Nicholas Thom

A History of World Language and Culture: Giving Linguistics Its Rightful Place in the Search for Mankind?s Cultural Past Nicholas Thom

This book is essentially a scientific study of relationship between languages, leading to a synthesis between the evidence of comparative linguistics and that of history, archaeology and genetics. It is based on an evaluation of the mathematics of language change and the logical deductions that can be made once a sound mathematical representation has been formulated. The methodology used is quite different from any standard linguistic approach and in many respects is much less definite in its detail, yet much more far- reaching with respect to the passage of time. The result is a set of conclusions based on linguistic comparison that accords well with deductions based on other disciplines, implying that the methodology used is appropriate despite its lack of precision. Conclusions are then drawn relating to several contentious issues, including for example the colonisation of America, the root of Chinese civilisation, the origin of Basque, the location of the original Indo-European ?homeland?, and the genetic relatives of the Caucasian language families.