BibTeX

@article{rama-2013-phonotactic-175455,
	title        = {Phonotactic diversity predicts the time depth of the world's language families},
	abstract     = {The ASJP (Automated Similarity Judgment Program) described an automated, lexical similarity-based method for dating the world’s language groups using 52 archaeological, epigraphic and historical calibration date points. The present paper describes a new automated dating method, based on phonotactic diversity. Unlike ASJP, our method does not require any information on the internal classification of a language group. Also, the method can use all the available word lists for a language and its dialects eschewing the debate on ‘language’ vs. ‘dialect’. We further combine these dates and provide a new baseline which, to our knowledge, is the best one. We make a systematic comparison of our method, ASJP’s dating procedure, and combined dates. We predict time depths for world’s language families and sub-families using this new baseline. Finally, we explain our results in the model of language change given by Nettle.},
	journal      = {PLoS ONE},
	author       = {Rama, Taraka},
	year         = {2013},
	volume       = {8},
	number       = {5},
	pages        = {e63238},
}