Not to be confused with the sociolinguistic term Sprechbund, or with Sprachraum, an area defined by a language.
A sprachbund (/ˈsprɑːkbʊnd/; German: Sprachbund[ˈʃpʁaːxbʊnt]ⓘ, lit. "language federation"), also known as a linguistic area, area of linguistic convergence, or diffusion area, is a group of languages that share areal features resulting from geographical proximity and language contact. The languages may be genetically unrelated, or only distantly related, but the sprachbund characteristics might give a false appearance of relatedness.
A grouping of languages that share features can only be defined as a sprachbund if the features are shared for some reason other than the genetic history of the languages. Without knowledge of the history of a regional group of similar languages, it may be difficult to determine whether sharing indicates a language family or a sprachbund.[1]
^Mallinson, Graham; Blake, Barry J. (1981). Language Typology – Cross-linguistic Studies in Syntax. North-Holland. pp. 17–18. ISBN 0-444-863117.
A sprachbund (/ˈsprɑːkbʊnd/; German: Sprachbund [ˈʃpʁaːxbʊnt] , lit. "language federation"), also known as a linguistic area, area of linguistic convergence...
The Balkan sprachbund or Balkan language area is an ensemble of areal features—similarities in grammar, syntax, vocabulary and phonology—among the languages...
which do not share these similarities, in essence creating a continental sprachbund. His intention was to argue that the disproportionate amount of SAE-specific...
to identify and evaluate genetic relations in linguistic linkages. A sprachbund is a geographic area having several languages that feature common linguistic...
the Altaic languages is now generally accepted to be the result of a sprachbund rather than common ancestry, with the languages showing influence from...
The Mainland Southeast Asia linguistic area is a sprachbund including languages of the Sino-Tibetan, Hmong–Mien (or Miao–Yao), Kra–Dai, Austronesian and...
language area is a sprachbund containing many of the languages natively spoken in the cultural area of Mesoamerica. This sprachbund is defined by an array...
as Chinese. Some northwestern Mandarin varieties in the Qinghai–Gansu sprachbund have undergone drastic changes in phonology, lexicon and grammar. A syllable...
family. A subset of these languages is notable for forming a well-studied sprachbund, a group of languages that have developed some striking structural similarities...
forming the East South Slavic languages), it is a member of the Balkan sprachbund and South Slavic dialect continuum of the Indo-European language family...
in great enough contact for those innovations to spread as part of a sprachbund. However, if they have another explanation (such as an SOV substratum...
the Balkan Slavic linguistic area, which is part of the broader Balkan sprachbund. According to UNESCO's list of endangered languages, Torlakian is vulnerable...
ISBN 978-90-272-3100-0 [1] Viacheslav A. Chirikba, "The problem of the Caucasian Sprachbund" in Muysken, p. 74 Lenore A. Grenoble (2003) Language Policy in the Soviet...
2017. Retrieved 21 November 2017. Mišeska Tomić, Olga (2006). Balkan Sprachbund Morpho-Syntactic Features. Springer. p. 27. ISBN 978-1-4020-4487-8. Schulte...
The languages of East Asia belong to several distinct language families, with many common features attributed to interaction. In the Mainland Southeast...
The Hunnic language, or Hunnish, was the language spoken by Huns in the Hunnic Empire, a heterogeneous, multi-ethnic tribal confederation which invaded...
central Andaman Islands in the Indian Ocean, and part of the Andamanese sprachbund. By the late 18th century, when the British first established a colonial...
Sumerian itself. Sumerian: a non-Semitic language isolate that displays a Sprachbund-type relationship with neighbouring Semitic Akkadian Elamite language:...
may diffuse from one dominant language to neighbouring languages (see "sprachbund"). Genetic relationships are represented in the family tree model of language...
proposed that Turkic, Mongolic and Tungusic languages form a language Sprachbund, rather than common origin. Mongolian literature is well attested in written...
such as Albanian, Bulgarian and Eastern Romance languages (see Balkan sprachbund), and has absorbed many foreign words, primarily of Western European and...
Sumerian and Akkadian had led scholars to describe the languages as a Sprachbund. Akkadian proper names are first attested in Sumerian texts in the mid-3rd...
scholars to refer to Sumerian and Akkadian in the third millennium as a sprachbund. Akkadian gradually replaced Sumerian as a spoken language somewhere around...
but it may be as well the effect of later convergence within the Balkan Sprachbund.." "List of words of Latin origin". Finkenstaedt, Thomas; Dieter Wolff...
The Pueblo linguistic area (or Pueblo Sprachbund, Pueblo convergence area) is a Sprachbund (group of languages with similarities due to language contact)...
These geographic and linguistic groups are called linguistic areas, or Sprachbund areas. Linguistic features shared by the languages in a language area...
south of Indonesia that is not part of the Central Malayo-Polynesian Sprachbund. The Sumbawa write their language with their own native script commonly...
Shirongolic branch and is part of the Gansu–Qinghai sprachbund (also called the Amdo sprachbund). There are several dialects, mostly spoken by the Monguor...
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