Indo-European languages. The first language family established through the comparative historical method was the so-called “Indo-European”. After the discovery of Sanskrit, many European scientists - Danish, German, Italian, French, Russian - began to study the details of the relationship of various externally similar languages of Europe and Asia using the method proposed by William Jones. German experts called this large group of languages “Indo-Germanic” and often continue to call it that to this day (this term is not used in other countries).
The individual language groups, or branches, included in the Indo-European family from the very beginning are Indian, or Indo-Aryan; Iranian; Greek, represented by dialects of the Greek language alone (in the history of which the Ancient Greek and Modern Greek periods differ); Italian, which included the Latin language, whose numerous descendants form the modern Romanesque group; Celtic; Germanic; Baltic; Slavic; as well as isolated Indo-European languages - Armenian And Albanian. There are generally recognized similarities between these groups, allowing us to talk about such groups as the Balto-Slavic and Indo-Iranian languages.
At the end of the 19th - beginning of the 20th century. inscriptions in languages were discovered and deciphered Hittite-Luwian, or Anatolian group, including the Hittite language, which shed light on the earliest stage of the history of Indo-European languages (monuments of the 18th–13th centuries BC). The use of materials from Hittite and other Hittite-Luvian languages stimulated a significant revision of systematizing statements about the structure of the Indo-European proto-language, and some scholars even began to use the term “Indo-Hittite” to designate the stage that preceded the separation of the Hittite-Luvian branch, and the term “Indo-European” proposes to retain one or more later stages.
Indo-European also includes Tocharian a group comprising two dead languages spoken in Xinjiang during the 5th–8th centuries. AD (texts in these languages were found at the end of the 19th century); Illyrian group (two dead languages, Illyrian proper and Messapian); a number of other isolated dead languages spoken in the 1st millennium BC. in the Balkans, - Phrygian, Thracian, Venetian And Old Macedonian(the latter was under strong Greek influence); Pelasgian language of the pre-Greek population of Ancient Greece. Without a doubt, there were other Indo-European languages, and perhaps groups of languages that disappeared without a trace.
In terms of the total number of languages included in it, the Indo-European family is inferior to many other language families, but in terms of geographical distribution and the number of speakers it has no equal (even without taking into account those hundreds of millions of people almost all over the world who use English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Russian , Hindi, to a lesser extent German and New Persian as the second).
Afroasiatic languages. The Semitic language family has been recognized for a long time; similarities between Hebrew and Arabic were noticed already in the Middle Ages. The comparative study of Semitic languages began in the 19th century, and archaeological finds in the 20th century. They introduced a lot of significant new information into it. The establishment of affinities between the Semitic family and certain languages of northeast Africa led to the postulation of a Semitic-Hamitic macrofamily; this term is still very common today. A more detailed study of the African members of this group led to the rejection of the idea of some kind of special “Hamitic” linguistic unity, opposed to Semitic, and therefore the name “Afroasiatic” (or “Afroasiatic”) languages, now generally accepted among specialists, was proposed. The significant degree of divergence of the Afroasiatic languages and the very early estimated time of their divergence make this grouping a classic example of a macrofamily. It consists of five or, according to other classifications, six branches; besides Semitic, This Egyptian a branch consisting of the ancient Egyptian language and its successor Coptic, now the cult language of the Coptic church; Cushitic branch (the most famous languages are Somali and Oromo); formerly included in the Cushitic languages Omotskaya branch (a number of languages in southwestern Ethiopia, the largest being Wolamo and Kaffa); Chadian branch (the most significant language is Hausa); And Berber-Libyan a branch also called Berber-Libyan-Guanche, since, according to modern ideas, in addition to the numerous languages and/or dialects of the nomads of North Africa, it also included the languages of the aborigines of the Canary Islands exterminated by Europeans. In terms of the number of languages it includes (more than 300), the Afroasiatic family is one of the largest; the number of speakers of Afroasiatic languages exceeds 250 million people (mainly due to Arabic, Hausa and Amharic; Oromo, Somalia and Hebrew are also quite large). The languages Arabic, ancient Egyptian, Hebrew revived in the form of Hebrew, Ge'ez, as well as the dead Akkadian, Phoenician and Aramaic languages and a number of other Semitic languages currently play or have played an outstanding cultural role in history.
Sino-Tibetan languages. This language family, also called Sino-Tibetan, includes the largest number of native speakers in the world. Chinese language, which together with Dungan forms a separate branch within its composition; other languages, numbering from about 200 to 300 or more, are united in the Tibeto-Burman branch, the internal structure of which is interpreted differently by different researchers. With the greatest confidence in its composition, the Lolo-Burmese groups are distinguished (the largest language is Burmese), Bodo-Garo, Kuki-Chin (the largest language is meithey, or Manipuri in eastern India), Tibetan (the largest language is Tibetan, fragmented into widely differing dialects), Gurung and several groups of so-called “Himalayan” languages (the largest is Newari in Nepal). The total number of speakers of the languages of the Tibeto-Burman branch is over 60 million people, in Chinese – more than 1 billion, and due to it, the Sino-Tibetan family ranks second in the world in terms of the number of speakers after the Indo-European. Chinese, Tibetan and Burmese languages have long written traditions (from the second half of the 2nd millennium BC, 6th century AD and 12th century AD, respectively) and great cultural significance, but most Sino-Tibetan languages remain unwritten. From numerous monuments discovered and deciphered in the 20th century, the dead Tangut language of the Xi-Xia state (10th–13th centuries); there are monuments to a dead language I drink(6th–12th centuries, Burma).
Sino-Tibetan languages have the structural characteristic of using tonal (pitch) differences to distinguish between usually monosyllabic morphemes; there is little or no inflection or any use of affixes at all; syntax relies on phrasal phonology and word order. Some of the Chinese and Tibeto-Burman languages have undergone extensive study, but reconstruction similar to that which has been made for the Indo-European languages has as yet been carried out only to a small extent.
For quite a long time, the Thai and Miao-Yao languages were also brought together with the Sino-Tibetan languages, specifically Chinese, uniting them into a special Sinitic branch, opposed to the Tibeto-Burman one. Currently, this hypothesis has practically no supporters left.
Turkic languages belong to the Altai language family. Turkic languages: about 30 languages, and with dead languages and local varieties, the status of which as languages is not always indisputable, more than 50; the largest are Turkish, Azerbaijani, Uzbek, Kazakh, Uyghur, Tatar; the total number of speakers of Turkic languages is about 120 million people. The center of the Turkic range is Central Asia, from where, in the course of historical migrations, they also spread, on the one hand, to southern Russia, the Caucasus and Asia Minor, and on the other, to the northeast, to eastern Siberia up to Yakutia. The comparative historical study of Altai languages began in the 19th century. Nevertheless, there is no generally accepted reconstruction of the Altaic proto-language; one of the reasons is the intensive contacts of the Altaic languages and numerous mutual borrowings, which complicate the use of standard comparative methods.
Ural languages. This macrofamily consists of two families - Finno-Ugric And Samoyed. Finno-Ugric family, which includes, in particular, the Finnish, Estonian, Izhorian, Karelian, Vepsian, Votic, Livonian, Sami (Baltic-Finnish branch) and Hungarian (Ugric branch, which also includes the Khanty and Mansi languages) languages, was described in general terms at the end of the 19th century; At the same time, the reconstruction of the proto-language was carried out; The Finno-Ugric family also includes the Volga (Mordovian (Erzyan and Moksha) and Mari (mountain and meadow dialects) languages) and Perm (Udmurt, Komi-Permyak and Komi-Zyryan languages) branches. Later, a relationship with the Finno-Ugric Samoyed languages, widespread in the north of Eurasia, was established. The number of Uralic languages is more than 20, if we consider Sami as a single language, and about 40, if we recognize the existence of separate Sami languages, as well as take into account dead languages, known mainly only by name. The total number of peoples speaking Uralic languages is about 25 million people (more than half of them are native speakers of Hungarian and over 20% of Finnish). The minor Baltic-Finnish languages (except Vepsian) are on the verge of extinction, and Votic may have already disappeared; Three of the four Samoyed languages (except Nenets) are also dying out.
- SINO-TIBETAN LANGUAGES
(Sino-Tibetan) family of languages spoken in China, Myanmar, Nepal, Bhutan and northeastern India. There is no generally accepted genetic classification. There are 2 branches: ... - SINO-TIBETAN LANGUAGES
(Sino-Tibetan), a family of languages spoken in China, Myanmar, Nepal, Bhutan and northeastern India. There is no generally accepted genetic classification. There are 2... - LANGUAGES
WORKING - see OFFICIAL AND WORKING LANGUAGES... - LANGUAGES in the Dictionary of Economic Terms:
OFFICIAL - see OFFICIAL AND WORKING LANGUAGES... - LANGUAGES
PROGRAMMING LANGUAGES, formal languages for describing data (information) and the algorithm (program) for their processing on a computer. The basis of Ya.p. make up algorithmic languages... - LANGUAGES in the Big Russian Encyclopedic Dictionary:
LANGUAGES OF THE WORLD, languages of the peoples inhabiting (and previously inhabiting) the globe. The total number is from 2.5 to 5 thousand (to establish the exact figure... - SINO-TIBETAN in the Big Russian Encyclopedic Dictionary:
SINO-TIBETAN LANGUAGES, see Sino-Tibetan languages... - SINO-TIBETAN in the Big Russian Encyclopedic Dictionary:
SINO-TIBETAN MOUNTAINS (Sichuan Alps), in China. OK. 750 km. High up to 7590 m (Gongashan city). Bordered from the east by the Tibetan Plateau, ... - LANGUAGES OF THE WORLD
the world, the languages of the peoples inhabiting (and previously inhabiting) the globe. The total number of Yam - from 2500 to 5000 (exact number... - LANGUAGES OF THE WORLD in the Linguistic Encyclopedic Dictionary.
