Similarities between japanese and amerindian languages

Unmundisto
Re: Similarities between japanese and amerindian languages

Postby Unmundisto » 2013-10-01, 17:31

I saved this reply for last, because it's in reply to a longer posting, and because it concludes my participation at this website.

Unmundisto wrote:Anyway, I'm not claiming that the Japanese/Tupi word-similarities prove that the words in question are common-ancestor survivals. But I'm saying that it isn't a terribly important issue either.

If by "issue" you mean the hypothesis of a common origin for Tupian and Japonic, then I agree with you. But I'm addressing the larger issue, which is one of properly evaluating arguments according to the evidence presented for them--not only in historical linguistics but also in the scientific endeavour in general.


Ah, so we're a defender of science. But if you're referring to your linked-to mathematical demonstration, then I remind you that it isn't a "proof" (to use your word) regarding the Japanese/Tupi instance. How often our Internet Defenders of Science turn out to just be ill-mannered common net-abusing pseudoscientists.

'
And that absolutely does matter. Because otherwise it leads to conclusions like this:
Unmundisto wrote:No, I haven't checked the OP's information. As I said, one of your objections is that such checking would need to be done, to verify the information, and I don't deny that. But in the initial posting, the word-similarities are remarkable.


That conclusion is simply not justified by the evidence presented.


I said that the similarities were remarkable--remarkablly close. I didn't say that they were conclusive. "Remarkable" and "Conclusive" are two different words, and don't have the same meaning. Remarkable similiarities needn't be conclusive in their import. You're still confusing word-meanings.

You do not know enough Tupi to judge whether the words listed are (a) actually attested; (b) accurately cited; or (c) mean something even close to what the Japanese words next to them mean.


A silly statement, because I clealy said the closeness of the meanings and sounds would need checking.

[For that matter, I'm also willing to bet you don't know enough Japanese to evaluate whether the definitions which John and Cumberbatch have given are accurate either.


As I said before, I'd already said that the closeness of the meanings and the sounds, of the paired words, would need checking.

You're looking at this list through doubly blind eyes and seeing only what you want to see.]


I made it clear that I wasn't taking a position on the common origin of the paired words. So it isn't entirely clear what beliefs of mine Linguoboy is referring to.

Unmundisto wrote:
"Impressive" is a subjective term. And subjectively, I think anyone who would even consider applying it to short, dubious list like this is very easily impressed.

One thing I like about Unilang is its absence of flamewarrior behavior; well almost. Try to limit yourself to the topic, as opposed to exprssion of your opinions of those with whom you disagree.

One thing I like about Unilang is that posters are generally well informed about languages and linguistics. We can't have everything we want from this thread, can we?


Yeah that's what I was referring to: Linguoboy feels a need to evaluate and express his opinion of those with whom he disagrees.

Linguoboy wants to imply that I've been making mis-statements that result from a lack of information about languages and linguistics. But, like other typical common flamewarriors and internet-abusers, Linguoboy forgot to specify the mis-statements, and how they result from some particular specified incorrect beliefs about languages or linguistics. It's easier to just do blanket, vague, unspecified and sloppy attempt at criticism.

I've participated in Internet discussions and debates before, on various subjects not including language, and I'm quite familiar with common net-abusers and their usual behaviors. So I'm not saying that I'm surprised to encounger another Internet abuser on the Internet. But I must admit that it's a bit disappointing to find that typical example of flamewarror-behavior here at Unilang, which seemed to be relatively free of it. I'd spoken of Unilang's "absence of flamewarrior behavior", but now I'm going to have to retract what I said then.

I've clarified that I don't make claims regarding a common origin of the OP's word-pairs.

I've said a number of things that make it clear that I don't claim to be a linguist. I haven't made claims about qualifications of mine. Therefore, Linguoboy's point in challenging my qualifications (of which I've claimed none) is unclear. ...except that common net-abusers need to criticize.

Maybe Linbuoboy is just saying that I shouldn't participate here, because I'm not a linguist, or am not expert enough. Just in case he's representatively speaking for the others at this website, I'll quit participating here. After I post this message, I'll cancel my membership at this website.

But another good reason to quit participating here is just because, for any forum-topic, there's no need or justificiation for participants to devote their postings to their opinions of other participants. Decorum matters, regarding the matter of whether or not a forum is worthwhile, and whether we like being there and are inclined to return.

Unmundisto

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Re: Similarities between japanese and amerindian languages

Postby Kliedesys » 2015-09-22, 18:16

How about these similarities between Japanese and Lithuanian languages? Some are very close calls and some are just my imaginations that may as well be my delirium. Just in case any Russians read this I write translation in Russian as well, because Russian and Lithuanian has several hundred similar words:

Japanese - Lithuanian - (English) - (Russian)

Kawa (hide of animal) = kavoja, slepia (hiding) (прячет)
Oppai = papai (tits, breasts) (цыцки, груди)
Kande = kanda (bite, bites) (кусает)
Mushi = musë (bug, fly) (муха! но всё таки жук)
Oshiri = uzhpakalis (butt, behind) (Lit. often pron, as "oshpakalis") (задница, жопа) не очень удачное сравнение
Kochi kochi = kuti kuti (tickling, tickle-tickle) (щекотать)
Katai = kietai, kieta, kietas (hard) (твёрдый, твёрдо)
Konki = kantri (patience) (not very similar) не очень удачное сравнение
Tairaka = taikinga, taika (peaceful, peace) (мирный, мир)
Tooi = toli (far) (very similar because the Lithuanian vowel "o" is pronounced long like Japanese "oo") (далеко)
Wakai = vaikai (kids, young) (wakaa - in West Lithuanian dialect) (дети)
Ikimas(u) = ejimas (going) (ходьба)
Ikimasho = eikime (lets go) (давайте пойдём)
Ate = ate (end, bye) (пока, до свидания)
Aishiteru = aistra (JP: I love you; LT: passion) (я тебя люблю/страсть)
Te = te (JP: hand; LT: take it (command)) (возьми(те))
Mizu** = myzu (myzhu) JP: water; LT: I pee, I take a leak) (я писаю, сцу, яп. вода)
Tikyu = tikiu (pron. tikü) (JP: Earth; LT: I believe) (Яп. Земля, Лит. Я верю)

** Note the Portuguese MIJO (mizho) also means to pee.

There are others, but I lost the notes on those and have to do research again.

I think the following words are not JP/LT match-coincidences and could as well be from intense past contact or even a proof that ancient Japanese was not originally an Asian language:

Oppai, kande, mushi, koti koti, katai, tairaka, tooi, wakai, ate, te, mizu.

