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The Classification of Languages
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... I AM NOT speaking here of genealogical classification, that is, of the attempts at a scientific and hypothetical reconstruction of the historical divergences and interaction of “cognate” languages, but of the so-called morphological classification of all languages, without regard to their actual kinship.
Nonetheless, I cannot help saying a few words about genealogical classification as well.
I give, of course, decided preference to the so-called wave theory over the “tree theory/’ although I must confess that even the “wave theory” leaves me with the impression that it approaches language apart from man, as something made up of wood or water, or suspended in the air. One salient fact is generally ignored in this approach, namely, that languages do not exist by themselves, but only in individuals who possess, along with other knowledge, the knowledge of one or more languages, which embody a specific type (or types) of linguistic thought. Linguistic intercourse consists in the fact that the members of a given speech community {Genossenschaft) communicate with each other by means of their speech organs and corresponding acoustic impressions1 which are associated with and evoke the linguistic concepts present in the mind of the speakers. This being the case, we can only conclude that the currently accepted “wave theory” pays insufficient attention to the following irrefutable phenomena:
1) The uninterrupted interpénétration and mixture of linguistic thought of various, including individual, languages. This mixture is, on the one hand, a consequence of linguistic intercourse in general and, on the other hand, of the fact that the human brain is capable of combining linguistic thought of more than one language, or more simply speaking, of mastering more than one language. Multilingual thinking exerts an influence in various directions;
2) Changes of habitat, the consequence of nomadic life, which bring about a dislocation of the so-called languages or, to be more precise, of the speakers of these languages. . . .
NOTES
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1. In written language we are concerned on the one hand with manual activity which is implemented in the physical world, and on the other hand with optical impressions.