- YANG TZE in the Big Encyclopedic Dictionary:
(Yangzijiang Blue River), in China. 5800 km, the longest in Eurasia, basin area 1808.5 thousand km2. Beginning on the Tibetan Plateau; ... - SICHUAN ALPS in the Big Encyclopedic Dictionary:
see Sino-Tibetan... - SINO-TIBETAN MOUNTAINS in the Big Encyclopedic Dictionary:
(Sichuan Alps) in China. OK. 750 km. Height up to 7590 m (Mount Gungashan). They border the Tibetan Plateau on the east and serve as the western... - Sino-TIBETAN LANGUAGES in the Big Encyclopedic Dictionary:
see Sino-Tibetan... - YANG TZE in the Great Soviet Encyclopedia, TSB:
The Yangtze River, the Blue River, is the largest river in China and Eurasia. Length 5800 km, basin area 1808.5 thousand km2 (according to others... - SINO-TIBETAN MOUNTAINS in the Great Soviet Encyclopedia, TSB:
mountains, Sichuan Alps, Huangduannan, mountains in China. They represent a ledge of the Tibetan Plateau on the border with the plains and lowlands of Eastern China. ... - ROMAN LANGUAGES in the Great Soviet Encyclopedia, TSB:
languages (from Latin romanus - Roman), a group of related languages belonging to the Indo-European family (see Indo-European languages) and descending from Latin ... - Sino-TIBETAN LANGUAGES in the Great Soviet Encyclopedia, TSB:
languages, Sinitic languages, a family of languages in China, Burma, the Himalayas and North-East India, subdivided, according to the classification of the American scientist R. Shafer, ... - CHINESE-TIBETAN in the Big Russian Encyclopedic Dictionary:
Sino-Tibetan languages (Sino-Tibetan languages), a family of languages spoken in China, Myanmar, Nepal, Bhutan and North-East. India. Generally accepted genetic no classification. ... - LANGUAGE AND LANGUAGES in the Encyclopedia of Brockhaus and Efron.
- LANGUAGES OF THE PEOPLES OF THE USSR
- languages spoken by peoples living on the territory of the USSR. In the USSR there are approx. 130 languages of the country's indigenous peoples living... - FINNO-UGRIAN LANGUAGES in the Linguistic Encyclopedic Dictionary:
- a family of languages that is part of a larger genetic group of languages called the Uralic languages. Before it was proven genetic. kinship... - URAL LANGUAGES in the Linguistic Encyclopedic Dictionary:
- a large genetic union of languages, including 2 families - Fiyo-Ugric (see Finno-Ugric languages) and Samoyed (see Samoyed languages; some scientists consider ... - SUDANIC LANGUAGES in the Linguistic Encyclopedic Dictionary:
- a classification term used in African studies in the 1st half. 20th century and determined the languages common in the area of geographic Sudan - ... - ROMAN LANGUAGES in the Linguistic Encyclopedic Dictionary:
- a group of languages of the Indo-European family (see Indo-European languages), connected by a common origin from the Latin language, general patterns of development and, therefore, elements of structural... - PALEOASIAN LANGUAGES in the Linguistic Encyclopedic Dictionary:
- a conditionally defined linguistic community that unites genetically unrelated Chukchi-Kamchatka languages, Eskimo-Aleut languages, Yenisei languages, Yukaghir-Chuvan languages and ... - OCEANIC LANGUAGES in the Linguistic Encyclopedic Dictionary:
- part of the eastern “subbranch” of the Malayo-Polynesian branch of the Austronesian languages (considered by some scientists as a subfamily of the Austronesian languages). Distributed in the regions of Oceania located east of ... - CUSHITE LANGUAGES in the Linguistic Encyclopedic Dictionary:
—a branch of the Afroasiatic family of languages (see Afroasiatic languages). Distributed to the north-east. and V. Africa. Total number of speakers approx. 25.7 million people ... - ARTIFICIAL LANGUAGES in the Linguistic Encyclopedic Dictionary:
— sign systems created for use in areas where the use of natural language is less effective or impossible. And I. vary... - IRANIAN LANGUAGES in the Linguistic Encyclopedic Dictionary:
—a group of languages belonging to the Indo-Iranian branch (see Indo-Iranian languages) of the Indo-European family of languages (see Indo-European languages). Distributed in Iran, Afghanistan, some... - INDO-EUROPEAN LANGUAGES in the Linguistic Encyclopedic Dictionary:
- one of the largest families of languages in Eurasia, which over the past five centuries has also spread to the North. and Yuzh. America, Australia and... - AFRASIAN LANGUAGES in the Linguistic Encyclopedic Dictionary:
(Afroasiatic languages; obsolete - Semitic-Hamitic, or Hamitic-Semitic, languages) - a macrofamily of languages widespread in the north. parts of Africa from the Atlantic. coast and Canary... - AUSTROASIATIC LANGUAGES in the Linguistic Encyclopedic Dictionary:
(Australian languages) - a family of languages spoken by part of the population (approx. 84 million people) South-East. and Yuzh. Asia, as well as... - AUSTRONESIAN LANGUAGES in the Linguistic Encyclopedic Dictionary:
- one of the largest families of languages. Distributed in the Malayan arch. (Indonesia, Philippines), Malacca Peninsula, in the south. districts of Indochina, in ... - TURKIC LANGUAGES in the Linguistic Encyclopedic Dictionary:
- a family of languages spoken by numerous peoples and nationalities of the USSR, Turkey, part of the population of Iran, Afghanistan, Mongolia, China, Romania, Bulgaria, Yugoslavia ... - Sino-TIBETAN LANGUAGES in the Modern Explanatory Dictionary, TSB:
see Sino-Tibetan... - GULAG ARCHIPELAGO in Wiki Quotation Book.
- KURIHARA KOMAKI in the Encyclopedia Japan from A to Z:
(b. 1945) - theater and film actress. She studied music and ballet. Since 1963, she studied at the school at the Hayuza Theater. ... - ABOTENI in the Directory of Characters and Cult Objects of Greek Mythology:
in the mythology of the peoples of the Tibeto-Burman group, the Adi (Dafla, Miri, Sulungs, Apatanis and other peoples of the Himalayan region in northeast India) is the first person... - RHEUMATIC DISEASES in the Medical Dictionary.
- RHEUMATIC DISEASES in the Large Medical Dictionary.
- VIOLA in the Literary Encyclopedia:
(English Viola) - the heroine of William Shakespeare's comedy “Twelfth Night, or Whatever” (1601). An image that most fully expresses the idea of a man of the era... - TIBETAN LITERATURE in the Literary Encyclopedia:
arose and developed in medieval, feudal conditions. Literary literature in Tibet has not yet had time to separate itself as a special area of ideology... - MONGOLIAN LITERATURE. in the Literary Encyclopedia:
The population of Mongolia—the Mongolian People's Republic and Inner Mongolia—is not ethnically homogeneous. The Mongolian People's Republic is inhabited mainly by Khalkha Mongols, ... - MANJUR LITERATURE in the Literary Encyclopedia:
arose after the creation of the Manjurian state, when in the middle of the 16th century. Christ era, 760 small Manjur tribes united and soon took possession of everything... - KALMYK LANGUAGE in the Literary Encyclopedia:
language Volga Oirats, known as Kalmyks, are included along with the dialects of the Asian Oirats (in the Kobdos district of the Mongolian People's Republic, Eastern ... - ASVAGOSH in the Literary Encyclopedia:
(more precisely Ashvaghosha) is a famous poet of Indian Buddhism. Tradition considers him a contemporary of King Kanishka (1st century AD). Tibetan and Chinese... - YALUNGJIANG in the Big Encyclopedic Dictionary:
river in China, left tributary of the river. Yangtze. 1324 km, basin area 144 thousand km2. It flows mainly in the Sino-Tibetan mountains. ... - TUJIA in the Big Encyclopedic Dictionary:
(self-name - biseka) people in China (Hunan and Hubei provinces). 5.9 million people (1992). The language of Sino-Tibetan... - TIBETAN PLATEAU in the Big Encyclopedic Dictionary:
to the Center Asia, in China, is one of the largest (approx. 2 million km2) and highest on the globe. Bounded by the Himalayas,…
Plan
Introduction
general information
Classification
Structural characteristics of Sino-Tibetan languages
Introduction
SINO-TIBETAN LANGUAGES, otherwise called Sino-Tibetan, is a language family in Asia. It ranks second in the world in terms of the number of speakers after Indo-European languages. Sino-Tibetan languages are spoken primarily in China, northeast India, Myanmar, Nepal and Bhutan, as well as in Bangladesh, Laos and Thailand; in addition, tens of millions of Chinese, who retain their language, live in almost all countries of Southeast Asia (in Singapore they make up more than 75% of the population); there is a significant Chinese diaspora spread throughout the world.
The number of languages included in the Sino-Tibetan family is estimated differently, most often at about 300. The uncertainty is associated not only with the traditional problem of distinguishing between language and dialect, but also with the sociolinguistic and cultural-historical heterogeneity of the family. On the one hand, it includes the largest in the world in terms of the number of speakers of it as a native language and which has a multi-thousand-year cultural tradition, writing and literature, Chinese, as well as two other fairly large ancient written languages - Burmese and Tibetan. On the other hand, the Sino-Tibetan family includes many small and completely unstudied tribal languages.
