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From the Search for an Original Afrasian Homeland to the Problems of Semantic Reconstruction: A Response to Commenters
 
PIIS086954150016800-0-1
DOI10.31857/S086954150016800-0
Publication type Article
Status Published
Authors
Alexander Militarev 
Affiliation: Russian State University for the Humanities
Address: Russian Federation, Moscow
Journal nameEtnograficheskoe obozrenie
Edition№4
Pages284-297
Abstract

The article is the author’s appreciative response to three colleagues who commented critically on the lead article (“Lexical Reconstruction for the Reconstruction of Prehistory: Proto-Afrasian Terms Related to Weaponry, Warfare and Other Armed Conflicts”). It focuses on problems of genetic classification, glottochronology, and ancestral home of the Afrasian (Afro-Asiatic) language macrofamily (response to A. M. Kozintsev); phonetic and semantic criteria of lexical comparison in the reconstruction of proto-language cultural terms, their representativeness in different branches of the language family and the distinction of the original vocabulary from the borrowed. It also touches upon the comparative quality of Afrasian and Indo-European reconstruction considering the large numbers of scholars working in the general area of Indo-European studies versus a few active specialists in the field of comparative historical Afrasian studies (responses to G. S. Starostin and A. V. Dybo).

Keywordsgenealogical classification, glottochronology, comparative and historical linguistics, lexical reconstruction, proto-language, Afrasian (Afroasiatic), Indo-European languages, weaponry, warfare
AcknowledgmentThis article is a translation of: Милитарев А.Ю. От поиска прародины до проблем семантической реконструкции: ответ оппонентам // Etnograficheskoe Obozrenie. 2021. No 4. P. 63–78. DOI: 10.31857/S086954150016699-8
Received22.09.2021
Publication date28.09.2021
Number of characters46651
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1 First of all, I would like to express my gratitude to the three colleagues who responded to the invitation of the exceptionally friendly editorial board of the "Ethnographic Review" to give their comments on my article. Such attention to other people's work is especially touching in this pragmatic and egocentric age. The result was not just comments and expert assessment with an analysis of material, which is very useful per se, but three full-fledged articles containing valuable theoretical and methodological provisions, which clearly go beyond the scope of proposed discussion.
2 Comments by A. G. Kozintsev and my responses. I shall start with the comments by Aleksandr Grigoryevich Kozintsev devoted not to the narrow topic of my article, but to disputable problems of Afro-Asiatic classification, chronology and ancestral home. They are exceptionally useful for me and, I hope, for the readers, especially in the part where extralinguistic data are presented and interpreted: I do not fully trust my own understanding and interpretation of genetic, archaeological and odontologic materials, so the analysis of an anthropologist with the broadest outlook makes many things clear to me, not to mention the fact that I was not familiar with many fragments of the picture, described by A. G. I was somewhat amused, however, by the characteristic of me as of "the most influential supporter" of the West Asian homeland: the representatives of the mainstream are influential, but I always stood somewhat aside, and I think, the people influenced by me may be counted on the fingers of one hand. Yes, there was a period in the international Afro-Asiatic linguistics, when I. M. Dyakonov and, in some degree, A. B. Dolgopolsky led the way, but this was before the era of "internet PR"; nowadays, the mainstream in comparative Afro-Asiatic linguistics (and extralinguistic problematics related to it) is represented by C. Ehret and R. Blench, as judged by the abundance of references to their work and opinions regarding all issues. I shall cite A. G. Kozintsev and comment on his words:
3 AK: An active advocate of the African homeland theory is C. Ehret. He ascribes a considerable ideological significance (emphasis added - A.M.) to this idea, since, in his opinion, it forces us to discard the long-standing prejudice that the ancient history of North Africa was only a reflection of the history of Western Asia. Ehret estimates the antiquity of the AA macrofamily at 15 thousand years, and places its homeland in the Horn of Africa. . The position of H. C. Fleming (Fleming 2006: 140–142) and R. Blench (Blench 2006: 159–160) is rather similar… A generally positive attitude to Ehret’s theory was expressed by G. S. Starostin (Starostin 2017: 226).
4 AM: G.S. Starostin says the following:
5 ... the intuitive opinions of many scientists, including Christopher Ehret, whose Afro-Asiatic concept is compatible with the African one, but not with the Asian ancestral homeland with the subsequent migration of the Semites to Asia...; according to Ehret, "there are no words in the Proto-Afrasian vocabulary indicating cattle breeding or cultivation of crops" (Ehret 2000: 290–291)... It should be borne in mind that Ehret's statement is based on his own Proto-Afrasian reconstruction (Ehret 1995), which is frequently criticized on methodological grounds...
6 (Starostin 2017: 226).
7 To finish with this incidental subject I will try to explain my attitude to "Ehret's theory" and to R. Blench's position. Both authors have really collected priceless field materials in many African languages, but they present themselves as primarily comparative linguists: in this case their opinion - like mine - on genetic or archaeological issues may only be interesting to readers of popular media. The position, and especially the theory, which relates to localization of ancestral homeland of a linguistic family, shall, first of all, present corresponding linguistic arguments – names, including reconstructed proto-language ones, of animals, plants, terms that shed light on ecology and culture; and there is no other method than glottochronology to establish the chronology of branching of any linguistic family, irrespective of any ones' opinion of it.
8 And only after obtaining the results, even just preliminary, of these operations, it makes sense to compare them with extralinguistic data – preferably relying on specialists in the relevant fields rather than on one's own idea of them. Unfortunately, neither G. K. Fleming, nor Ch. Ehret, nor R. Blench relied on any representative selection and reconstruction – their own or someone else's – of the above-mentioned terms, not to mention glottochronology, and neither of these authors had such an opportunity, not possessing necessary established comparative methodology and technique (see the extremely soft, "politically correct" assessment of Proto–Afro-Asiatic reconstruction by Ch. Ehret above in G. S. Starostin's quotation). The rest – "intuitive opinions", "theories", "conceptions", "statements", particularly their ideological significance, are, in my opinion, of little value.

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