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Re: Similarities between japanese and amerindian languages

Postby linguoboy » 2015-09-22, 18:24

Kliedesys wrote:How about these similarities between Japanese and Lithuanian languages?

What about them? As I tried to explain to Unmundisto, it is trivially easy to compile lists like this--particularly if one allows onomatopoeic words (e.g. kochi kochi/kuti kuti) and cherry picks inflectional forms (as you did with verbs). It can be a fun way to waste some time, but it's no more than that.
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Re: Similarities between japanese and amerindian languages

Postby linguoboy » 2015-09-22, 19:32

Kliedesys wrote:How about this page: http://www.slideshare.net/graspingfish/ ... -languages

How about it? It only proves my point. Igbo, Finnish, Tupinamba--why single out these languages when you could come up with an equally convincing set of resemblances for Japanese and any other language out there?

If you're interested in seeing what the process of historical reconstruction looks like when applied by actual linguists, let me know and I can recommend some reading. One of the very basic ground rules is that the correspondences should be systematic. I challenge you to find any rhyme or reason to any of the correspondence sets presented on those slides.
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Re: Similarities between japanese and amerindian languages

Postby Kliedesys » 2015-09-22, 22:09

I thought that information was a bunch of sensationalist nonsense. It's just fun to find similar or matching words in two completely different languages and then see what different people say about it. Still, knowing Japanese language I always was amazed how different it sounds from other Asian languages, if Chinese borrowings are set aside. Could it be a pro-European language? Or perhaps Pacific.

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Re: Similarities between japanese and amerindian languages

Postby linguoboy » 2015-09-22, 22:14

Kliedesys wrote:I thought that information was a bunch of sensationalist nonsense. It's just fun to find similar or matching words in two completely different languages and then see what different people say about it. Still, knowing Japanese language I always was amazed how different it sounds from other Asian languages, if Chinese borrowings are set aside. Could it be a pro-European language?

I don't even know what you're asking.

Of all the European languages, I've always thought Japanese sounded most like Finnish. They both have a relatively simple phonology that avoids initial clusters but allows for both geminate vowels and consonants. If only Finnish had pitch-accent then the resemblance would be even closer.
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Re: Similarities between japanese and amerindian languages

Postby Rowanne » 2021-06-12, 22:21

Hi!
Just to back what the OP said, I would like to validate
Ama - Ame (rain)
Arassy / Arashi (storm)
Sumare - Sumire (Violet - Wild orchid, both of which are lilac)

I can't validate the rest because I have not found information about the actual Guarani meanings, so I can't compare.
Edit: I'll do what I can to clarify etymologies, but it will be a difficult task.
I am not necessarily saying that these languages are related. But a common substract may exist. Arabic words were introduced in the Spanish language, but they don't come from each other because the main substract of Spanish is Latin. Hispanised Arabic words are around 4,000 words, which nevertheless work according to the Spanish sounds and grammar.

I'll add these pairs (Guarani/Japanese):

:arrow: Ko — ‘this’; it also means ‘to inhabit, to live’ / Kono (‘this'). Originally a compound of Old Japanese elements こ (ko, “this”, pronoun) +‎ の (no, possessive, modifies following noun). こ as a pronoun is no longer used individually in modern Japanese. Mandarin: gè - this, that, individual, classifier for people or objects in general; size
:arrow: Amo — ‘that’ / Ano (both words with stress in last syllable). 'Ano' is a compound of あ (a, distal pronominal marker) +‎ の (no, genitive particle).
:arrow: Ko ára — ‘Today’ / Kyou. Kyou's kanjis are 今日, The kanji spelling is an orthographic borrowing from Chinese ("jinri").
:arrow: Ko'ápe — ‘here' / Koko. What it says of ここ: From Old Japanese.
:arrow: Heē — ‘yes’ / Hai. Perhaps related to interjection は (ha, “yes”). Or else, according to some sources, it may derive from Cantonese 係 (hai6), or perhaps from Sino-Japanese 拝 (hai), which however is believed by other scholars to be a false cognate.
:arrow: Ñe'ã — ‘heart' / Mune 胸 (‘chest' in kun-yomi, the native Japanese pronounciation of 胸). From Old Japanese. There are many theories: cognate of 棟 (muna, “main roofline, roof ridge”), from the idea of central or main portion; 空, 虚 (muna, “emptiness, void”), from the idea of cavity; a compound of 身 (mu, “body”) +‎ 根 (ne, “root”); Cognate with 棟 (mune, “main roofline, roof ridge”) and 宗, 旨 (mune, “gist, main idea, primary part”). And there could a sound shift from "muna", from the fusion of this word with the emphatic nominal particle い (i): /muna i/ → /mune/, from Proto-Japonic *munay. Similar to the phonetic process observed in the shift from 神 (kamu, “spirit, god”, older form used in compounds) to 神 (kami, newer form, used as a standalone noun). It is found as the first element of compounds in modern Japanese.
:arrow: Karai — ‘man' / Kare (‘he’). "From Old Japanese". Sadly, one doesn't find more than this hint.
:arrow: Asaje — ‘Noon' / Asa 朝 (‘morning', associated to the beginning of the afternoon). "From Old Japanese". There are theories; some say it is related to Middle Korean àchóm, “morning”, Alexander Vovin believes つとめて (tsutomete) is the native Japonic root for "morning" [I personally don't see a link].
:arrow: Aku — ‘hot’ / Atsui 熱い (hot object), 暑い (hot weather)
:arrow: Aravai — ‘storm' / Arashi 嵐. From Old Japanese. Derivation theories: Compound of 荒ら (ara, “desolate, sparse”, archaic) +‎ 風 (shi, “wind”, obsolete). From 荒らし (arashi, “destroyer”), the 連用形 (ren'yōkei, “stem or continuative form”) of verb 荒らす (arasu, “destroy, ruin”). Apophonic form of 颪 (oroshi, “wind blowing down from the mountains”).
:arrow: Agueru — ‘ to bring' / Ageru あげる (to give)
:arrow: Añá — Demon / Oni 鬼 (both words with stress in last syllable). Etymology not clear. It is though to be derived from Middle Chinese 鬼 "kui" into Middle Korean "kwuy" (recorded in 1527). Some also believe that it is derived from the on-yomi pronounciation of the Chinese character 隠 "on", which means "to hide from sight".
:arrow: Guata - To walk / Wataru 渡る - To cross.
:arrow: Juky - happy, agreeable, jovial / youki (na) 陽気な - happy, merry
:arrow: Sunu - noise / souon 騒音 - noise (it doesn’t come from ‘sound’ because it’s written with kanji)
:arrow: Opa Rire (in the end, finally) / Owari 終わり- End
:arrow: Opa / Owatta 終わった- It has finished
:arrow: Guio, Guivo (Spanish pronunciation of ‘gui’, as in ‘rag’) (Next to) / Gawa 側 (side of an object). Gawa is the kun-yomi (Japanese native) reading. This kanji has three kunyomi readings: gawa (side), kawa (side) and soba (vicinity). One on-yomi reading: soku (side); and two irregular readings: hata (vicinity) and katawara (vicinity). Etymologically the kanji comes from Middle Chinese 側, but I believe that kun-yomi readings do not come from Chinese (t͡ʃɨk̚), but from Old Japanese.
:arrow: Chiu / Shichi 七 - number seven. It says that it is borrowed from Mandarin qī.
:arrow: Chau / Kyuu - Number nine
:arrow: Churi / Chou - intestine
:arrow: Ere / Meirei 命令 (ei=ee) suru - Both mean ‘to say’. Ere is also ‘to speak’, while meirei suru is also ‘to order’.
:arrow: Guaru (disgust, gu=w) / warui 悪い (something that is bad). 'Warui' is the kunyomi pronounciation. The classical form is 'waroshi' 悪ろし.
:arrow: Guiyeia (good, brave, persistent; gu=soft g) / gyougi no yoi (good; also referred to good temperament)
:arrow: Petei, Metei (Number one), Meteia (first) / hito (alone). Whitman (The Relationship Between Japanese and Korean, 2012) reconstructs Old 'Japonic' numeral 1 as *pitə. And Bentley (Old Japanese, 2012) renders it "pi1to2".
:arrow: Mokôi (number two), Mokoia (Second) / Mōutsu no (Second, another).
:arrow: O / ie - House
:arrow: Ore (us) / ore (me), oretachi (us)
:arrow: Paravo / Erabu - To choose
:arrow: Risi / retsu - queue
:arrow: Sakä (transparent, clear, evident) / Sukete (transparent).
:arrow: Siki / Tsuki - thrust.
:arrow: Yakai / Yakedo o suru 火傷 or 焼け処- To get burned. The on-yomi reading would be 'kashou'.
:arrow: Hái / Suppai 酸っぱい - Sour. I think the Chinese etymology may be interwined with Old Japanese here: Chinese 酢 'su' (vinegar) + hai would be 'suppai', because of Japanese gemination.
:arrow: Jyvaguy (armpit) / waki (underarm)
:arrow: Ayvu / uwasa - rumour
:arrow: Kururu / kaeru - toad
:arrow: Po / Go - Five. Etymology: from Proto-Sino-Tibetan *l/b-ŋa (“five”).
:arrow: Ca'agüi (English: Ca'agwee) (mount, forest, jungle) / Oka: mount. Etymology: 大岡(おおおか), Ōoka, "large hill" (oo + ka).
:arrow: (a)ñe'e (to speak, language) / hanasu - to speak. A possible etymology could be "Sino-Japonic": Middle Chinese 話 (MC ɦˠuaiH) + Old Japonic. I could see the relationship with ñ being n in Japanese.
:arrow: Motyre'ÿ / mitsuteru 見捨てる - to abandon.
:arrow: Karu / Hiru - lunch. Etymology of 'hiru': from Old Japanese. It says it is derived from 日 (day) + ru "of uncertain meaning". It means both daytime and lunch. In Chinese it broadly mans daytime ("zhòu") and in 'Hakka' and 'Min' Chinese it also means lunch ("chu"/"de̿").