This essay reveals the topic of Sino-Tibetan languages, their commonalities, classification and the role of the Chinese language in it.
general information
Sino-Tibetan languages(formerly also called Sino-Tibetan listen)) is a large language family common in East, Southeast and South Asia. Unites about 300 languages. The total number of speakers of these languages is at least 1.2 billion people, thus, in terms of the number of speakers, this family ranks second in the world after Indo-European.
Tibetan languages are a linguistic group of the Sino-Tibetan family, uniting the mutually obscure Tibeto-Burman languages spoken predominantly by Tibetans living in eastern Central Asia bordering South Asia, including the Tibetan Plateau, northern Hindustan: Baltistan, Ladakh, Nepal, Sikkim and Butane. The classical written form of the language is the largest literary language of the region, used in Buddhist literature. Tibetan languages are spoken by about 6 million people. Lhaska Tibetan is spoken by about 150,000 exiles living outside their ethnic lands, such as in India. Tibetan is also spoken by a number of ethnic minorities in Tibet, who have lived for centuries in proximity to the Tibetans, but have retained their own language and culture. Classical Tibetan is not tonal, but some varieties such as Central Tibetan and Kham Tibetan have a developed tone (Amdo and Ladakhi are toneless). The morphology of Tibetan can be described generally as agglutinating, although Classical Tibetan was isolating. The Varying classification is different. Some Kham and Amdo groups are grouped together as Eastern Tibetan (not to be confused with Eastern Bod, who are not ethnically Tibetan).
Classification
The literature presents several classifications of Sino-Tibetan languages, which differ significantly from each other. Genealogical connections within the Sino-Tibetan family have not been sufficiently studied, which is due to a number of reasons: a shortage of empirical material, the absence of any long written tradition in most Sino-Tibetan languages and, therefore, information about their state in the past, as well as the structural features of these languages: underdeveloped morphology and the widespread use of tones, which until recently were poorly recorded in descriptions - and all this against the background of significant typological similarity in their phonological structure. This combination of typological similarity (which the Sino-Tibetan languages share with a number of geographically neighboring language families) with insufficient development of historical reconstruction resulted in the unclear boundaries of the Sino-Tibetan language family. For quite a long time, it included the Thai languages (which include, in particular, Thai and Lao) and the Miao-Yao languages, now recognized as independent language families; The question of whether the Bai or Minjia language in the Chinese province of Yunnan belongs to the Sino-Tibetan language remains debatable (about 900 thousand speakers out of 1.6 million ethnic Bai; Chinese borrowings in the dictionary of this language reach up to 70%).
The first classification of Sino-Tibetan languages that became famous in European science belongs to the Norwegian scientist S. Konov (1909), one of the authors of the fundamental multi-volume Linguistic Survey of India. The other two standard classifications belong respectively to the American scientists R. Shafer and P. Benedict, under whose leadership a project on the comparative study of the phonetics of Sino-Tibetan languages was carried out at the University of California in the USA in 1934–1940. The results of this project were published: Introduction to the Study of Sino-Tibetan Languages R. Shafer (in 5 parts) was published in 1966–1974, and the book by P. Benedict Sino-Tibetan languages. Abstract– in 1972. At the end of the 1970s, the classification schemes of G. Mayer and B. Mayer, S.E. Yakhontov also appeared; There are other classifications.
The genetic commonality of the Sino-Tibetan languages is now generally recognized, although the material (in the form of morphemes having a common origin) differences between them are great. Glottochronological analysis shows that the time of their divergence can reach 10 thousand years (a number of researchers consider this figure to be overestimated).
In all classifications, starting with Konov’s, the Chinese branch, consisting of the Chinese and Dungan languages, and the Tibeto-Burman branch are distinguished and contrasted with each other. (Chinese is actually a group of dialects that have diverged so much that if it were not for the strong national identity of the Chinese, the common culture and the presence in China of a supra-dialectal written norm and a unified statehood, then they should be considered independent languages; Dungan is precisely the only Chinese a dialect for which the status of a language is recognized.) The Tibeto-Burman branch, the number of speakers of which exceeds 60 million people, includes all Sino-Tibetan languages minus Chinese and Dungan. Sometimes, along with these two branches, the Karen branch is also distinguished as an independent branch of the Sino-Tibetan family (the languages included in it with a total number of speakers of slightly more than 3 million are widespread in the south of Burma and in the adjacent regions of Thailand). In Benedict, the Karen group unites with the Tibeto-Burman sub-branch into the Tibeto-Karen branch opposed to the Chinese; Shafer has the so-called The “Karen section” is part of the Tibeto-Burman branch along with the Tibetan, Burmese and Bar (Bodo-Garo) sections. Tibeto-Burman languages in all classifications have complex internal divisions.
At the intermediate levels, classifications diverge so much that any definite correspondence between them is not established or is not clear. We can only indicate several genetic groupings, distinguished more or less unambiguously, but embedded in different classifications in different ways (and sometimes under different names). These include the following.
The Lolo-Burman group is the most studied group of Sino-Tibetan languages, for which there are reconstructions of the proto-language (in particular, the reconstruction of J. Matisoff). The languages of this group are spoken mainly in Burma and southern China, with several languages also in Laos, Thailand and Vietnam. In addition to Burmese, the Lolo-Burmese group includes such relatively large languages as Hani in the Chinese province of Yunnan and neighboring countries (the number of “official nationalities” is about 1.25 million people; the number of speakers of Hani proper is smaller); the Akha language, closely related to the previous one (about 360 thousand people in the same area); the Lahu languages, widespread at the junction of the PRC, Burma and Thailand (has two very different dialects: the “Black Lahu” dialect – about 580 thousand, according to 1981 data, and the “Yellow Lahu” dialect – about 14.5 thousand) and Lisu (whose population is estimated at approximately 657 thousand). The latter two languages, especially Lahu, are well described, and their material at one time played an important role in syntactic typology.
The Bodo-Garo group, which includes about a dozen languages spoken in eastern India and Bangladesh, in particular, the Bodo languages themselves (about 1 million speakers) and Garo (up to 700 thousand). For Bodo-Garo there is a reconstruction of the phonetics of the parent language , published in 1959 by R. Berling.
The Kuki-Chin group (about 40 languages), mainly in India and Burma, which includes, among others, the Meithei, or Manipuri languages (the second is the name of the state of Manipur; Meithei serves as a lingua franca and is spoken by about 1, 3 million people in almost all states in eastern India), Lushi (at least 517 thousand people in eastern India and partly in Burma) and Rong, or Lepcha (about 65 thousand mainly in India and Bhutan; some authors highlight lepcha into a separate group).
The languages of the Naga peoples living in northeast India (the states of Nagaland, Minipur, Mizoram, Assam, the union territory of Arunachal Pradesh and neighboring regions of Burma) are genetically distributed between these two groups. The southern Nagas (about one and a half dozen tribes each with their own language, the largest - Angami, Lhota, or Lotha, Sema, Rengma) speak languages close to the Kuki-Chin languages, and about the same number of tribes in the north of this region speak the so-called languages cognac (the largest are AO and cognac itself; in relation to Naga, “largest” means a population of about 100 thousand people). The Kuki-Chin languages are combined with the Southern Naga languages into the Naga-Kuki(-Chin) group, and the Bodo-Garo languages are combined with the Konyak languages into the Konyak-Bodo-Garo group. The latter is sometimes combined with the Kachin group, which actually includes one Kachin language, or Jingpo (over 650 thousand speakers, mainly in Myanmar and partly in the People's Republic of China) in the Baric subbranch.
The most controversial are the existing classifications of languages of the northwestern part of the Tibeto-Burman area - relatively speaking, Tibeto-Himalayan, widespread in northern India, Nepal, Bhutan and China (in Tibet). Sometimes they are united under the name “Bodic” (Bodic - from the self-name of Tibet). The Tibetan group stands out here, which includes approx. 30 languages, including Tibetan proper with a number of closely related languages (according to other interpretations - Tibetan dialects), the speakers of which are officially included in the “Tibetan nationality”; Amdo (about 800 thousand people in various autonomous entities of the provinces of Qinghai, Gansu and Sichuan; sometimes this language is considered as a Tibetan dialect that has retained archaic features); not too numerous, but well known in the world for extralinguistic reasons, the Sherpa language (approx. 34 thousand people); Ladakhi language (about 100 thousand people in the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir), etc. This group, naturally, includes the classical Tibetan language. There is also a group of Gurung (in Nepal), which includes, among others, quite large languages Gurung (two very different dialects, about 180 thousand people) and Tamang (four very different dialects, over 900 thousand people: Tamang spoken by the Gurkhas, famous for their service in the British Army); several “Himalayan” groups with a fairly large number of languages included in them, among which the most significant is the Newari language (over 775 thousand people in Nepal); as well as a number of smaller groups, sometimes consisting of one language.
In various classifications, other groups are also distinguished; The place of some languages in the classification, while it is certain that they belong to the Sino-Tibetan group, remains unclear.
In addition to the listed living languages, the Tangut language, which was part of the Tibeto-Burman branch, is also well known, which was the official language of the Xi Xia state (10th–13th centuries), destroyed by the Mongol conquerors. The language was reconstructed as a result of deciphering monuments discovered by P.K. Kozlov’s expedition in the dead city of Khara-Khoto in 1908–1909. In texts from the 6th to the 12th centuries. the now dead Pyu language survives in Myanmar.
