive deep here, the number one issue simply is that the ‘Semitic, Chadic, Cushitic, Omotic’ he is using are NOT attested, nor is it living and it is actually a hypothetical proto reconstruction, he is comparing reconstructions to get another reconstruction which violates Grimm’s law usages of living and attested languages, I hope he was already critiqued for this blatant mistake, for the fact that proto-languages are reconstructed hypothetical and incomplete thus it cannot be placed scientifically alongside LIVING and attested languages with the completeness of phonology and morphology, he literally is reconstructing Afro-Asiatic with other reconstructions like Cushitic, unbelievable and this is not historical linguistics.
This first mistake killed his entire analysis, anyone can look up proto languages and you will see that they are man-made hypotheticals. This looks very amateurish, the correspondences to me look like mere borrowings. The data here explaining labial obstruents [b] show scanty sound correspondences, the correspondences between Semitic and Egyptian only correspond in a scanty fashion with the other Black African languages.
How do I know that this is borrowing? Borrowing would be a similarity in a small number of basic vocabulary (Dimmendaal 2011). When we review the specific words of the basic lexis, the core vocabulary items like <> observed in #35 do NOT correspond and he has numerous missing slots.
These terms have missing slots between Egyptian and Semitic like in <> <> <> <> <> <> <> <> <> <> <> <> do NOT correspond literally. Thus, from numerous core basic items being compared in his work only a few legitimately correspond, for example, Christopher Ehret number 37# reconstructed Semitic *baʕbaʕ – the prime of youth with Egyptian <> – abundance ??????
The usages of other African languages assist with whether we are dealing with cognates or chance look-alikes so Cushitic has <> and indicates that the Semitic abundance is in fact a look-alike, I mean cognates suppose to match in form and meaning as well as “intra-field and inter-field metonymic or metaphoric changes” Dimmendaal 2011. Even if we tried, how can you even make sense of this, we can only reduce this down to ‘chance similarities’ at best, prime of youth —–> abundance, in no way possible, being in the prime of your youth equals abundance. The third mistake is evident because of the first mistake which is his use of placing manmade hypothetical proto-languages alongside comparing with actual ‘LIVING’ languages thus the first error leads to the third error. The third error is generated in reality from the first error mentioned, Christopher Ehret makes the amateurish mistake of using a reconstructed proto-language which is an incomplete language system this, in turn, is the reason Mr. Ehret juggles his use between the Semitic languages, for example: In numbers # 24 and 26 he uses a different Semitic language than in numbers # 22 and 23.
New term: Comparing hypothetical incomplete abstract proto-languages with living languages will lead to what we should rightly dubb “Linguistic Juggling” which would indeed be a violation of Grimm’s law.
22- pPS- Pre Proto Semitic
23- Proto Semitic – proto-language
24- Arabic – a living language
25- Proto Semitic – proto-language
26- Arabic – a living language
note: Abbreviations, pPS- Pre-proto Semitic, A – ArabicThe guy is literally using different Semitic language systems juggling in his analysis between a living language Arabic and man-made reconstruction. This violates all kinds of regularity rules in which would be too detailed to mention in this post. When comparing languages and forming relationships by sound laws between two or more languages it is only scientific to follow the exact principles that established Indo -European. We can examine Grimm’s law with ease and see that this violates Grimm’s law and this is not what historical linguistics is. If this is a violation of Grimm’s law and the operations of sound regularity you find between LIVING Indo – European languages this means that this is simply pseudo linguistics. There are numerous other errors like, he juggles between timelines of what he calls ‘Egyptian”. What exactly is Egyptian? In some cases, he is comparing what he calls ‘Egyptian’ and in some cases, he compares Late Egyptian. That makes no logical sense, the guy is literally jumping timelines like the movie Back to the future. The man should be sticking with the time period, like Old Egyptian, Middle Egyptian, Late Egyptian. In one sense he compares some phases of Egyptian and in others, he compares late Egyptian.
Examples of this madness:
https://www.google.com/…/Reconstructing…/la4wDwAAQBAJ…14 Comments-
To your point, I think grammar is another thing that shows the fallaciousness of Afro-asiatic. Ex: arabic does not distinguish between nominal and adverbial predication. Ebonics does, due to it’s niger-congo base, and medew netcher has the same distinction.
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88,828
Abibisika (Black Gold) Points
Clearly krakkkaz try to pass of areal diffusion for genetic relatedness. It is the temporal and spatial depth of comparison at play in Négro-Égyptien that makes for compelling argumentation. There is little to no chance that the correspondences could be due to borrowing or areal influences.-
Okunini, You are absolutely correct, when we look at Ehret’s data, clearly, he juggles between Semitic, Pre-Semitic, and Arabic, and others, even if I took this seriously, this is clearly borrowings by areal diffusion or even in some cases of his so-called correspondences as ‘chance similarities’ and ‘false friends”(Dimmendaal 2011). None of the most basic lexeis correspond in Ehret’s work, either missing slots or simply false friends or similarities by chance. His correspondences look very scanty and do not have the uniformity of systematic regularity. This guy is literally all over the place.
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88,828
Abibisika (Black Gold) Points
By the way, ya homeboy claimed to be a student of Christopher Ehret, so I reached out to him. Ehret does not know him at all.
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LOLLLLL, Okunini, he is still in the community teaching this madness, what a shame, I’m happy I’m over here.
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88,828
Abibisika (Black Gold) Points
That’s to use the word community very loosely. If there really was any community he would have had it a looooong time ago.
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He is a liar, he lies on every professor
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88,828
Abibisika (Black Gold) Points
All hail king cyclops! lol
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Okunini have you observed Wikipedia peer review about Asar Imhotep, the King Cyclops is cool in the land of the blind, but, it seems this one-eyed King is not getting a pass even in the land of the blind. Wikipedia peer review had a ‘linguist’ that reviewed his work and stated he was a hoax and pseudo-linguistics. In ASCAC Dr. Mario Beatty stated that his methodology is inaccurate, on top of the rejection you gave him about Mboli’s work, so, this one-eyed King, even in the land of the blind is diminishing, lollll.
1- Dr. Mario Beatty/ ASCAC rejection of his work
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Okunini, here is the Wikipedia rejection and labeled Asar Imhotep work a ‘HOAX’ and also, ‘pseudo – linguistics’
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2- Wikipedia Peer – review rejection/ labeled as a HOAX and ‘Pseudo linguistics’
https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Talk:Negro-Egyptian_languages-
88,828
Abibisika (Black Gold) Points
I hadn’t read it before. I read everything to the end, but I had to skim the HJ stuff as any time I even start to read anything from him I can actually feel brain cells dying from the sheer abuse they are being put through. lol.
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The more I research into linguistics and see the flaws of mass comparison the less likely I am to see “Semetic” as a valid language family.
The problem is that religious folks have a vested interest in maintaining the legitimacy of Semetic as well as Afro Asiatic and it is borderline pseudo science.
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*Semetic* or Syrio Arabian would be a branch and not a language family.
This is my mistake.
Im a student new to this stuff and still learning about the proper classification of our Afrikan languages. My desire is for pure science in our analysis without personal bias. Feel free to correct me if a make innacurate statements.
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