--
Guarani words are transliterated into the sounds of Spanish, so I have in some cases translated them into English, to make it clear. Basically, the correspondence would be:
Güi - wee, gu-ee
Gua - wa
Gue - as in 'Gate' (soft g+e)
Gui - as in 'Guiness' (soft g+i)
Ju - yu, ju
Ñ - 'ny' as in canyon.

Y - it is a 'dark i', different from Japanese i
ã, ẽ, ĩ, õ, ũ, ỹ- vowels with this symbol (similar to that of Spanish ñ) are nasalised. Guarani has both nasalised and not nasalised vowels. Japanese vowels are not nasal, as far as I know (they don't distinguish them by nasal quality, but rather by length in pronounciation).
Ho'u - That ' indicates a glotal stop that separates the pronounciation in two 'syllables'. The closest phenomenon in Japanese is gemination, which creates a stop, in words like motto or Nippon.

--

Syntaxis of Guarani. The order is usually SVO, can also be OSV or VOS. It is flexible. In fact, "the word order is often described as VO due to the more flexible position of the subject" (Hillman, The Syntax of Guarani, 2020).
The order in Japanese is SOV or OSV.
The subject can be omitted in both.

Jagua o-juka mbarakaja-pe
S V O
The dog kills the cat

(Che) a-reko peteĩ mesa
S V O
I have a table

Hakuete ko arahaku or Ko arahaku hakueterei
V S / S V
This is a very hot Summer
*It's very hot this Summer). This Summer is very hot

Arapoty jave haku
S . Gramm. Particle - V
*Spring during it is hot. (In/during Spring, it's hot).

Ko'ẽrõ arakõi
Particle S
Tomorrow (is) Monday -> No verb. In Japanese: Ashita wa getsuyoubi (+ verb 'desu').
--

Language names are created as in Japanese: adding the suffix ñe'e / go:
Avañe'e - Guarani (literally: the language of men)
Nihongo (Japanese. Go means language)

To create a nationality, they employ sufixes -kuera or -jin:
Franceskuera (French)
Furansujin (French)

Both languages link the concepts of blue and green. They have the same word in Japanese and almost the same word in Guarani (adding a suffix). In Guarani, blue is 'hovy, chovy'. In Japanese, blue and green is 'aoi'. 'Hovyü' is green in Guarani (very close to the word 'hovy', blue').
On the other hand, Guarani, has almost the same word (word + suffix) to refer to red and violet: pytã and pytãũ. Pink and orange also seem to derive from red: 'pytangy' and 'pytã'yju'. Finally, black is 'hũ' and grey derives from black: 'hungy'.
In Japanese, what I have found is "the words orange, blue, and purple were all created more recently" (https://blog.nihongomaster.com/learn-tr ... se-colors/).

--
Features of Guarani: midly polysynthetic, with 'sentence-like' inflected words. For example:
A-vaka-ami-ta ko-pyhareve
1st pers sing / cow-milk / this-morning
‘I’ll do some milking this morning'

https://cedar.wwu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.c ... wwu_honors

--

Apart from this, we can observe words in Japanese that are 'wanderwort': A loanword that has spread to many different languages, often through trade or the adoption of foreign cultural practices.