Structural characteristics of Sino-Tibetan languages
The structural characteristics of the Sino-Tibetan languages are usually measured from Chinese, which is actually the standard syllabary isolating language; acquaintance with it led to the formation of the concept of an isolating language ( cm. LINGUISTIC TYPOLOGY). A syllable in languages of this type is the basic phonetic unit, the structure of which is subject to strict laws: at the beginning of the syllable there is a noisy consonant, then a sonant, intermediate and main vowels and a final consonant, with all elements except the main consonant being optional. The number of possible final consonants is less than the number of initial ones, and in a number of languages only open (ending in a vowel) syllables are generally allowed. Many languages have several different tones ( cm. LINGUISTIC PROSODY).
Whether all Sino-Tibetan languages have always been structured this way is not entirely clear. Data from the Tibetan language, for which from the 7th century. There is a syllabary writing system, in principle capable of accurately conveying the sound composition of a word, which leads one to suspect that, at least in this language, at the time of the creation of writing, the structure of the syllable was significantly more complex. If we assume that all the signs of the Tibetan script were used to denote sounds (there are arguments in favor of this point of view, in particular, data from the Amdo language), then we have to assume that Tibetan had numerous structures of the type brgyad"nine" or bslabs“he studied science” (they are obtained by transliterating Tibetan words). Subsequently, the initial and final combinations of consonants were greatly simplified, and the repertoire of vowels expanded and tones appeared. Typologically, this is similar to what happened in the history of English or French, where the distance between spelling and pronunciation is also great, and there are significantly more vowel phonemes than the special letters denoting them. In some respect (the specific way in which smooth r And l to the preceding vowel) in Tibetan there is even a material similarity with processes that took place in the history of the English language.
A morpheme, and often a word in the “ideal” Sino-Tibetan language is usually equal to a syllable. There is no inflection (declension, conjugation), and to express syntactic relationships, function words and the order of words within phrases and sentences are used. Classes of words (parts of speech) are distinguished solely on syntactic grounds; for example, an adjective is a word that can serve as a definition. At the same time, conversion is widespread: without any changes in form, a word can change its syntactic functions and thereby refer to different parts of speech. Service morphemes are often postpositive and can form not only words, but also phrases.
In reality, many of the Sino-Tibetan languages differ from this standard to one degree or another, and elements of inflection are observed in them (in classical Tibetan, for example, several stems were distinguished in the verb, for the formation of which non-syllabic ones were used and therefore were obviously part of the stem syllable prefixes and suffixes).
The syntax of Sino-Tibetan languages is quite diverse. Many of them are characterized by the construction of sentences not in accordance with the “subject-predicate” structure, but in accordance with the “topic-commentary” structure (or, in other terminology, “topic-rheme”): a word that occupies a syntactically distinguished first position in the sentence , may be in completely different semantic (so-called role: action producer, addressee, sufferer, etc.) relationships to the predicate verb; It is important that this word names the subject of speech and thereby limits the scope of applicability of what will be said next. In Russian these are constructions with “nominative themes” like Department store « Moscow» I'll get there? (instead of normative I'll get to the department store« Moscow"?), which are part of colloquial speech; in Sino-Tibetan languages (at least in some of them: in Chinese, Lisu, Lahu - the so-called “topic-promoting languages”) such constructions are the norm.
Conclusion
Chinese- a language or linguistic branch of the Sino-Tibetan language family, consisting of varieties that are mutually intelligible to varying degrees. Chinese is the most widely spoken modern language by the total number of speakers
1.213 billion people.
Chinese is one of two branches of the Sino-Tibetan family of languages. It was originally the language of the main ethnic group of China - the people han. In its standard form, Chinese is the official language of the People's Republic of China and Taiwan, and one of the six official and working languages of the United Nations.
The Chinese language is a collection of very different dialects, and therefore it is considered by most linguists as an independent language branch, consisting of separate, although related, language and/or dialect groups.
The history of the study of Sino-Tibetan languages is, first of all, the history of the study of Chinese and Tibetan languages. China is one of the countries that created a national linguistic tradition, and Tibet inherited the linguistic tradition of Ancient India, brought along with Buddhism. As for the typological and comparative historical study of Sino-Tibetan languages, it began only at the end of the 19th century; its main stages are mentioned at the beginning of the article. In Russia, research in this area was carried out, in particular, by S.A. Starostin and S.E. Yakhontov.
Bibliography
Peiros I.I. Sino-Tibetan and Austro-Thai languages. – In the book: Comparative study of languages of different families: tasks and prospects. M., 1982
Starostin S.A. Hypothesis about the genetic connections of the Sino-Tibetan languages with the Yenisei and North Caucasian languages. – In the book: Linguistic reconstruction and history of the East. M., 1984
Yakhontov S.E. Sino-Tibetan languages. – Linguistic encyclopedic dictionary. M., 1990
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The languages of East Asia are members of several of the world's largest language families. In first place in terms of the number of speakers is the Sino-Tibetan family of languages that developed in this territory. The Altai family has representatives of all branches here, and the sphere of its formation, although partially, was within East Asia.
Geographically, the distribution of languages in East Asia can be represented as follows: Sino-Tibetan languages almost completely occupy the entire central and southern parts of this territory. Only in two places on the outskirts are foreign components interspersed among them: Mon-Khmer in Yunnan and Malay-Polynesian in Taiwan. The languages of the Altai family surround the entire region under consideration along its northern edge. This belt is closed in the extreme west by the languages of the mountain Tajiks, belonging to the Indo-European family, and in the extreme east by the Ainu language. 1
Sino-Tibetan language family
The divergence in the vocabulary and grammatical structure between the individual branches and languages of the Sino-Tibetan family is much greater than in the other language families mentioned here; words, meaning the degree of kinship, parts of the body, as well as natural phenomena, are often completely different even in the languages of the same branch. On the other hand, the numerals are very close, almost identical in languages even of different branches. Reconstruction of any proto-language for the Sino-Tibetan family is comparatively unlikely. Their similar features can rather be explained by the partial preservation of an area that once existed here with primitive linguistic continuity. Repeated migrations have disrupted this continuity, but traces of it remain in the nature of the differences between languages.
The common features for the entire Sino-Tibetan family are as follows: with very rare exceptions, each primary unit of speech - a root coinciding with a single-root word - represents one syllable. Moreover, any such syllable, taken separately, already gives us, if not in a modern living language, then at least in its ancient meaning, a completely complete word - a part or particle of speech. This gives some linguists a reason to characterize modern Sino-Tibetan languages as monosyllabic, that is, monosyllabic. However, in fact, most concrete words of any living language of this family are polysyllabic, representing a combination of several root syllables. Cornesyls - parts of speech, when combined, give complex words: for example, in the New Chinese language, the root words ho j/c "fire' and che 1$. cart', when combined, give a new word 'hoche train'.
Such two-part words are usually called binomials. Words composed of three or more root syllables can be considered as secondary binomials. Thus, the word “type” in Chinese is expressed by the binomial dazi from the root words “beat” and “zi” sign 7. The concept “typewriter” consists of three syllables: dazi ji, but this is also essentially a binary of two meanings: dazi “type” and ji “mechanism”.
If in Russian and other Indo-European languages there are relatively few such compound words, then in Sino-Tibetan they make up the majority of the entire vocabulary; Corneslogs are particles of speech and words that have lost their independent semantic meaning, joining other words, at the beginning or end they turn into prefixes or suffixes, which serve for word formation and inflection.
Potentially, syllables in Sino-Tibetan languages fall into three elements: an initial consonant consisting of one or more consonants, a vowel (simple or diphthong, triphthong) and a final consonant. A vowel is the carrier of a certain tone and is called a tonal. Tonal is an obligatory element in a word; So, in Chinese, the root syllable man' f! canopy’ contains an initial simple consonant (initial) m, a simple vowel a (tonal) and a final nъ. The root syllables ma YL sacrifice’, an’ VTs twilight’ and a ppf are also possible interjections. It should be noted that the initials are usually all the consonants found in a given language, and in many languages their combinations. Initials - combinations of consonants - were present, for example, in the ancient Tibetan language. However, Sino-Tibetan languages tend to simplify the composition of initials and to condense combinations of consonants into simple consonants.
Syllable finals can be closed consonants, but not all of them. For example, in modern literary Chinese, only two finals are preserved - n and n. The Yue (Cantonese) dialect retains the finals p, g, k - remnants of the ancient Chinese wider set of finals. The reduction of finals, inherent in the Chinese-Tibetan family as a whole, in a number of cases resulted in their complete disappearance and the transformation of all syllables into open ones.
Since only consonants and their combinations are used in initials, the total number of theoretically possible syllables (and therefore root words) in each language is quite limited. However, this number increases several times due to the presence of tones that are meaningful in nature. Thus, the word ma “sacrifice” mentioned above, like all the words associated with it, is pronounced with a falling tone (the fourth in the Chinese language). The same sound combination ma, pronounced under the first (even) tone, means Sh
"mother", under the second (ascending) - "hemp", under the third (descending-ascending) - "horse". The primary formation of tones is historically in direct connection with the truncation of finals in Chinese-Tibetan languages; sometimes it is also associated with changes in vowel composition.
The number of tones varies in different languages and dialects from two to nine or even more, but the general historical trend rather leads to a simplification of the tonal composition.
