Editing Nostratic languages (section)

===Origin of the Nostratic hypothesis===
The last quarter of the 19th century saw various linguists putting forward proposals linking the [[Indo-European languages]] to other language families, such as [[Finno-Ugric languages|Finno-Ugric]] and [[Altaic languages|Altaic]].<ref>[[Henry Sweet|Sweet]] 1900: vii, 112–132.</ref>

These proposals were taken much further in 1903 when [[Holger Pedersen (linguist)|Holger Pedersen]] proposed "Nostratic", a common ancestor for the [[Indo-European languages|Indo-European]], [[Finno-Ugric languages|Finno-Ugric]], [[Samoyedic languages|Samoyed]], [[Turkish language|Turkish]], [[Mongolian language|Mongolian]], [[Manchu language|Manchu]], [[Yukaghir languages|Yukaghir]], [[Eskimo–Aleut languages|Eskimo]], [[Semitic languages|Semitic]], and [[Afroasiatic languages|Hamitic]] languages, with the door left open to the eventual inclusion of others.

The name ''Nostratic'' derives from the [[Latin]] word ''nostrās'', meaning 'our fellow-countryman' (plural: ''nostrates'') and has been defined, since Pedersen, as consisting of those language families that are related to Indo-European.<ref>Pedersen as cited by Ruhlen, 1991: 384.</ref> [[Merritt Ruhlen]] notes that this definition is not properly taxonomic but amorphous, since there are broader and narrower degrees of relatedness, and moreover, some linguists who broadly accept the concept (such as Greenberg and Ruhlen himself) have criticised the name as reflecting the [[ethnocentrism]] frequent among Europeans at the time.<ref>Ruhlen 1991: 384-5.</ref> [[Martin Bernal]] has described the term as distasteful because it implies that speakers of other language families are excluded from academic discussion.<ref>{{cite book|last=Bernal|author-link=Martin Bernal|title=[[Black Athena]]|chapter=Nostratic and Euroasiatic|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=yFLm_M_OdK4C|year=1987|publisher=Rutgers University Press|isbn= 0-8135-3655-3}}</ref> However, some people like Pedersen's older contemporary [[Henry Sweet]] attributed some of the resistance by Indo-European specialists to hypotheses of wider genetic relationships as "prejudice against dethroning [Indo-European] from its proud isolation and affiliating it to the languages of yellow races".<ref>Sweet (1900), ''The History of Language'', cit in Ruhlen 1991: 381-2.</ref> Proposed alternative names such as ''Mitian'', formed from the characteristic Nostratic first- and second-person pronouns ''mi'' 'I' and ''ti'' 'you' (more accurately '[[thee]]'),<ref>Ruhlen 1991:259.</ref> have not attained the same currency.

An early supporter was the French linguist [[Albert Cuny]]—better known for his role in the development of the [[laryngeal theory]]<ref>Szemerényi 1996:124.</ref>—who published his ''Recherches sur le vocalisme, le consonantisme et la formation des racines en « nostratique », ancêtre de l'indo-européen et du chamito-sémitique'' ('Researches on the Vocalism, Consonantism, and Formation of Roots in "Nostratic", Ancestor of Indo-European and Hamito-Semitic') in 1943. Although Cuny enjoyed a high reputation as a linguist, the work was coldly received.