1282: Language Families: Altaic Jun 14, 2018

Certain terms, such as 'language family' can often be vague; it is often unclear when it refers to groups of languages as specific as West Germanic of which there are around six, and others like Indo-European, which includes scores of languages. Another proposed large family of language-families was the now-discredited Altaic languages, including Turkic, Tungusic, and Mongolic families, as well as the disputed Koreanic, Japonic, and Ainu languages, thus covering most of central and northeastern Asia. The former three families are inarguably more similar to each other than to the others, but even so, people have claimed that the similarities are only due to geographic relation and cultural contact, rather than having common origins, citing the fact that earlier forms of all the languages are quite dissimilar. Even though the theory has virtually no support from linguists today, the theory is still often cited in writings about languages such as Turkish or Mongolian by non-linguists. Nevertheless, it is sometimes hard to know where to draw distinctions among various languages and families thereof.

Make sure also to check out Word Facts' analysis of the film, Arrival.