The grammar of the Sino-Tibetan languages is analytical at its core. As a rule, person, time, subject-object relations are expressed descriptively and through context. Almost all languages of this family are characterized by an abundance of particle classifiers, which are used to combine numerals and pronouns with nouns and indicate the gender of the latter. For example, in Chinese “two tables” - liang zhang zhuo, where liang two’, zhuo “table”, zhang is a classifier of all flat objects. Many Sino-Tibetan languages are characterized by a tendency to reduce the number of such categories and to use a limited number of universal classifiers.
The Chinese language became known to European linguists earlier than other Sino-Tibetan languages. The monosyllabic nature of the roots, the lack of inflection, and the apparent grammatical amorphism of the Chinese language gave rise to linguists - supporters of the stage theory - to see in it an example of a lower stage in the development of language, a state characteristic of the language almost immediately after its origin and preserved to this day. The historical study of Sino-Tibetan languages refutes this opinion.
The monosyllabic state of the classical Chinese language Wenyan Yie is primary, but is the result of a simplification of the ancient Chinese language, which had elements of agglutination and inflection.
Between classical and modern Chinese there are still centuries of development towards repeated complexity and the emergence of new elements of agglutination.
The unity of the proto-Chinese tribal languages, one of which was the language of the Shang-Yin tribes known to us from the inscriptions on oracle bones (XVI-XI centuries BC), is confirmed by the ease of spread of Yin writing after the 11th century. Due to the hieroglyphic nature of the latter, the phonetic composition of these languages or dialects is difficult to reconstruct. It is possible to reconstruct with sufficient accuracy only the general sound system of the ancient Chinese language.
The development of the Chinese language has continued throughout the centuries-old history of the Chinese people. Two sides of this process are the development and gradual change of language in connection with ethnic history and the gradual formation and then absorption of local dialects.
There are significant differences in the phonetics and semantics of the vocabulary of the Chinese language of different historical periods. For example, the word go, which currently means state, has gone through an interesting path of changing meaning depending on the socio-economic conditions of its existence. It meant, successively, a fence, a fenced place, a city, a possession, a kingdom, a state. The word jia “family” sounds like this in modern literary language; the same word in the south sounds like ka, something like how it sounded in ancient Chinese.
The ancient Chinese language developed until the 3rd century. BC e., the literary language of this time was Guven, coinciding with the spoken language or close to it; and from the 3rd century. n. e. Ancient Chinese gradually becomes a dead language and the formation of Middle Chinese begins on the basis of Guwen. At this time, ancient Chinese turns into an archaic written Wenyan, different from the spoken one. Then follows a new period - from the 9th century. According to the “May 4, 1919” movement, when Wenyan existed, but the language of the “Yuan drama”, which was already close to the colloquial language, was formed, based on northern dialects. As a result of the struggle for a universally understood Baihua language, Putonghua, based on the Beijing dialect, is gradually becoming stronger throughout the country.
The Chinese language includes a number of dialects. Currently, it is customary to distinguish eight main dialects: 1) Beijing, which is spoken by more than half of all Chinese, 2) Jiangnan (i.e., a dialect common in Jiangsu province south of the Yangtze and in Zhejiang province), 3) Guangdong, 4) Hunan , 5) Kejia (or Hakka) dialect, 6) Minnan (i.e. Southern Fujian), 7) Jiangxi 8) Minbei (i.e. Northern Fujian).
The names of the dialects reflect only the main areas of their distribution. Thus, the provinces of Hubei, Sichuan, Guizhou and Yunnan are also included in the area of distribution of the Beijing dialect.
Differences in the dialects of modern Chinese are mainly along phonetic lines; there are lexical differences; the differences in grammatical structure are small. In general, the dialects are uniform, although the most widely divergent large dialects of the Chinese language are mutually incomprehensible.
The geographical distribution of dialects and the periodization of language development are in good agreement with the ethnic history of the Chinese. The development of the languages of clans and tribes was undoubtedly associated with its first stage; within the ethnic territory of the Chinese, these languages were linked by a chain of linguistic continuity.
The main modern dialects are obviously relics of local tribal languages that existed in ancient times in different regions of China. In addition, foreign language, non-Chinese substrates, for example Zhuang Tung in the south, could also play some role in the formation of modern dialects. The peoples of the south-eastern coastal strip, who defended their independence for a long time, partially perceived the language of the victors, first as a second language, then as the only one. Yet the features of the local languages of the south have been preserved to this day in the local dialects (or, as they are called, Koine g/, Min and Yue).
A significant influx of immigrants from the central Chinese regions consolidated the process of language adaptation. Already a thousand years later, the population of the coastal strip considered themselves part of the Chinese people.
The process was different in the north- and south-western regions of the country. The assimilation of local languages of non-Chinese peoples was either unopposed or did not occur. The differences between the Chinese dialects of these regions are so small that it would be more accurate to talk about dialects (Tuhua).
The modern colloquial and literary Chinese language (the normative language of the Chinese nation) - Putonghua, which literally means “common language”, is the largest language in the world in terms of the number of speakers.
The Chinese language is polytonal. In Beijing pronunciation, which is accepted as standard for Putuihua, there are four tones.
Putonghua is characterized by the use of a large number of classifiers, modifiers, modal particles, showing changes in number, type, form, etc. To a large extent, these final auxiliary particles have become suffixes (for example, the plural indicator of animate nouns myn, as in the word
tongzhimyn "comrades'). Modal particles can express a question, emotion, shade in expression.
There is no inflection of names in Chinese. The plural suffix for names denoting persons, myнъ, is used only when the plurality is not clear from the context. Only the verb has somewhat developed inflection, but even here there is no tense or person, but there are forms of aspect and modality. The syntax is built according to the subject-predicate-object pattern. The definition precedes the defined. Prepositional constructions and postpositions have been preserved from the ancient Chinese language. Thus, in modern language there is a very characteristic construction, which in literal translation reads:
or I take a pencil and write’ (in a literary translation, it’s better to write with a pencil’).
The Tibeto-Burman languages have a different syntax from other languages of the Sino-Tibetan family, where there is a rigid subject-object-predicate pattern.
Only in cases where there is a subject indicator and an object indicator, as for example in the Naxi language, the order of their relative positions can be changed.
Usually the definition precedes the defined (in Tibetan it can also come after the defined). Additions are introduced by postpositions. The verb has tense, participial and participial forms. It is interesting to note that all these features are also present in the Altai family, the probable zone of formation of which is geographically adjacent to the zone of formation of the Tibeto-Burman languages - for the former it is mainly the Altai-Sayan Plateau and the steppes of Mongolia, for the latter - the provinces of the PRC - Gansu, Sichuan and Qinghai. It is possible that the Altaic languages influenced the westward-spreading branches of the Sino-Tibetan languages, the initial center of which most likely was the Great Chinese Plain and the Loess Plateau to the west of it.
In a number of respects, the languages of the Tibeto-Burman branch appear to be more archaic than other Sino-Tibetan languages. So, for example, in them, especially in Jiazhong and a number of dialects of Tibetan, traces of the former polysyllabicity, clusters of consonants in initials and finals, a smaller number of tones and a smaller proportion of their meaningful role are preserved; in some languages - Tibetan and Jingpo - classifiers are rarely used. In a number of languages of the Izu group, on the contrary, they are close to merging with the numeral. The position of classifiers in the syntactic structure also differs from that accepted in the Chinese language. Instead of the Chinese scheme of numeral (or demonstrative pronoun)-classifier-noun, the construction noun-numeral-classifier is used in the Tibeto-Burman languages.
Many Tibeto-Burman languages are characterized by the presence of suffixes.
The Tibeto-Burman branch of languages within East Asia falls into three groups: Tibetan, Izu and Jingpo. 2
In the Tibetan group one can distinguish the languages Tibetan, Jiazhong, Qiang, Xifan, Dulong, well; however, the last two languages occupy a special position, and they can be divided into a separate subgroup, calling it the eastern, and the remaining Tibetan languages - the western subgroup. The languages of the eastern subgroup are close to another group of the Tibeto-Burman branch, namely the Itzu group, which includes the Itzu, Lisu, Nasi, Lahu, Hani, Achan, and Bai languages. The Jingpo language alone forms a special group, which, however, sometimes gets closer and even merges with Burmese, and on the other hand, was influenced by the languages of the Itzu group.
Many of the listed languages fall into dialects, sometimes very numerous and so very different from one another that the scale of these differences is close to the differences between individual languages. This especially applies to the Tibetan, Izu, Hani, and Jingpo languages.
The Zhuang Tung languages constitute the third branch of the Sino-Tibetan language family, which in Western European linguistics is usually called Thai. It is divided into three groups - Zhuang-Tai, Dong Shui and Li group. The first includes the Zhuang languages, which are extremely close to it, especially to its northern dialects, the Bui language and the Tai language. The Dong Shui language includes the Dong, Mulao, Maonan, and Shui languages. The Li language with its dialects is the only representative of the third group. It should be noted that, with the exception of the peculiar Li language, dialect differences in the languages of the Zhuang Tung branch are not very great and, as a rule, mutual understanding is possible even between speakers of different languages within the same group.
Usually, speakers of neighboring dialects and languages understand each other better. There is a greater difference between the languages of peoples separated by large distances. The nature of the relationship between the Zhuang-Tung languages apparently makes it possible to talk about their origin from a single language.
