[ExI] SF books taught in college classes

[Dan TheBookMan]

On Mar 4, 2021, at 9:45 AM, Anton Sherwood via extropy-chat <extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
> On 2021-3-04 09:09, Dan TheBookMan via extropy-chat wrote:
>> There are a bunch of click languages — most in Africa (Khoisan family, I think) and a few outside (mainly in Australia, so probably going extinct if not already extinct). I seem to recall someone positing that click consonants are evolutionarily basal. In other words, that they’re among the first phonemes humans or human ancestors used. I’m not sure if this view holds sway in the field.
> 
> Hm.  Their speakers are extreme outliers on the great family tree.  So humanity split early on into click-keepers, who settled in southern Africa, and click-droppers, who spread throughout the world?
> 
> (Not counting some neighboring Bantu languages that also use clicks, like Xhosa.  Perhaps their speakers are descended from clickers who were absorbed by the Bantu expansion.)
> 
> The Australian click language is a ceremonial or "taboo" language, used in special contexts and considered by linguists to be artificial, a bit like pig latin.
> 
> (Attach "I've read somewhere" to every statement of fact here.)

That’s about the size of it. A problem I see is it click consonants are basal, why don’t they arise again and again? Why would they drop away save for a few outliers? My non-expert view is just that click consonants are one of a huge menu of phonological options. I’d go for the most widely used (among language families) is likely basal, but that’s just me playing cladist here.

As for your parenthetic comment, I would include stuff I heard somewhere. A lot of linguistics stuff I’ve heard. I listen to lectures on it and also used to be in contact with a linguistics professor.

Regards,

Dan