For example, Kuro (black). Etymologycally, it is from Proto-Japonic *kuro, and possibly also cognate with Ainu kur (“shadow”) and Korean 구름 (gureum, “cloud”); compare also Japanese 雲 (kumo, “cloud”), Korean 검— (geom-, “black”), and Ainu kunne (“black; dark”). May be connected to Proto-Indo-European *kr̥snós (“black”) (whence Sanskrit कृष्ण (kṛṣṇá)), suggesting a Wanderwort in Asia, possibly from an Indo-Iranian language. Compare also Proto-Turkic *kara (“black”), Mongolian хар (khar, “black”). Finally, compare with Guarani "hũ".
It can also be due to the wanderwort that Japanese, Chinese and even Guarani share a similar word for 'cotton' (trade-related, perhaps); it's 'men' 綿, 'mián' 綿, and 'mandyju'.

Unrelated to this (kind of), but I read that the Ashina clan in Japan during the Sengoku period (1467 to 1615), bears a Turkic name, Açina. And I believe Japan has been the scenario of different cultural and linguistic intrusions. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashina_tribe
Last edited by Rowanne on 2021-06-30, 20:07, edited 103 times in total.

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Re: Similarities between japanese and amerindian languages

Postby linguoboy » 2021-06-14, 16:18

Rowanne wrote:Hi!
Just to back what the OP said, I would like to validate
Ama - Ame (rain)
Arassy / Arashi (storm)
Sumare - Sumire (Violet - Wild orchid, both of which are lilac)

I can't validate the rest because I have not found information about the actual Guarani meanings, so I can't compare.

And I'll add these pairs:

And I'll just repeat the objections in my previous posts.

(I have to say, I particularly like the "pair" ko ~ ikiru, whose entire resemblance consists of sharing one consonant. In the interests of furthering the reconstruction of Proto-World, I would like to add to the series Quechua kawsay, Purhépecha irekani, Sardinian campai, Kannada ಬದುಕು baduku, Malay duduk, Hungarian lakik, and Ancient Greek οἰκέω.)
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Re: Similarities between japanese and amerindian languages

Postby Linguaphile » 2021-06-14, 23:48

Since both Japanese and Guaraní use agglutination, this makes it relatively easy to break a word down into its parts and see if the lexical similarities remain through that process. Usually, with languages that don't have a proven relationship, most of the similarities don't because there is no systematic relationship between words the two languages, just random similarities. I don't know much Japanese or Guaraní, so I haven't gone through all the words in the lists from the previous posts, but I will use the words arassy/arashi and aravai/arashi as an example as they jumped out at me as a good demonstration of what I mean. The words as they were originally posted may look a bit similar, but in both languages they are actually composed of smaller words which aren't similar at all.
Rowanne wrote:Arassy / Arashi (storm)

Arassy does not mean "storm", it means "dawn" (in Old Tupi, an ancestor of Guaraní, but not in modern Guaraní).
Old Tupi arasy "dawn" comes from:
    ara day
    sy mother (the letter y is /ɨ/ , not /i/)
    So arasy was the mother of the day (= dawn).
Rowanne wrote:Aravai — ‘storm' / Arashi

Guaraní aravai means "storm" and comes from:
    ara day
    vai bad, ugly
    So aravai is a bad or ugly day, where "day" also refers to the weather (= storm).
Another way to say "storm" in Guaraní is arapochy. It comes from
    ara day
    pochy anger, angry
    So arapochy is an angry day, where "day" also refers to the weather (= storm).
Japanese arashi is believed to come from one of the following:
    荒ら 'ara' sparse, desolate, wild + 風 (て) 'ti, chi' wind
    or a form derived from 荒らす 'arasu' destroy, ruin
    So arashi was (theoretically) a sparse or wild wind or a thing that destroys.

Rowanne wrote:Taikuere / Tegakari - track

Guaraní: takykuére is a footprint or track left by an animal; it comes from a root -akykuéri "back part" which is also found in words like takykue "behind, back" and rakykuere "past".

Japanese: tegakari (てがかり) is like a hint or a clue. It seems to come from 手 'te' hand and 掛 'gakari' "catch or hang".

Both meanings make sense for a "track" in the sense of following someone's tracks: it's a thing that was left behind (Guaraní meaning) or a thing you are trying to catch (Japanese meaning). But these etymologies are quite different from each other.

I have probably not written the Japanese etymologies entirely correctly - I don't speak Japanese and I've done it quickly. Someone here on the Japanese board can correct me! But from it we can at least be certain that "arashi" in Japanese definitely does not mean "an angry day" or "an ugly day" as it does in Guaraní. We can safely say that at least in a simplified form, in Guaraní a storm is "an ugly or angry day" and in Japanese a storm is believed to be something like "a sparse wind or a destroyer".
We can say the same for the words meaning "track": something to do with "catching" in Japanese, but something to do with "going back to what was left behind" in Guaraní.
My meanings here are not precise. But I think it's enough to show that although these words may end up sounding a bit similar when they are used in the words for "storm" or "track", it's coincidental, because they are made up of unrelated parts. They do not come from a common origin.
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Re: Similarities between japanese and amerindian languages

Postby Rowanne » 2021-06-15, 11:20

Well, thank you for your reply.

Linguoboy:
ko - Ikiru - I think I should have perhaps categorised that one as "possible", not like a straightforward similarity. Still, what do you think about the rest? You just brought up the one that is probably the less clear in the whole list. What about the rest? Thanks

More like reconstructing Proto-world, I'd like the see language families coming together that perhaps are lost in oblivion due to many reasons: hard to master scripts, difficulty to find transliterated texts on the internet or minority languages which are not compiled and compared enough.
In my case, I have been able to find a text or brief diccionary with Guarani words in the Spanish language, which for me was a bridge to get information on Guarani. I would check each word with the Japanese ones.
--

Linguaphile:

I see your point.
However, I think that similar word forms together with exact or in a few cases, almost always exact meaning, are quite telling of a similarity (and possible link). Obviously not closely related. Guarani is also different in many other words. But these similarities imply something; these are commonly used words, like deictics, elements of nature, cardinal and ordinal numbers, body parts.

I do not think that a pair of words should have the same etymology to be considered related, if they have a related or exact form, and the same meaning - that is strange in itself. I could go on scrutinising Guarani words, if only I had access to more. These that I counted with are just a sample of the language.