In modern Chinese linguistics, * this branch has been given the name Zhuang Tung branch, after the names of the most important languages included here, widespread in China. The vocabulary of the Thai, or Zhuang Tung, languages is partially similar to Chinese. This especially applies to numerals, which are generally similar in Chinese, Tibeto-Burman, and Zhuang Tung languages. The sentence is constructed according to the “subject-predicate-object” scheme. The method of definition is sharply different from that adopted in the Tibeto-Burmese and Chinese languages, namely, the definition always follows the defined. So, in the Bui language, a young man’ sounds r’i sa: i literally a young man’; “old man’-r” and 1ai literally old man’. Classifier words are close to becoming prefix articles and are included in the dictionary form of nouns. In the same language buoys tu - animal classifier; tu- ma horse', tu- pa "fish'; zwak - bird classifier: zwak- la: in "sparrow', zwak- kau miau “horned owl.” In numeral constructions, the “noun-numeral-classifier” scheme is common, but with demonstrative pronouns and the numeral “one” the “noun-classifier-pronoun” construction is used.
The fourth branch - the Miao-Yao languages differ in their vocabulary from both the Chinese language and the Zhuang-Tung languages more than these branches of languages differ from each other, although there are undoubtedly some common features between the vocabulary of the Miao-Yao and Chinese languages or Zhuang Tung. However, in the field of grammar, the Miao-Yao languages occupy rather an intermediate position between the Chinese and Zhuangdong languages. There are several tones in the Miao-Yao languages - from five to eight. The structure of the phrase “subject-predicate-object” coincides with the Zhuang Tung model. As for the relative position of the definition and the defined, the most common scheme is “defined-definition”. So, in the Miao language “short clothes” sounds like<аэ1е "одежда короткая’. Однако некоторые наиболее употребительные прилагательные ставятся перед определяемым словом, например, mien d^ u ^big gate’, uh sa “good song”, as well as pronominal definitions, which brings the Miao-Yao syntax closer to Chinese.
Nouns in dictionary form usually appear together with their classifiers, although in a phrase the latter may be omitted; So in the Miao-Yao language the classifier of kinship terms is a: a-ra ‘father’,<a- mi mother’, a-r’eu grandfather’.
The composition of numerals in the Miao-Yao languages is very different from the Chinese, Zhuang Tung and Tibeto-Burman set of numerals, but the developed system of counting words brings them closer to Chinese. As for the demonstrative-pronominal construction, the order “classifier-noun-pronoun” is adopted in the Miao language, and “pronoun-classifier-noun” in the Yao language.
In the Miao-Yao branch, one can distinguish the Miao group (the Miao language with its dialects)^ the Yao group (Yao and She languages); The Gelao language, which stands somewhat apart, can be classified into the third group. The dialects of the Yao and especially Miao languages are so different from each other that mutual understanding between speakers of different dialects is often impossible.
It seems that these dialects go back to tribal languages and are now only in the process of consolidation into national languages. At the same time, individual groups calling themselves Miao, for example on the island. Hainan speak dialects very close to Yao, and even a number of distinctly Miao dialects, such as Mabu Miao, have some Yao-like features. It can be assumed that the differentiation of the Miao-Yao dialects into two groups can be approximately dated to the turn of our era.
However, it is hardly possible to talk about a single proto-language of Miao-Yao. Rather, there was a single area of existence of dialects that were in a state of primitive linguistic continuity. Perhaps some ancient stage of it is recorded in Chinese sources as San-Miao. One must think that the Gelao language emerged from it earlier than others. At the same time, one should remember about the possibility of the presence in the San-Miao of the ancestors of the Zhuangtung peoples, later called Yue (Lo-Yue, Nan-Yue, etc.). It is natural to assume that the languages of the ancient Miao and Yue strongly influenced each other, which was manifested in the specific, somewhat intermediate character of the Gelao and Li languages.
While the closeness of Chinese and the Tibeto-Burman languages was generally not seriously disputed, the classification of the Thai (Zhuang Tung) languages and the Miao-Yao languages was controversial. Thus, in Benedict's work, the Thai languages are separated from the Sino-Tibetan family and are considered as belonging to one large community along with the Malayo-Polynesian languages. A relic of their common proto-language was the Kadai group constructed by Benedict, which included the Li language and the Gelao language, which, indeed, of all the Miao-Yao languages, is closest to the Zhuangdong languages.
Davis's work, which greatly influenced the views of European linguists on this issue, included the Miao-Yao languages in the Mon-Khmer family of languages. There are other points of view, but in general the battle of opinions was conducted mainly on the issue of the relationship of the Zhuang-Tung and Miao-Yao languages with the Sino-Tibetan languages, as well as with the Mon-Khmer and Malay-Polynesian languages. Indeed, in the syntax of the Zhuang-Tung and partly Miao-Yao languages, and in their vocabulary, one can notice shifts towards convergence with the languages of the Mon-Khmer and Malayo-Polynesian families, which are the closest neighbors.
The Vietnamese language is not considered separately here, since it is spoken mainly outside the study area and is spoken by only a small number of Vietnamese living in the border areas of China. However, the formation of the Vietnamese language is obviously closely connected, just like the formation of the Zhuang-tung languages, with the Luo-Yue dialects that existed in Southern China, in Guangxi and adjacent areas. The vocabulary fund brings the Vietnamese language closer to the Mon-Khmer family, but its structural characteristics make it equally similar to most languages of the Sino-Tibetan family.
Actually Chinese (Han). China is a vast historical and ethnographic region. The peoples whose languages belong to the Sino-Tibetan family live in one state - the People's Republic of China. China is a multinational country. Scientists identify 56 peoples here. Actually, the Chinese are their self-name han- make up 93.5% of the total population. This is the most numerous people not only in China, but throughout the world. There is not a single province or autonomous region in China where Han Chinese do not form a majority. In terms of culture, the Han people are very close to the Dungans, who are distinguished by their religious affiliation: they profess Islam. Ethnologists highlight
several large historical and cultural (or ethnographic) regions, the population of which has its own regional linguistic and cultural characteristics. These features are determined by the history of the settlement of various territories of the People's Republic of China by the Han people.
For two thousand years, China has been and remains the most populated country on the globe. Experts believe that by the beginning of our era, the population of China was approaching 90 million people. Nowadays, the number of Han Chinese in the PRC, not counting the Chinese living in other countries, is more than 1 billion people. The rapid growth of the PRC population creates many difficulties for the government and residents of the country. The population is distributed very unevenly throughout China. 80% of its inhabitants are concentrated on 1/10 of the state’s territory. In some places, for example, on the Great Chinese Plain and in the southeast of the country, the population density reaches 700 people per 1 sq. km. It must be remembered that China is a “rural” country: the urban population does not exceed a fifth of the total number of its inhabitants. In general, the distribution of land used in China is quite remarkable. Arable land occupies 1/10, forest – 1/8 and pastures – 1/3 of the country’s territory. The most “plowed” part of the PRC is the Great Plain. In total, 9/10 of arable land is concentrated in eastern China.
The main distinctive feature of Chinese agriculture is careful cultivation of the soil and selection
tional work on breeding the most productive plant varieties. The Chinese peasant receives the maximum possible harvest from his plot of land.
In Chinese agriculture, from time immemorial, a very large share was made up of purely manual labor - cultivating the land with a hoe or other hand tools. The main occupation of the Chinese population has always been plow farming. It was either rainfed (non-irrigated) or irrigated. Irrigated agriculture required a lot of labor. It was necessary to supply water to the fields using canals of various sizes. The largest canal in China is called the Grand Canal. It was built in the eastern part of the country and stretches for 1700 km. It took almost 600 years to build it. Canals are used not only for irrigating fields, but also for transporting goods on various ships.
The most common agricultural crop in China is rice. Chinese peasants developed many varieties of this cereal. He gives two
The second most important cereal is winter wheat. It also makes up a significant share of the food supply. Vegetable growing and horticulture occupy a large place in Chinese agriculture.
Livestock Han Chinese traditionally occupy a less important place in agriculture than farming. Cattle are raised as draft power for plowing fields. The Han people get their main working and meat and dairy cattle from the northern regions of the PRC, where Mongols, Uyghurs, Kazakhs and other peoples engaged in nomadic (mobile) cattle breeding live. Pig farming is a large part of the Wuhan population. They bred very productive Evina breeds, which were also used in breeding work by Europeans.
“Seafood” plays an important role in the Han diet. Since ancient times, fishing has developed in China - both sea and river. In addition to fish, various mollusks, sea urchins, sea cucumbers, etc. are used as food. In terms of the level of development of fisheries, China ranks third in the world. In the recent past, a very significant share of fish catches came from fishing in inland waters (rivers, irrigation canals). Now, due to water pollution, catches have decreased.
Long before European scientists, Chinese peasants understood the danger of destroying forests on Earth. They began planting man-made forests long ago. They have bred special tree species that have the necessary properties - Massiona pine and the widely cultivated coniferous cuningamia tree. The latter grows very quickly and reaches maturity within 25 - 30 years after planting. The wood of these species is very durable and does not rot for a long time. It is used for the construction of ships, the production of railway sleepers, and the construction of housing. And yet, forest plantings do not save the country from deforestation.
Chinese craft has a long history. It expressed to a large extent this ancient civilization. The Chinese independently discovered the secret of making ceramics, smelting copper, bronze and iron. Chinese artisans are credited with creating such things as the world needs, such as paper, silk, porcelain, compass and gunpowder.
The first information about paper dates back to the 2nd century. n. e. According to the Chinese version, it was invented by Chai Lun. The first paper was made from bamboo stems and the bark (bast) of the mulberry tree.
The mulberry tree (mulberry) also played a vital role in another area of human activity - sericulture. Evidence of silk fabrics dates back to the 3rd millennium BC in China. e. The silkworm, from whose cocoons silk thread is obtained, feeds on mulberry leaves. The Chinese kept the secret of making silk threads for a long time and did not allow it to be exported from
cocoon countries. Silk fabrics were delivered from China to Asian and European countries along the Great Silk Road by camel caravans. This caravan route retained its significance until the 14th century, that is, until the development of regular navigation.
