World Atlas of Language Structures
The World Atlas of Language Structures (WALS) or World Atlas of Language Structures is a project of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig and the Max Planck Digital Library , which the phonological , word semantic and grammatical knowledge to 2,676 languages summarized in a database . In this way, relationships between the expression of linguistic variables can be examined over a large area. The results of the study are freely available on the Internet as WALS Online and also published as a book.
Details
A team of 55 authors, led by Bernard Comrie , David Gil and Martin Haspelmath (all the time at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology) and Matthew Dryer ( University at Buffalo ) evaluated on the basis of 6800 sources over 2600 both related as also unrelated languages to analyze their similarity structures.
The examination parameters included:
- Number of consonants
- Presence of rare sounds
- Differentiation of tones
- Gender categories
- Plural formation
- Number of cases
- Future and past tenses on the verb
- imperative
- Word order
- Passive constructions
- Numerals
- Color adjectives
- Writing systems
The result of the project can be used free of charge on the Internet as WALS Online and has also been published as a book by Oxford University Press . The WALS is intended not only to offer linguists but also other interested parties an insight into the structural diversity of the world's languages. Due to insufficient linguistic research, only about half of the approximately 7,000 languages spoken worldwide could be dealt with. The published languages are analyzed on an equal footing and regardless of their distribution.
The structural analysis is visually supported by 141 picture cards, each showing between 120 and 1370 languages. The WALS database comprises a total of over 58,000 data points.
WALS program (Interactive Reference Tool)
A free program for Mac OS X, Mac OS9.2 and Microsoft Windows is available for further and specialized use of the World Atlas of Language Structures, see web links.
literature
- Martin Haspelmath, Matthew S. Dryer, David Gil, Bernard Comrie (Eds.): The World Atlas of Language Structures . Oxford University Press, 2005, ISBN 978-0-19-925591-7 (English).
Web links
- WALS Online
- WALS program (Interactive Reference Tool)
- WALS Sunburst Explorer
- Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, former Department of Linguistics
- Mark Hammer: Surprising language affinities. ORF.at, April 7, 2010
Individual evidence
- ↑ “ […] There is a total of 2676 languages which appear on at least one map in the atlas. " WALS Chapter Introduction
- ↑ a b WALS Online
- ↑ University protocols (from August 1, 2005)
- ^ Oxford University Press