My reason is that etymology is sometimes a tricky concept. Many - if not most - words are linked to Latin in Spanish, and it may come across as a bit dubious. For example, 'chico' (small) supposedly comes from 'ciccum' or 'cicus'. It could come from a sentence by comedian Plautus, "ciccum non interduim", translated as "I won't give the slightest thing". Or it could mean ciccum as the little membrane or fluff that some fruit or plants have, and which are of little importance, hence it equals 'small'.
In Basque, 'txiki' (tx=ch) simply means 'small'. The official version says that Basque inherited the word from Latin. But there is still a possiblity that it may have been the other way around that it wasn't this way, and it was integrated from Basque.
Think of the strong efforts to make every thing in Indo-European languages relate to Latin or Greek, while how there is so little effort to throroughly compare Welsh, for example, to Hamitic-Semitic languages. Etymologies can be used in one's favour, I think.
About 'tegakari', you might as well consider that it is kanji of Chinese origin, and that this may not have been the original etymology, but the reinterpreted one.

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Re: Similarities between japanese and amerindian languages

Postby linguoboy » 2021-06-15, 14:40

Rowanne wrote:Linguoboy:
ko - Ikiru - I think I should have perhaps categorised that one as "possible", not like a straightforward similarity. Still, what do you think about the rest? You just brought up the one that is probably the less clear in the whole list. What about the rest? Thanks

What about them? I think I've already explained well enough in my other replies to the thread how easy it is to create lists like these and how little they actually tell us about the relationships between languages. In particular, I shared this link:

How likely are chance resemblances between languages?

I think anyone who wants to do amateur linguistic comparison should read it first. It clears up many misconceptions.

Rowanne wrote:I do not think that a pair of words should have the same etymology to be considered related, if they have a related or exact form, and the same meaning - that is strange in itself.

But it isn't really; that's the point of the article I shared above.

Rowanne wrote:My reason is that etymology is sometimes a tricky concept. Many - if not most - words are linked to Latin in Spanish, and it may come across as a bit dubious. For example, 'chico' (small) supposedly comes from 'ciccum' or 'cicus'. It could come from a sentence by comedian Plautus, "ciccum non interduim", translated as "I won't give the slightest thing". Or it could mean ciccum as the little membrane or fluff that some fruit or plants have, and which are of little importance, hence it equals 'small'.

So your reasoning is that because some etymologies are dubious we should ignore etymology completely?

By the same principle, since some of the comparisons in your list are dubious, we should discard the entire list.

Rowanne wrote:Think of the strong efforts to make every thing in Indo-European languages relate to Latin or Greek, while how there is so little effort to throroughly compare Welsh, for example, to Hamitic-Semitic languages.

There were attempts. They weren't particularly successful and so people decided to abandon them.

The relationships between Welsh and Latin are not only obvious, they're systematic. Where Latin has qu, Welsh has p--not in one or two words but in a whole series of them. What systematic correspondences can you point to between Welsh and any Semitic language? (Or--for that matter--between Tupi-Guaraní and Japanese?)

Rowanne wrote:About 'tegakari', you might as well consider that it is kanji of Chinese origin, and that this may not have been the original etymology, but the reinterpreted one.

Why? At this point, you're no longer making comparisons to see if you can find evidence to support a hypothesis; you're starting with a hypothesis and trying to change what you're comparing in order to fit it. From a scientific point of view, that's a poor methodology.
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Re: Similarities between japanese and amerindian languages

Postby Linguaphile » 2021-06-15, 16:22

Rowanne wrote:I could go on scrutinising Guarani words, if only I had access to more. These that I counted with are just a sample of the language.

What Guaraní dictionary are you using? There are quite a lot of Guaraní dictionaries and other resources online. I understand that you do not speak Guaraní but know Spanish; do you speak Japanese?
Rowanne wrote:I do not think that a pair of words should have the same etymology to be considered related

The thing with attested etymologies is that they have been already studied extensively and usually there are systematic features that support the relationship. Spanish is known to have a large part of its vocabulary derived from Latin, and also words from Basque, and certain sound changes that systematically tend to occur in borrowings from Latin and Basque. Therefore it's very plausible that the Spanish word chico comes from Latin ciccum 'cosa de poquísimo valor' or possibly from Basque txiki. RAE has accepted the ciccum etymology and I imagine there is a good reason for that (perhaps there is evidence that txiki entered Basque from Spanish, or evidence from other Romance languages, and a timeline showing which languages may have used it first and when those languages historically had contact with each other, and so on.) Regardless, if there were a lack of evidence preferring one over the other (but see below), either ciccum or txiki would be quite plausible etymologies based on historical data.
Rowanne wrote:It could come from a sentence by comedian Plautus, "ciccum non interduim", translated as "I won't give the slightest thing".

I don't understand what you are saying here. Ciccum in Latin means a worthless thing or trifle, and by analogy also a seed membrane. A single sentence like the one from Plautus would not be its source in Spanish. But, Plautus lived in what is now Italy in the third and second centuries B.C.; the fact that he used "ciccum non interduim" in a work believed to have been written in 211 BC can be used as evidence that this word existed in Latin at that time with this meaning. (In other words, if someone were to claim that this usage somehow came from Basque, it's highly unlikely because its use in Latin predates contact with Basque and there is evidence of this due to Plautus's words being written down and their date being known.)
This is the kind of thing etymologists look at when tracing the origins of words. It's true that they are often not certain, but there is a lot more research that goes into it than just looking for similar sounds in two languages. And when new evidence is found that is sufficiently solid, the "official" etymologies (such as those that RAE indicates in its dictionaries) are revised. Actually, for many words RAE does indicate more than one possible etymology.
Rowanne wrote:About 'tegakari', you might as well consider that it is kanji of Chinese origin, and that this may not have been the original etymology, but the reinterpreted one.

Kanji is a writing system; you are looking at pronunciations though. In Chinese the words aren't pronounced anything like "tegakari"; the Japanese pronunciation, which is what you are focusing on, is not of Chinese origin. For example the character I used for wind (風) is pronounced "feng" in Chinese; this is why I had to indicate its Japanese pronunciation as て to make it clear that I'm referring to that specific pronunciation and not the Chinese pronunciation (!) or かぜ, another Japanese word for wind which uses the same kanji and yet another pronunciation /kaze/. I should write those characters as a suprascript over the kanji, but I don't know how to do that here.
The writing system is irrelevant to this discussion. (You yourself used the Latin alphabet for the Japanese words. Would it have helped you if I had just stuck to that?)
Rowanne wrote:Jagua ryhai - you are good for nothing. / Yaku ni tatanai - unuseful, unhelpful

