Proposed branch of the Austronesian language family
This article is about a proposed subgroup of the Austronesian language family. For the native languages spoken in the Philippines, seeLanguages of the Philippines.
One of the first explicit classifications of a "Philippine" grouping based on genetic affiliation was in 1906 by Frank Blake, who placed them as a subdivision of the "Malay branch" withinMalayo-Polynesian (MP), which at that time was considered as a family. Blake however encompasses every language within the geographic boundaries of thePhilippine archipelago to be under a single group.[6] Formal arguments in support of a specific "Proto-Philippines" were followed by Matthew Charles in 1974, Teodoro Llamzon in 1966 and 1975, and Llamzon and Teresita Martin in 1976.[7][8][9][10] Blust (1991) two decades later updates this based on Zorc's (1986) inclusion ofYami, and theSangiric,Minahasan, andGorontalo groups.[6]
The genetic unity of a Philippines group has been rejected particularly byLawrence Reid.[11] This arose with problems in reconstructing Philippine subgroups within MP (Pawley, 1999; Ross, 2005).[12][13] In a recent state-of-the art on the classification of Philippine languages, he provides multidisciplinary arguments on the field's methodological and theoretical shortcomings since Conant's description in the early 1900s. This includes Malayo-Polynesian archeology (Spriggs, 2003; 2007; 2011),[14][15][16] andBayesian phylogenetic analyses (Gray et al., 2009)[17] substantiating the multiplicity of historical diffusion and divergence of languages across the archipelago.[18] He suggests that the primary branches under this widely acknowledged Philippine group should instead be promoted as primary branches underMalayo-Polynesian.[19] Malcolm Ross (2005) earlier also noted that theBatanic languages, constitutingYami,Itbayat, andIvatan, should in fact be considered as a primary MP branch.[13] In an evaluation of thelexical innovations among the Philippine languages, Alexander Smith (2017) regards the evidence for a Philippine subgroup as weak, and concludes that "they may represent more than one primary subgroup or perhaps an innovation-definedlinkage".[20] Chen et al. (2022) present further arguments for the Philippine languages being a convergence area (sprachbund) rather than a unified phylogenetic subgroup.[21]
The Philippine group is proposed to have originated fromProto-Malayo-Polynesian and ultimately fromProto-Austronesian. There have been several proposals as to the composition within the group, but the most widely accepted groupings today is the consensus classifications by Blust (1991; 2005) and Reid (2017); however, both disagree on the existence of a Philippine group as a single genetic unit.
An earlier classification by Zorc (1979) is presented below. From approximately north to south, a Philippine group according to his analysis of previous reconstructions are divided into two main subgroups, Northern or "Cordilleran" and Southern or "Sulic".[22] Note that the groupings herein no longer reflect widely accepted classifications or naming conventions today. For exampleSouth Extension nowadays reflects the widely establishedCentral Luzon, and North Mangyan withinCordilleran is not supported by later reconstructions; the group containingYami,Ivatan andItbayat is called "Bashiic" in Zorc (1977) and remains generally accepted.[23]
Formerly classified as one of theSouth Mindanao languages, theKlata language is now considered to be a primary branch of the Southern Philippine languages by Zorc (2019).[24]
Map of the distribution of the major languages of the Philippines, showing their subdivisions
1.^ Ambiguous relationship with other Northern Philippine groups
2.^ Ambiguous relationship with other Northern Philippine groups and has possible relationship with South Extension; equivalent to the widely establishedBatanic or Bashiic branch.
^Zorc, R. David Paul (1986). "The Genetic Relationships of Philippine Languages". In Geraghty, P.; Carrington, L.; Wurm, S. A. (eds.).FOCAL II: Papers from the Fourth International Conference on Austronesian Linguistics. Pacific Linguistics, Series C, No. 94. Canberra: The Australian National University. pp. 147–173.doi:10.15144/PL-C94.147.hdl:1885/252029.ISBN0-85883-345-X.
^abBlust, Robert (1991). "The Greater Central Philippines Hypothesis".Oceanic Linguistics.30 (2):73–129.doi:10.2307/3623084.JSTOR3623084.
^Blust, Robert A. (2005). "The Linguistic Macrohistory of the Philippines". In Liao, Hsiu-Chuan; Rubino, Carl R.Galvez (eds.).Current Issues in Philippine Linguistics Pangaral Kay Lawrence A. Reid. Linguistic Society of the Philippines and SIL Philippines. pp. 31–68.
^Charles, Mathew (1974). "Problems in the Reconstruction of Proto-Philippine Phonology and the Subgrouping of the Philippine Languages".Oceanic Linguistics.13 (1/2):457–509.doi:10.2307/3622751.JSTOR3622751.
^Llamzon, Teodoro (1966). "The Subgrouping of Philippine Languages".Philippine Sociological Review.14 (3):145–150.JSTOR23892050.
^Reid, Lawrence (1982)."The Demise of Proto-Philippines"(PDF). In Amran Halim; Carrington, Lois; Stephen A. (eds.).Papers from the Third International Conference on Austronesian Linguistics. Pacific Linguistics, Series C, No. 75. Vol. 2: Tracking the Travellers. Canberra: Australian National University. pp. 201–216.
^Pawley, Andrew (1999). "Chasing Rainbows: Implications for the Rapid Dispersal of Austronesian Languages for Subgrouping and Reconstruction". In Zeitoun, Eilzabeth; Li, Paul Jen-kuei (eds.).Selected Papers from the Eighth International Conference on Austronesian Linguistics. Taipei: Academia Sinica. pp. 95–138.
^Spriggs, Matthew (2003). "Chronology of Neolithic Transition in Island Southeast Asia and The Western Pacific".The Review of Anthropology.24:57–80.
^Spriggs, Matthew (2007). "The Neolithic and Austronesian Expansion Within Island Southeast Asia and Into the Pacific". In Chiu, Scarlett; Sand, Christophe (eds.).From Southeast Asia to the Pacific: Archeological Perspectives on the Austronesian Expansion and the Lapita Cultural Complex. Taipei: Academia Sinica. pp. 104–140.
^Smith, Alexander D. (2017). "The Western Malayo-Polynesian Problem".Oceanic Linguistics.56 (2):435–490.doi:10.1353/ol.2017.0021.S2CID149377092., p. 479
^Zorc, R. David Paul (1979). "On the Development of Contrastive Word Accent: Pangasinan, a Case in Point". In Nguyen, Dang Liem (ed.).Southeast Asian Linguistic Studies, Vol. 3. Pacific Linguistics, Series C, No. 45. Canberra: The Australian National University. pp. 241–258.doi:10.15144/PL-C45.241.hdl:1885/253117.ISBN0-85883-177-5.