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Lexicostatistics
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==Applications== A leading exponent of lexicostatistics application has been [[Isidore Dyen]].<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Dyen |first1=Isidore |title=The lexicostatistically determined relationship of a language group |journal=International Journal of American Linguistics |date=1962 |volume=28 |issue=3|pages=153–161 |doi=10.1086/464687 |s2cid=143070513 }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Dyen |first1=Isidore |title=Lexicostatistically determined borrowing and taboo |journal=Language |date=1963 |volume=39 |issue=1 |pages=60–66|doi=10.2307/410762 |jstor=410762 }}</ref><ref>{{cite book |editor-last1=Dyen |editor-first1=Isidore |title=Lexicostatistics in Genetic Linguistics |date=1973 |publisher=Mouton |location=The Hague}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Dyen |first1=Isidore |title=Linguistic Subgrouping and Lexicostatistics |date=1975 |publisher=Mouton |location=The Hague}}</ref> He used lexicostatistics to classify [[Austronesian languages]]<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Dyen |first1=Isidore |title=A lexicostatistical classification of the Austronesian languages. |journal=International Journal of American Linguistics |date=1965 |volume=19}}</ref> as well as [[Indo-European languages|Indo-European]] ones.<ref name=Dyen&al1992 /> A major study of the latter was reported by Dyen, Kruskal and Black (1992).<ref name=Dyen&al1992 /> Studies have also been carried out on [[Amerindian]] and [[African languages]]. ===Pama-Nyungan=== The problem of internal branching within the [[Pama-Nyungan languages|Pama-Nyungan]] language family has been a long-standing issue for Australianist linguistics, and general consensus held that internal connections between the 25+ different subgroups of Pama-Nyungan were either impossible to reconstruct or that the subgroups were not in fact genetically related at all.<ref name = Dixon2002>{{cite book | quote = ''Australia provides a prototypical instance of a linguistic area. It has considerable time-depth, fairly uniform terrain leading to ease of interaction and communication, a fair proportion of reciprocal exogamous marriages, rampant multilingualism, and an open attitude to borrowing ... There is a basic uniformity to Australian languages which is the natural result of a long period of diffusion. Although no justification had been provided for 'Pama-Nyungan', it came to be accepted. People accepted it because it was accepted—as a species of belief. ... It is clear that 'Pama-Nyungan' cannot be supported as a genetic group. Nor is it a useful typological grouping.'' | first = Robert M.W. | last = Dixon | title = Australian languages: their nature and development | year = 2002 | pages = 48, 53 | publisher = Cambridge University Press}}</ref> In 2012, Claire Bowern and Quentin Atkinson published the results from their application of computational [[Phylogenetics|phylogenetic]] methods on 194 [https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/doculect doculects] representing all major subgroups and isolates of Pama-Nyungan.<ref name = Bowern&Atkinson2012>{{cite journal | last1 = Bowern | first1 = Claire | last2 = Atkinson | first2 = Quentin | title = Computational phylogenetics and the internal structure of Pama-Nyungan | journal = Language | volume = 88 | issue = 4 | year = 2012 | pages = 817–845| doi = 10.1353/lan.2012.0081 | hdl = 1885/61360 | s2cid = 4375648 | hdl-access = free }}</ref> Their model "recovered" many of the branches and divisions that had erstwhile been proposed and accepted by many other Australianists, while also providing some insight into the more problematic branches, such as [[Paman languages|Paman]] (which is complicated by the lack of data) and [[Ngumpin-Yapa languages|Ngumpin-Yapa]] (where the genetic picture is obscured by very high rates of borrowing between languages). Their dataset forms the largest of its kind for a [[hunter-gatherer]] language family, and the second largest overall after [[Austronesian languages|Austronesian]] ([https://abvd.shh.mpg.de/austronesian/ Greenhill et al. 2008] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181219182305/https://abvd.shh.mpg.de/austronesian/ |date=2018-12-19 }}). They conclude that Pama-Nyungan languages are in fact not exceptional to lexicostatistical methods, which have successfully been applied to other language families of the world.
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