Jagua ryhai is an insult in Guaraní, just like "you are good for nothing" is an insult in English, but when a Guaraní speaker says this, they understand it to mean that they are calling the other person "dog sweat" and not literally "you are good for nothing". "You are good for nothing" is the English equivalent, with the meaning we give to the insult used in English. It is not a direct translation of the Guaraní expression.
Jagua means "dog" (and speaking of etymologies, it is also the origin of the English/Spanish/etc word "jaguar", from jagua rete) and ry'ái (ryhai as you have spelled it) means "sweat".
The point is that a Guaraní speaker knows this "etymology" because it is literally what they are aware they are saying: "dog sweat".
Likewise a Japanese speaker who says "yaku ni tatanai" is aware that they are using the negative form of 役に立つ yaku ni tatsu "to be useful, to help", which is yaku ni tatanai 役に立たない (or やくにたたない if you want to avoid kanji here), "not useful."
So one means "dog sweat" and the other means "not useful". These are their actual meanings which speakers are aware of, not some hidden etymology. The fact that the Guaraní phrase meaning "dog sweat" happens to sound a bit like the Japanese phrase meaning "not useful" is entirely a coincidence. It's a slightly amusing coincidence that can be a bit entertaining to look at (this one seems like a stretch to me, but I get it because other coincidences like this have amused me as well), but it definitely doesn't demonstrate any relationship between the two languages.
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Re: Similarities between japanese and amerindian languages

Postby Rowanne » 2021-06-16, 4:10

Linguaphile wrote:What Guaraní dictionary are you using? There are quite a lot of Guaraní dictionaries and other resources online. I understand that you do not speak Guaraní but know Spanish; do you speak Japanese?

I do have a basic Japanese knowledge, still learning more of it. I don't speak Guarani, but it was a basic contact to it that made me wonder about this. I am a Spanish native. I had it difficult to actually find the Guarani resources, to be honest. There are not a lot of dictionaries online (I was especially looking for traditional ones; I don't mean the online ones in which you search for a particular word). One the one hand, I used this: https://elblogdeidiomas.es/el-idioma-gu ... loquiales/, in which I found the expression you are comenting on, Jagua ryhai. It is literally explained as "No sirves para nada", which translates into English as "you are good for nothing" or "useless".
Besides, I used this other text for Guarani words: http://www.pueblos-originarios.ucb.edu. ... 001282.pdf

Therefore it's very plausible that the Spanish word chico comes from Latin ciccum 'cosa de poquísimo valor' or possibly from Basque txiki
. I suppose so.
It could come from a sentence by comedian Plautus, "ciccum non interduim", translated as "I won't give the slightest thing".

I mean that one possibility for acquiring this word is that it was popularised in Hispania through that sentence by Plautus. Quite simply. Hispania had recently been conquered by the Romans, in 218 BC.
The text predates Basque contact with Romans. However, it is possible that the word did not come though Latin - but through Basque into medieval Spanish. The concept of Spanish did not exist before that (the first Castilian grammar was complied in 1492). And just like Arabic does not filter from Latin, it is a possibility that Basque doesn't as well.

There is a lot more research that goes into it than just looking for similar sounds in two languages.
I have been looking to the meaning as well, not just the form of the word. Again, the coincidences are very strange. And no, I don't believe coincidences exist for the sake of it. It's true, I have not gotten the gist of Guarani yet, I need to learn more of it and of Japanese to fully understand, but I believe there might be more than just a coincidence.

Kanji is a writing system; you are looking at pronunciations though
.
In Chinese the pronounciations are usually different. I say usually because 手 in Chinese is "shǒu", and the on-yomi or "Chinese reading" of 手 is "shu". But it is more common to see it as "te" which is the kun-yomi or native Japanese reading. So, of course in Chinese it is not tegakari, and I agree, the Japanese pronunciation is not of Chinese origin. 風 = feng in Chinese; fu, fuu in on-yomi and kaze in kun-yomi.

[Quora](You yourself used the Latin alphabet for the Japanese words. Would it have helped you if I had just stuck to that?)[/quora]
Now I don't know what you mean. You mean Guarani? Because it uses the Latin alphabet. Or perhaps you mean Japanese, in which case I thought it was more clear to have it written in romaji, for the comparison, you know.

Rowanne wrote:Jagua ryhai - you are good for nothing. / Yaku ni tatanai - unuseful, unhelpful

As I told you, "no sirves para nada" translates as "you are good for nothing", just like the Japanese sentence. In Spanish saying that is an insult too, even if not too strong. Obviously "dog sweat" sounds stronger and I can think of a more perfect translation, but perhaps the one who wrote that wanted to be more polite. Yes, it is not a direct translation of the Guaraní expression, however it was passed as such.
(and speaking of etymologies, it is also the origin of the English/Spanish/etc word "jaguar"
Jaguar yes, I just hadn't thought about it, but it's true.

It's a slightly amusing coincidence that can be a bit entertaining to look at (this one seems like a stretch to me, but I get it because other coincidences like this have amused me as well), but it definitely doesn't demonstrate any relationship between the two languages.

Well, not all would be coincidences I believe. I will keep reading about this, and we never know. We'll see.
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Re: Similarities between japanese and amerindian languages

Postby Rowanne » 2021-06-16, 4:48

What about them? I think I've already explained well enough in my other replies to the thread how easy it is to create lists like these and how little they actually tell us about the relationships between languages.

Well I will read the article. But it is not like I need you to believe what I believe. I would need to do more reading on these two languages to form a conclusion.

So your reasoning is that because some etymologies are dubious we should ignore etymology completely?
No. But they should not be treated as truths. Because sometimes they are not. Sometimes, you don't know how a word came to be, and you go to your trusted source language and make a link to it. As of today, words like "Celtic" or "Phoenician" have an obscure meaning. Almost all languages today have been established by the contact of several languages that not always came from the same language family or branch entirely.

By the same principle, since some of the comparisons in your list are dubious, we should discard the entire list.
Or give it the benefit of the doubt, because why not.

Rowanne wrote:Think of the strong efforts to make every thing in Indo-European languages relate to Latin or Greek, while how there is so little effort to throroughly compare Welsh, for example, to Hamitic-Semitic languages.

There were attempts. They weren't particularly successful and so people decided to abandon them.

What systematic correspondences can you point to between Welsh and any Semitic language?)

This is going to be long. Perhaps this video, "Strange Similarities Between Celtic & Semitic Languages", may help: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OAAmwtdP1bE
This linguist has studied Hebrew and he discovered similarities of Celtic with Semitic languages - which are actually known to linguists, in his own words. By the examples he puts, it is not that the words are identical, but they show syntactical coincidences:
For example, "The man drank water" is "drank the man water" in the structure of Arabic, Hebrew, Irish and Welsh. The 4 languages say the structure "the chair that I sat on it"*, instead "the chair which I sat on". All 4 languages write "door the house" for "the door of the house". He does a throrough comparison, perhaps you can watch all the examples. He knows these relationships have not been proved but they are not farfetched.