China has also enriched humanity with such production as the production of porcelain tableware. Reliable information about the production of porcelain dates back to the VI-VII centuries. n. e. It, like silk, was of great importance in the export trade of the Chinese state. Chinese porcelain of the 10th-13th centuries was especially famous and is now valued. with red glaze (coating). Since the 17th century Porcelain vessels began to be decorated with polychrome (multicolor) painting.
The method of coating various products with varnish, invented by the Chinese, has become world famous. Classic Chinese varnish is made from poisonous tree resin. The varnishes were painted in various colors with mineral paints and gold powder. Things coated with several layers of varnish are moisture-resistant, durable and very beautiful. Excellent examples of lacquerware made back in the 3rd century have survived to this day. BC e. Varnish coating techniques are varied. Craftsmen learned to build up thick layers of varnish on things and then applied beautiful three-dimensional carved patterns to the items.
Gunpowder was invented in China and was used for peaceful purposes - to make firecrackers and fireworks.
The high level of craft production found its expression in the construction industry. The classical home of the Han Chinese is very diverse and rationally arranged. The design and layout of houses depends on natural conditions. In the northwest, for example in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, houses are built frameless, made of mud brick. In the 11 central and eastern regions of the PRC, the Han people build their homes on a fairly high compacted artificial platform. The basis of the house is a strong wooden frame. The gaps between the beams are filled with bricks. Login is usually done with
south, the roof is often covered with tiles. National feature of the Chinese house. - can. This is an elevation occupying at least a third of the house’s area (up to 60 cm in height), inside of which a zigzag chimney is laid. The firebox is located in one corner of the chimney, and the exhaust pipe is in the diagonally opposite corner. Passing through the chimney, hot smoke heats the flue. The entire home life of the owners takes place on the kana: they sleep, work, eat, and receive guests here.
The art of construction in China has reached amazing perfection. Civil and religious buildings are distinguished by their graceful forms - numerous pagodas and the majestic palaces of the nobility are amazing. For example, in the rock temple of Lunmen (the middle reaches of the Yellow River) about 100 thousand bas-reliefs and statues were carved. The professional skill of Chinese architects is also evidenced by the “iron” pagoda, built in 967 and having a height of 56 m. It received its name from the “iron” color of the tiles used for its cladding.
One of the wonders of the world can be called the Great Wall of China. Its length is more than 4 thousand km. The beginning of the construction of the wall dates back to the IV-III centuries. BC e., and the end - by the 3rd century. n. e. The wall, wide enough for a chariot to pass through, was an excellent road for transporting troops in wartime. She saved China more than once from raids by nomads from the north.
The Chinese knew their neighbors well. Information about geographical maps in China dates back to the 7th century. n. e. Maps of China and adjacent territories from the 11th century have survived to this day. Chinese mathematicians calculated the number "pi" - the ratio of the circumference to the diameter (3.14). The achievements of traditional Chinese medicine are widely known: the Chinese knew ways to combat many infectious and other diseases.
Hieroglyphic writing in China it has been known since the 2nd millennium BC. e. The hieroglyph “draws” the word and conveys its meaning, but only approximately and does not always give its sound. The Chinese language has many dialects that vary greatly in phonetics, and
sometimes in terms of grammar. The oral speech of the Han Chinese - residents of the northern provinces of China - is incomprehensible to the Han Chinese in the south of the country. Only hieroglyphic writing can preserve some form of linguistic community. The country has long been making attempts to simplify the hieroglyphic writing, which should contribute to the creation of a unified Chinese language. Common to the entire PRC and universally understood in public and state life at present is the language Putonghua. It is based on the capital's (Beijing) dialect. Putonghua writing, compared to traditional hieroglyphs, is significantly simplified. This is the official state language in which teaching is conducted, which is used in the army and in complex industries. Nevertheless, the linguistic unity of China in our days is preserved mainly thanks to hieroglyphic writing. The problem of linguistic unity is one of the most important in the PRC.
Very unique religious situation in China. Already in the 6th century. BC e. In China, two philosophical systems developed, which gradually turned into religions. Having arisen almost simultaneously, they are more or less
developed less peacefully over two and a half thousand years. This Confucianism And Taoism. The first of these two teachings was created by Confucius (Kun Fuzi, about 551 - 449 BC). It mainly determines the moral and ethical order in the state structure. The teachings of Confucius were expounded by his students in the book Lun Yu. The basis of Confucianism: the power of the sovereign is sacred; The division of people into superior and inferior is a universal law of justice. Each person must act in society in accordance with his position. According to Confucius, to manage means to put everyone in their “own place,” that is, a person is obliged to do only the work for which he is intended. Advancement in social life is possible only through moral improvement and comprehension of science.
The second doctrine is Taoism. Its creator is considered to be Lao Tzu (real name Li Er, IV-III centuries BC). It is more concerned with the philosophy and norms of family life and its structure. Proponents of this doctrine preached a rapprochement with nature. The goal of later Taoists was to achieve longevity through a special diet, exercise, etc.
Lao Tzu was depicted as an old man sitting on a bull. Legends about the founder of Taoism speak of Lao Tzu as the head of all immortals. The teachings of Taoism are most fully expounded in the “Book of the Path and Virtue.” Among followers of Taoism there is a legend that Lao Tzu is the father of Buddha. It is possible that this plot is inspired by the similarity of dogmas (basic tenets of belief) of Taoism and Buddhism.
In the first centuries AD, Buddhism spread in China, and in the 8th century. The first preachers of Islam appear. Later, in the Middle Ages, Christian missionaries entered China. All canonized religious teachings exist in the PRC today.
The formation of Confucianism and Taoism was greatly influenced by the ancient beliefs of the Han Chinese. Confucius, for example, is credited with the authorship of the Shijing - Book of Songs - one of the oldest collections of folk ritual songs.
The widespread cult of ancestors is of great importance, especially in rural areas.
More than half a century has passed since the victory of the people's revolution in China and the formation of the People's Republic of China (1949). Life has made its own adjustments to the traditions of Chinese society. China's economy has changed: the country is quickly becoming one of the industrialized countries of the world. But even in these conditions, the population of the most populous country respects its traditions.
Ritual folklore song and dance performances over time transformed into professional theatrical genres - musical dramas with the participation of professional actors. Such troupes have been known in China since the turn of the 1st and 2nd millennia AD. The classical forms of Chinese musical drama emerged in the 14th century. The professional theater finally took shape in the 19th century. It is now known as Peking Opera.
Fiction has an equally long history. Poetic genres developed more actively in it than prose. Qu Yuan, who lived in the 3rd century, is considered the father of Chinese professional poetry. BC e. One of the oldest monuments of Chinese literature is the works dedicated to the “Eight Posthumous Sages”. In their final form, their biographies were formed in the 13th-14th centuries. n. e. Modern professional culture has reached a high level of development.
Peoples of the Tibeto-Burman language group. The languages of this group are spoken by several peoples settled in the southwestern provinces of the PRC. The largest - Tibetans(4.5 million people) and itzu(5 million people). Tibetans live in vast areas of the Tibetan highlands. They are mainly engaged in goat breeding and mountain farming (in the valleys), and raise yaks. In the summer, the herds graze high in the mountains, and in the winter they are allowed into the valleys. Yaks are the only animals that are well adapted to the harsh conditions of the highlands. They provide the Tibetans with milk, meat, wool, and leather. Wool and leather are used for making
clothes, carpets, summer tents. Tibetans raise cows and horses in small quantities.
Before the formation of the People's Republic of China (1949), Tibet was a semi-independent theocratic (purely ecclesiastical) state headed by the Dalai Lama. The residence of the Dalai Lama was in the city of Lhasa, located in the south of Tibet. He not only led the Buddhist Church of Tibet, but also headed the state leadership of the country. Today, Tibet is an integral part of the PRC, and the Dalai Lama is recognized as having the right to lead the Buddhist Church of Tibet. The modern Dalai Lama emigrated to India in 1959 and has a residence in this country.
The southwestern part of the PRC is striking in its ethnic diversity. Many peoples live here, standing at different levels of socio-economic development. Their. languages belong to different linguistic groups. The largest of them is the Itzu people, who live on the border of the PRC and Myanmar (Burma). The peoples inhabiting this part of China harmoniously combine plow and hoe farming. The Yizu are engaged in agriculture and are also known for developed crafts, such as blacksmithing. Itzu women are skilled embroiderers.
Peoples of the Thai language family. East of Izu, on the border with Vietnam, lives a group of peoples who speak languages of the Thai family. In total there are about 21 million people. The largest of them is named zhuang(more than 15 million). The Zhuangs are skilled farmers and artisans. They are famous for metal processing, porcelain, and silk fabrics. Other peoples of the southwest of China are not so numerous, but are of interest to ethnologists, since they have retained many features of the traditional way of life in everyday life.
JAPAN AND THE JAPANESE
Japan is an island state located on four large islands - Hokkaido, Honshu, Shikoku and Kyushu - and about 40 thousand small and very small ones (many of them are not inhabited).
