Caucasian languages

Caucasian languages
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Name	Caucasian languages
Region	Caucasus
Familycolor	Caucasian
Child1	Northwest Caucasian
Child2	Northeast Caucasian
Child3	Kartvelian

Caucasian languages are groups of languages indigenous to the Caucasus region, spoken across parts of Russia, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Armenia, Turkey and northeastern Iran. The term covers three primary families with distinct typological profiles that have been treated variously by scholars associated with institutions such as the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, the University of Oxford, the Russian Academy of Sciences, the Georgian National Academy of Sciences and the Leningrad State University in studies influenced by comparative work of researchers like Sergei Starostin, Georgiy Klimov, Johann Friedrich Blumenbach and Nicholas Marr. Research on these languages intersects with fields represented at the British Museum, the Smithsonian Institution, the Institut National des Langues et Civilisations Orientales, and conferences like the International Congress of Linguists.

Overview and classification

Scholars divide the families into Northwest, Northeast and Kartvelian branches following classifications advanced at the St. Petersburg University, the University of Tübingen, the University of Chicago, the Institute for Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences and the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology. Comparative proposals linking the families to macrofamilies have involved proponents associated with the Institute of Linguistics (Moscow), critics from the Department of Linguistics, Harvard University, reviews in journals like Language and Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, and debates at gatherings such as the Society for the Study of the Indigenous Languages of the Americas panels. Classification remains controversial in work cited by the Encyclopaedia Britannica, the Oxford Handbook of Languages, and monographs from Cambridge University Press.

North Caucasian languages

The North Caucasian grouping is used in descriptive traditions at institutions such as the Russian Academy of Sciences and the Georgian National Academy of Sciences to refer collectively to Northwest and Northeast branches discussed in comparative work by Sergei Starostin, Georgiy Klimov, Vladimir Minorsky and researchers publishing in the Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies and Acta Linguistica. Fieldwork has been conducted by teams from the University of Cologne, the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, the University of Bonn and the Kartvelian Institute.

Northwest Caucasian languages

Northwest languages including those historically spoken by communities in regions administered by Adygea, Karachay-Cherkessia, Kabardino-Balkaria, parts of Krasnodar Krai and the Republic of Abkhazia have been documented in grammars produced at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, the University of Leiden, the University of Warsaw and the Institute of Linguistics (Moscow). Researchers such as John Colarusso, Geoffrey Samuel, M. A. Chirikba and teams affiliated with the European Research Council have described features in field reports archived at the World Oral Literature Project and at university libraries including the Harvard University Library. Northwest languages figure in studies alongside materials from the British Library, the Library of Congress and the Bibliothèque nationale de France.

Northeast Caucasian languages

Northeast families spoken in areas administered by Dagestan, Chechnya, Ingushetia and Daghestan Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic locales are documented in works by Vladimir Dybo, I. M. Diakonoff, Nina D. Dzhagfarova and at centers such as the Institute of Linguistics (Moscow), the University of Cambridge and the University of Munich. Grammars and lexicons have been published by presses including Cambridge University Press, Brill, Peeters Publishers and the State Publishing House of Languages of the Peoples of the USSR with corpora deposited in archives like the Endangered Languages Archive.

South Caucasian (Kartvelian) languages

Kartvelian languages, with representatives such as those used in the Kingdom of Georgia, in the writings of Shota Rustaveli and in inscriptions associated with medieval institutions like the Bagrationi dynasty and monastic centers at Gelati Monastery and Jvari Monastery, are the subject of scholarship at the Georgian National Academy of Sciences, the Tbilisi State University, the Institut Français de Géorgie and international departments at the University of Oxford. Major publications include works from Peeters Publishers, Cambridge University Press and studies by scholars like Georgij Klimov, Hans Vogt, Michael Chikobava and G. I. Tsereteli.

Phonology and grammar features

Descriptions appearing in journals such as Phonology, Lingua, Natural Language & Linguistic Theory and monographs from Oxford University Press and Cambridge University Press highlight features like large consonant inventories noted by researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics and the Institut de Phonétique de Paris, complex morphosyntax analyzed by scholars at the University of Chicago and Harvard University, rich ergativity discussions appearing in work from MIT Press and Routledge, and vowel systems treated in handbooks associated with the International Phonetic Association. Analyses cite field data collected under projects funded by the European Research Council, the National Science Foundation, the Russian Foundation for Basic Research and the Georgian Shota Rustaveli National Science Foundation.

Historical development and contacts

Historical linguists publishing in venues such as Diachronica, the Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies and books from Brill examine loan interactions with languages of empires and polities including Persian Empire, Byzantine Empire, Ottoman Empire, Russian Empire, trade contacts documented in archives at the British Library and missionary reports held at the Vatican Archives. Work by scholars like I. M. Diakonoff, Thomas Gamkrelidze, Vladimir Ivanov and Nicholas Marr explores substrate and adstrate influence, ancient inscriptions studied at museums like the Hermitage Museum, the State Museum of Georgian Folk Architecture and Ethnography and the National Museum of Georgia.

Sociolinguistic status and preservation efforts

Contemporary status reports issued by organizations such as UNESCO, the Council of Europe, the European Centre for Minority Issues, the Endangered Languages Project and the Living Tongues Institute for Endangered Languages document varying degrees of vitality; revitalization initiatives have involved partnerships with the Georgian Government, the Republic of Dagestan, non-governmental organizations like Caucasus Heritage Watch, academic teams from the University of Tartu and donors such as the Ford Foundation and the MacArthur Foundation. Education and media projects leveraging resources at the Georgian Public Broadcaster, the Ministry of Education and Science of Georgia, regional cultural centers, and collaborations with the British Council and UNICEF aim to support documentation, curricular development and digital archiving in repositories including the Endangered Languages Archive and the Open Language Archives Community.

Category:Languages of the Caucasus