And this curious incident happened in Lybia: https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-wales-17444890. It reads: "UK journalists held in Libya after Welsh mistaken for Hebrew". The Lybian brigade believed that the Welsh written in some medicines was a coded message in Hebrew, and they took the journalists as spies, who actually got into a serious situation.

Anatolians existed in Great Britain as far as 6000 years ago, replacing the previous population, according to DNA studies. https://www.dailysabah.com/history/2019 ... study-says. And this is another interesting article: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/201 ... nt-britons.
Then the Beaker people arrived in Britain c. 4000 BC, with genocidal instincts (again): https://www.theguardian.com/science/201 ... tudy-shows. After that, Phoenicians discovered tin deposits in Britain and they became traders. But who knows if they also established a few colonies and settled (as they did in Spain). One needs tin to create bronze, which was also used in weaponry, so no wonder that they considered it important and valuable for trade, living in the Bronze Age. https://phoenicia.org/britmines.html

At this point, you're no longer making comparisons to see if you can find evidence to support a hypothesis.
[/quote] You are wrong. Based on contact with Guarani, I found similarities, first of all it was deictics (ko, amo), then I learned basic words 'yes', Heē (he-E); and 'rain', "ama" - just like in Japanese (I'm sure you can't argue about that one). And then, I decided to compare further. And there are words which you cannot deny that they are very similar to the Japanese ones. The problem here is that I lack a basis of Guarani to tell you why it is. But I think there is something to it, that is my view. You can believe what you want.
Good day.
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Re: Similarities between japanese and amerindian languages

Postby Linguaphile » 2021-06-16, 6:13

Rowanne wrote:I do have a basic Japanese knowledge, still learning more of it. I don't speak Guarani, but it was a basic contact to it that made me wonder about this. I am a Spanish native. I had it difficult to actually find the Guarani resources, to be honest. There are not a lot of dictionaries online (I was especially looking for traditional ones; I don't mean the online ones in which you search for a particular word).


Rowanne wrote:One the one hand, I used this: https://elblogdeidiomas.es/el-idioma-gu ... loquiales/,

One thing I notice about this one is that it doesn't seem to be very accurate. Let's take the phrase we've been discussing, "jagua ryhai". As you said, it says "Jagua ryhai - no sirves para nada." We've already discussed the fact that this isn't a literal translation. But it's not just that; a little bit further on the same website (under the heading "Insultos en guaraní") it has this entry: "Jaguaryai - Persona con un sudor pestilente". This is actually the same phrase, just spelled differently and with a different translation given.
At the bottom of the page there are many comments like this one: "buen artículo pero hay errores en algunas de las palabras en guaraní que citaron, algunas no escribieron de manera correcta y otras no significan lo que pusieron." They have made some of the corrections that were suggested, but not all; this is why there are some words crossed out on the page and some words that have multiple spellings. And where they have made corrections, it seems they're just taking the word of the people who posted the comments, which may or may not be accurate either. The spelling used is very inconsistent (misspellings? different orthographies? different dialects?) Some of the words are not even Guaraní. In short it's really not the best source to use without verifying from other sources. It generated over 200 comments there, but a lot of them are from Guaraní speakers and Paraguayan Spanish speakers pointing out errors.
Rowanne wrote:in which I found the expression you are comenting on, Jagua ryhai. It is literally explained as "No sirves para nada", which translates into English as "you are good for nothing" or "useless".

By the way earlier today I looked for more information about this phrase and came across this video which you might be interested in, since you speak Spanish. You can also hear how the phrases are pronounced there.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CC3PexC7gMQ&t=15s
The very first phrase is "jagua ryai" and when he asks a random person on the street what it means, she immediately answers "sudor del perro". This is actually not what he wanted her to say and when he presses her to explain how it is used and how she would see a person who was described that way, she gets embarrassed and says "no, no lo veo... es una manera de decir, así, para ofenderle". Anyway it was that video and several other sites (like this one) that made it very clear to me that Guaraní speakers definitely associate this phrase with its two components "jagua" (dog) and "ry'ái" (sweat) rather than thinking of it as a separate phrase just meaning "no sirves para nada" and so it really has no semantic connection at all to Japanese "yaku ni tatanai." It's just one example, but I think you'll find a similar situation with many of the phrases on your list.

Rowanne wrote:And this curious incident happened in Lybia: https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-wales-17444890. It reads: "UK journalists held in Libya after Welsh mistaken for Hebrew". The Lybian brigade believed that the Welsh written in some medicines was a coded message in Hebrew, and they took the journalists as spies, who actually got into a serious situation.

Confusing written Welsh with written Hebrew doesn't really demonstrate anything aside from a complete lack of familiarity with both Welsh and Hebrew.
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Re: Similarities between japanese and amerindian languages

Postby Rowanne » 2021-06-16, 11:04

I have seen that video, for your information, some time ago, but I wasn't thinking of the possible connection of these languages then. I see jagua ry'ái is a compound noun and knowing the actual meaning, it has a different etymology from yaku ni tatanai. Still does that discard the rest of my list? I think it doesn't until etymologies are proved.

Thank you for the dictionaries.

"Confusing written Welsh with written Hebrew doesn't really demonstrate anything aside from a complete lack of familiarity with both Welsh and Hebrew."
I beg to differ. As an isolated case, it could mean nothing. But we have more context that backs up a possible link of the languages - did you see the video? That is just an example.
Lybians mostly speak Lybian Arabic and to a degree Arabic and Hebrew relate. This incident tells me that probably they had a lack of knowledge of the existence of Welsh - like they may have had no contact with the language before. But are they really not going to know the language of their neighbours? - the brigade looking for possible Israeli spies, I mean; not the average person. That is my view.

Again, this is not isolated. People casually comment on the internet saying that they were 'surprised' of how easy it was to pick up on Welsh after knowing Hebrew or Arabic. https://forum.saysomethingin.com/t/wels ... rabic/8384

But back to Japanese, to stay on topic:

Someone wrote that 'arashi' and 'aravai' are not related and gave me an etymology for "arashi". Could you please post the link? Because what I found is that etymologies for Old Japanese are often unclear. But I know one thing: every Guarani word that resembled Japanese, did to the kun-yomi (native Japanese pronounciation), not the on-yomi (the Chinese pronounciation). So I have thought that if there be a link, it predates Chinese contact c. 6th AD.