According to archaeological data, people entered the Japanese islands quite early, but the most studied archaeological sites that already contain ceramics date back to a relatively recent time - about 10 thousand years ago. It is possible that their ancestors left them Ainu- people now living in the north of the island of Hokkaido. There are about 16 thousand of them, and by our time they have already lost their original culture. Research into classical Ainu culture has shown that their distant ancestors were associated with the more southern regions of East and Southeast Asia. In the 2nd millennium BC. e. the south of the Japanese islands was inhabited by people who spoke languages of the Austronesian group. Speakers of the ancient Japanese language proper moved to the Japanese Islands from Korea in the 5th century. BC
Modern Japan is a single-national country. About 99% of its population is Japanese. Among them there are several ethnographic groups that once had their own cultural characteristics. They were largely preserved by one such group on the Ryukko Islands.
The linguistic situation in Japan is very complex: there are three large groups of dialects and many dialects in the country. Every Japanese usually knows at least two spoken languages: firstly, the official and literary language, which almost all Japanese speak, and, secondly, their local dialect. The difficulty in communication is that the dialects are very different phonetically.
The written language of the Japanese language is based on Chinese hieroglyphs. Reading Japanese texts is a very difficult matter. Created in the 10th century. syllabary alphabet (of 50 characters) is used mainly for writing case letters
endings, postpositions and other grammatical indicators.
The traditional economic activity of the Japanese is arable farming. In the Middle Ages, due to the fragmentation of land plots into small plots and the impoverishment of peasants, hoe farming was revived. In traditional Japanese agriculture, many operations are performed manually.
Fishing occupies a large place in the livelihoods of classical Japanese society. A special economic and cultural type of coastal fishermen and gatherers has even developed here. At the same time, fishermen have always been one of the poorest groups of the population. As in Korea, in Japan there is a female profession of divers for deep-sea shellfish. Since ancient times, the method of fishing with the help of trained cormorants has been preserved. A ring is put on the bird's neck, preventing the fish it catches from slipping past the neck pouch, from where the bird's owner takes it out. Nowadays it is more of a spectacle for tourists than a practical way of fishing.
Material culture. The food of the Japanese has retained its originality the most. There are two parts to it: 1) shushoku- “main food”, - consisting of rice or some other cereals and noodles, and 2) fucuss-ku- “additional food”, which includes various fish, vegetable and meat seasonings. The Japanese eat very little meat. In the past, like the Chinese, they did not even milk cows or drink milk.
Traditional Japanese rural housing - a one-story frame house with sliding walls and a floor covered with straw mats tatami,- and remains today without any significant changes.
A lot of what came from the past culture was preserved in the home costume of the Japanese. If they use modern overalls and a European suit as work clothes, then at home the Japanese prefer to wear kimono(straight-cut robe). By
The cut of men's and women's kimonos is the same. In the men's version, only the sleeves are much shorter.
Features of social life. In the modern social structures of Japanese society, many features from past eras have been preserved. Since then, as the leader of the small-scale service nobility samurai- Minamoto Ritomo announced himself ( navel supreme ruler (12th century), samurai played a very noticeable role in the political life of Japan. A code of knightly honor was developed " Bushido"("The Way of the Warrior"), which regulated the behavior of samurai, including the ritual of suicide (harakiri).
To a large extent, the moral foundations of society are traditionally subordinated to the idea of the exclusivity of the Japanese character. Patriarchal relations, that is, the complete subordination of all family members to the will of the head of the family, remain dominant. The degraded and unequal position of women is also evident at the state level. For equal work with a man, a woman receives less compensation.
In fact, the division of Japanese society into castes remains. Caste occupies a humiliated, inferior position in society burakumin, or this. About 3 million people belong to it in Japan. They live in special settlements (numbering up to 600). Burakumin are people of the so-called “vile professions” - scavengers, tanners, buffoons, etc. Officially, they have equal rights with the rest of the Japanese, but in practice their discrimination continues.
Marriages between Burakumin and other Japanese people are frowned upon by society. It is much more difficult for the Burakumin than other representatives of Japanese society to obtain an education. Access to highly skilled labor in modern conditions, when all production is based on high technology, is practically closed to them.
The needs of the modern economy influence the formation of the education system. In Japan, nine years of secondary education is compulsory.
Beliefs. The religious situation in a country where two religions coexist simultaneously is also not entirely normal. The first one is Shintoism (Shinto in Japanese - “path of the gods”) - worship of the solar goddess Amaterasu and veneration of her “descendants” - members of the imperial family. Until the end of World War II, Shintoism was considered the state religion, or more precisely, an ideology obligatory for all Japanese (in this case, a person’s belonging to another religion did not matter). The second religion with many followers is Buddhism. In everyday, everyday practice, these religions peacefully “divided” spheres of influence among themselves. Buddhism is in charge of funeral rites, and Shintoism is in charge of the everyday religious practice of the Japanese, many of whom are spontaneous atheists.
Today in Japan, modern technologies, which have put the country among the leading industrial powers in the world, and conservative family life, rooted in the past, are intertwined in a very complex way. Modern Japanese follow a double standard of behavior: in production it is, so to speak, “modernity”, in everyday life it is “tradition”. This is typical not only for the Japanese living in the Land of the Rising Sun (as Japan is sometimes called), but also for their fellow countrymen - ethnic Japanese who have settled in other countries of the world. True, in the latter case, traditional features are to a greater extent inferior to innovations.
POPULATION OF KOREA
Koreans(68 million people) - one of the most ancient peoples of the Eurasian continent. They live on the Korean Peninsula, an area that is one of the most densely populated areas on the globe (average population density of about 250 people per km 2). Many Koreans left their country at different times in search of a better life. More than 4 million Koreans now live outside of Korea.
People appeared on the Korean Peninsula in ancient times - in the Early Paleolithic. According to archaeological data, it is known that even a thousand years before our era, the ancestors of the Koreans knew agriculture and cattle breeding, in particular, they bred horses. Already in the VII-II centuries. BC e. A slave-owning state was formed on Korean territory. The consolidation (unification) of disparate ancient Korean tribes into a nation was completed by the 7th century. n. e. Probably from now on we can talk about a single Korean language. Until recently, the language of the Koreans was considered isolated, that is, not included in any of the language families, but recent research by linguists has revealed evidence of the relationship of the Korean language with the languages of the Altai family. In the 7th century AD the Korean writing system appeared I'm coming. It used Chinese characters. In the 15th century n. e. Korean phonetic writing was created. Its alphabet originally consisted of twenty letters, in our time their number has increased to forty. Hieroglyphs are used as an auxiliary method of writing (mostly in scientific literature). The written heritage written in Korean is very extensive. Koreans already in the 11th century. They knew woodblock printing well.
Traditional Korean farming- irrigated agriculture. The technique of tillage (using cattle for draft power and planting rice seedlings in beds) indicates close economic ties with Southeast Asia.
The main agricultural crop was and remains rice. The population of the northern part of the peninsula, where the climate is cooler, is largely engaged in the cultivation of soybeans, wheat and corn.
Korean agriculture still relies heavily on human muscle power. First of all, this applies to the supply of water to the fields. The water-lifting wheels are driven by people; mechanisms are used to a limited extent.
In addition to agriculture, fishing occupies a large place in the Korean economy, especially coastal fishing and at the mouths of large rivers. The abundance of small coastal islands creates good conditions for fishing - both alone and in small teams. Among Koreans, there is a profession for women - divers for sea shellfish, which are delicacies in Korean cuisine.
Until recently, the inhabitants of the mountains were mainly engaged in hunting and collecting wild useful herbs. In general, plant foods and seafood predominate in the Korean diet. Koreans eat many different soy seasonings, including many spicy ones seasoned with pepper. But they do not consume milk or dairy products and drink little tea.
Since ancient times, the products of Korean artisans have been famous. In 770 AD e. Korean metallurgists cast a giant bell for a Buddhist temple. Its diameter reached 2.3 m and height - 3 m. Korean craftsmen have mastered methods of inlaying metal products with semi-precious stones and colored enamel. Already in the 16th century. In Korea, warships were built with hulls lined with copper sheets. Weaving, papermaking, and pottery reached a high level of development. Korean porcelain was of very high quality, which, however, is highly valued all over the world today.
Koreans have settled along rivers since ancient times. Most Korean cities are located at river mouths. Cities grew up on the sites of medieval fortresses that blocked the entrance to the valleys. About high art
Korean builders are evidenced by the defensive wall that closes the entrance to the peninsula. It was built in the 10th century. against the raids of the troops of the Khitan people. Its length reached 500 km.
Koreans have achieved great perfection in the construction of houses. Their traditional frame houses have an important feature - heated floors ( ondol.), arranged on the principle of the Chinese kan. The entire life of a Korean family - sleeping, eating, various activities - is spent on ondol. A fireplace with a boiler for cooking and heating water is done separately from the ondol firebox in the kitchen. There is not much furniture in a Korean house. Small light tables for eating remain a mandatory part of home “equipment”. They are served with the meal and removed at the end.
Koreans profess Buddhism, which penetrated into China in the 4th-7th centuries. n. e. In addition to Buddhism, the cult of ancestors, performed according to Confucian rituals, is widespread in the country. In the 20th century Christian missionaries intensified their activities.
Assessing the contribution to world civilization of the peoples living in Central and East Asia, one should say that it is very great. Here a different formation has developed from other parts of the ecumene. cultural area(regional civilization). From ancient times to the 19th century. Here the Chinese cultural tradition dominated, which largely determined the cultural appearance of the neighboring countries. The impact of the East Asian cultural complex on the peoples of Southeast and Central Asia is very strong. The influence of the population of this region on world events is constantly increasing due to the powerful technological growth of the industry, banking capital and demographic potential, which makes up a quarter of the planet's population. The role of Central and East Asia in the cultural life of the world is great and will continue to grow.
SP. Polyakov