Chapter 8

There are at lest 7,102 living languages in the world.

2,301 are in Asia

2,138 in Africa

1,313 in the Pacific

1,064 in the Americas

Most spoken languages

  1. English

  2. Mandarin

  3. Hindi

  4. Spanish

  5. French

  6. Arabic

  7. Bengali

  8. Russian

  9. Portuguese

  10. Indonesian

Popular Languages:

  1. English

  2. Mandarin

  3. Spanish

  4. French

  5. Arabic

  6. Russian

The world’s lingua Franca: English

Historical Causes

English spreads via Imperialism/Colonialism

Language Family

Major Language

Location

Indo-European

English

America, Europe, SW Asia, Australia, South Africa

Sino-Tibetan

Chinese

China, SE Asia

World’s Language organized into:

  • Language Families: collection of languages related through a common ancestral language

  • Language Branches: collection of languages within a family related through a common ancestral language. Difference are not as significant or as old as between families.

  • Language Groups: collection of languages within a branch that share a common origin in the relatively recent past and display similar grammar and vocabulary.

Acronym:

Fat Babies Get Lots of Doughnuts

F: Family

B: Branch

G: Group

L: Language

D: Dialect

Language Tree:

Other Asian Language Families:

  • Several other language families spoken by large numbers of people in East and Southeast Asia.

    • Isolation on islands and peninsulas contributed to overall independent development

  • Languages of Southeast Asia and North Africa and Central Asia

    • Two largest language families are

      1. Afro-Asiatic

        • Arabic is major language.

        • Official languages in 24 countries of S.W. Asia and North Africa

        • One of six official languages in UN

      2. Altic

        • Altic language that is most spoken in Turkish

African Language Families

  1. more than 1000 distinct languages have been documented

    • several thousands dialects recognized

    • most lack a written tradition

  2. Niger - Congo

    • first language of 800,000 thousand people

    • official language of Tanzania

    • Lingua Franca of Africa, 30 million Africans speak it

  • Distribution of Indo-European Branches

    • Four most widely spoken branches

      1. Germanic Branch

        • Spoken primarily in northwestern Europe and North America

        • English is classified in the Low Germanic group

      2. Indo-Iranian

        • spoken mostly in South Asia

        • most speakers of language branch

        • 438 languages in India, 29 with over a million speakers

    • Four most widely spoken branches

      1. Balto-Slavic Branch

        • Spoken primarily is East Europe divided into:

          1. Eastern Slavic and Baltic groups:

            • Russian Crania

            • Belarusian

          2. West Slavic Group:

            • Polish Czech

            • Slovak

          3. South Slavic Group:

            • Serbo-Croatian

      2. Romance Branch

    • Spoken mostly in South West Europe and Latin America

    • Mostly used in Spanish, French, Portuguese, and Italian.

  • Origin and Diffusion of Language Families

    • Modern English has evolves primarily from the Language spoken by three Germanic tribes invading the British Isles.

      1. Angles - South Denmark

      2. Jutes - North Denmark

      3. Saxons - North West Germany

    • Over time, others invaded England

      • Vikings from Norway

      • Normans from present-day Normandy in France spoken in French.

    Two Theories:

    1. Nomadic Warriors: Kurgan Hearth Hypothesis states that the first language in the boarders of

    2. Sedentary Farmers: East Anatolia Hypothesis states that the first language was brought up in Turkey

Isogloss: boundaries of where regional words are used can be mapped; such as word usage boundary.

Dialects in the United States:

  • The 13 original colonies can be grouped into three dialects regions:

    1. New England

      • Inhabited by settlers from England

    2. Southeastern

    3. Midlands

      • Most diverse group

Dialects in the United Kingdom:

  • Languages with multiple dialects my recognized one as the standard language that is widely recognized as the most acceptable for government, business, education, and mass communication.

    • Ex. England’s is known as British Received Pronunciation

  • British and American English Dialects

    • English language is noticeably different than English spoken spoken in England in three ways

      1. Vocabulary

      2. Spelling

      3. Pronunciation

  • Language Diversity

    • Diversity can arise at the boundary between two languages.

      • Varying degrees of difficulties

        • Belgium

          » Southern Belgians (Walloons) speak French

          » Northern Belgians (Flemings) speak Flemish

        • Switzerland

          » Peacefully exists with multiple languages

        • Switzerland attributes success to decentralized government

        • Four official languages —- German (65%), French (18%). Italian(10%), and Romansh(1%)

  • Isolated Languages: one unrelated to any other and therefore not attached to any language family.

  • Extinct Language: An extinct language is one that is no longer spoken or read in daily activities by anyone in the world.

Religion:

Christianity: Cross, Jesus sacrifice

Judaism: Star of David, Shields against evil

Islam: Crescent, Kingdom, Unity

Sikhism: Two swords

Buddhism: Wheel of Dharma, Wisdom, Knowledge, and Insight

Hinduism: Om, Essence of reality

Geographers are concerned with the distribution of the world’s religious because of the potential for religious conflict and the different ways that religious use space

Religion is another core value of culture but unlike other cultural values, few religions allow for people to join more than one religion.

There are 2 main types of religion that you need to know about:

  • Universalizing

    • Anyone can be a part of it as long as you follow the religion’s codes.

    • Beliefs attract universal population.

    • Often send missionaries to attract converts around the world.

    • Worshippers come from various ethnic backgrounds.

    • Major religions include Christianity, Islam, and Buddhism.

  • Ethnic

    • Part of a particular ethic or political group

    • Does not seek converts; most members are born into the religion

    • Ethnic religions tend to be most appealing to one particular group of people in one particular place.

    • Ethnic religions are found near the hearth (origin) but spread through relocation diffusion

      • E.g. Judaism diffused by the scattering of Jews around the world after the Roman destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD.

    • Major ethnic religions include Judaism, Hinduism, and Sikhism.

Branches:

  • A large fundamental division within a religion (e.g. Sunni vs. Shia)

Denomination:

  • A division of a branch that unites a number of local congregations in a single legal and administrative body (e.g. Hanafi, Maliki, Shafi’i)

Sect:

  • A relatively small group that has broken away from an established denomination (e.g. Wahhabism)

Religions and Monotheistic when they believe in one supreme being or god (Islam, Judaism, Christianity, etc.)

Polytheistic religions believe in more than one supreme or deity. Polytheistic religion practiced today include Hinduism, Shintoism and Sikhism.

Secularism:

  • when religious beliefs and systems are rejected. It is rising in popularity in Europe.

Autonomous religious:

  • are self-sufficient religions with little organizations.

    • Ex. Islam prefers to unify by faith rather than specific boundaries.

Agnostic: Believe in god if it is proven to me.

Atheist: There is no god

Proselytic religion:

  • a universalizing religion that tries to convert other to practice.

Fundamentalism:

  • is the literal/strict interpretation of the fundamental (basics principals of a religion)