About these two words: Ko ára (Guarani) and Kyou (Japanese), Kyou's kanjis are 今日. I read that the kanji spelling is an orthographic borrowing from Chinese (which reads "jīn rì"). This tells me that some Chinese hanzi may have been accomodated to words meaning the same, but which were still pronounced the Japanese way (or in many cases, annexing the Chinese pronounciation without losing the original one).

What I've read about the etymology of Arashi:
From Old Japanese.
Derivation theories include:
- Compound of 荒ら (ara, “desolate, sparse”, archaic) +‎ 風 (shi, “wind”, obsolete).
- From 荒らし (arashi, “destroyer”), the 連用形 (ren'yōkei, “stem or continuative form”) of verb 荒らす (arasu, “destroy, ruin”).
- Apophonic form of 颪 (oroshi, “wind blowing down from the mountains”).
So it is not clear at all. I would need to know more on when and how the word was formed.

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Re: Similarities between japanese and amerindian languages

Postby Linguaphile » 2021-06-16, 15:51

Rowanne wrote:
Linguaphile wrote:"Confusing written Welsh with written Hebrew doesn't really demonstrate anything aside from a complete lack of familiarity with both Welsh and Hebrew."
I beg to differ. As an isolated case, it could mean nothing. But we have more context that backs up a possible link of the languages - did you see the video?

Yes, it talks about things like VSO word order, inflected prepositions, articles, and other structural features. He states repeatedly that these features are found in other languages as well and that "many linguists have challenged these theories and emphasized their speculative nature. The truth is that we don't really know what kinds of languages were spoken in ancient times or what kind of contact they had with each other." And in the video he doesn't suggest that these similarities could indicate a linguistic relationship; the theory he is discussing suggests that they may have had some early contact that influenced their language structures (this is not the same as being related languages).
Rowanne wrote:Lybians mostly speak Lybian Arabic and to a degree Arabic and Hebrew relate. This incident tells me that probably they had a lack of knowledge of the existence of Welsh - like they may have had no contact with the language before. But are they really not going to know the language of their neighbours?

Yes, it's quite possible (in this case almost certain) that they don't "know the language of their neighbors". At best maybe they thought it was transliterated and knew that Hebrew doesn't write some vowels not realizing that in Welsh w is a vowel; at worst they couldn't tell the difference between the Welsh (Latin) alphabet and Hebrew script. In either case, they didn't know either language and didn't understand what they saw. The confusion was based on a misunderstanding and lack of knowledge about Hebrew and Welsh, not any similarity between those languages. (I can't envision any scenario where that would not be the case.) It's like saying "they couldn't understand Hebrew and they couldn't understand Welsh either, so that proves that they are similar!" It doesn't work that way.
Rowanne wrote:Again, this is not isolated. People casually comment on the internet saying that they were 'surprised' of how easy it was to pick up on Welsh after knowing Hebrew or Arabic. https://forum.saysomethingin.com/t/wels ... rabic/8384

He said Arabic was easier for him than it was for his coworkers because he was already familiar with the concepts of regional variations, vowel variations, and huge differences between spoken and formal language. These are things that are common to many languages and don't indicate any relationship; they were just less surprising to him than they were to his coworkers because he had already learned a different language which had them and they hadn't. He agrees with me on this; he says "the languages themselves are totally and utterly different. "
Rowanne wrote:But back to Japanese, to stay on topic:
Someone wrote that 'arashi' and 'aravai' are not related and gave me an etymology for "arashi". Could you please post the link? Because what I found is that etymologies for Old Japanese are often unclear. But I know one thing: every Guarani word that resembled Japanese, did to the kun-yomi (native Japanese pronounciation), not the on-yomi (the Chinese pronounciation). So I have thought that if there be a link, it predates Chinese contact c. 6th AD.

All this means is that when you are looking for similarities, you are looking at a list that gives Japanese words with their native pronunciation (not a list of the Chinese words or om-yomi readings) and that's why those are the words that you are finding.
Rowanne wrote:What I've read about the etymology of Arashi:
From Old Japanese.
Derivation theories include:
- Compound of 荒ら (ara, “desolate, sparse”, archaic) +‎ 風 (shi, “wind”, obsolete).
- From 荒らし (arashi, “destroyer”), the 連用形 (ren'yōkei, “stem or continuative form”) of verb 荒らす (arasu, “destroy, ruin”).
- Apophonic form of 颪 (oroshi, “wind blowing down from the mountains”).
So it is not clear at all. I would need to know more on when and how the word was formed.

This (specifically the first two) are exactly the same as the etymologies I posted. In Japanese the etymology has several possibilities, but not in Guaraní. In Guaraní the etymology is certain: "ara" (day) + "sy" (mother) where it means "dawn" and "ara" (day) + "vai" (bad, ugly) where it means "storm". Neither of these are connected to a possible etymology for Japanese "arashi". We can know that without needing to know which of the various etymological theories for Japanese "arashi" is the correct one

Since we're obviously not going to convince each other here, I think we'll just need to agree to disagree.
Sono di continuo a caccia di parole. Descriverei il processo così: Ogni giorno entro in un bosco con un cestino in mano. Trovo le parole tutt'attorno: sugli alberi, nei cespugli, per terra (in realtà: per la strada, durante la conversazioni, mentre leggo). Ne raccolgo quante più possibile. -Jhumpa Lahiri

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Re: Similarities between japanese and amerindian languages

Postby linguoboy » 2021-06-16, 16:22

Rowanne wrote:But it is not like I need you to believe what I believe.

Obviously not. As I said, you've reached a conclusion based on very weak evidence and you're willing to ignore all counterevidence in order to keep believing in it.

Rowanne wrote:But I think there is something to it, that is my view. You can believe what you want.
Good day.

It's not about "believing what I want"; it's about what the evidence supports.

Comparative reconstruction is not a new field. The basic principles were established over 300 years ago. In that time there's been a lot of opportunities to check their soundness through the discovery of new evidence. (The history of the laryngeal theory in PIE studies is a prime example of this.) We know they work well when we are rigourous about sticking to the scientific method. You're basically hearkening back to a mediaeval style of scholarship where people just speculated freely based on the resemblances that caught their fancies. Again, nothing particularly wrong with that as a pastime, but it really has nothing to do with the discipline of linguistics.

I agree with Linguaphile that there's no real sense in continuing the conversation at this point.
"Richmond is a real scholar; Owen just learns languages because he can't bear not to know what other people are saying."--Margaret Lattimore on her two sons

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Re: Similarities between japanese and amerindian languages

Postby Rowanne » 2021-06-18, 13:31

I agree, Liguaphile. That is a good idea. Let's leave it at that.


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