On the Relationship Between the Austroasiatic and Austronesian Languages in Southeast Asia

Abstract

Currently, in the taxonomy of Southeast Asian languages, there exist two different explanations for the relationship among Austroasiaticand Austronesian languages. As have been known, the Austroasiatic and Austronesian languages have phonetical and lexical correspondence. However, whether this is borrowing or inheritance relationship has long been an issue of controversy, because plausible evidence to these points ofview is still unavailable. In this paper, equivalent data from basic vocabulary between the Việt Mường disyllabic/sesquisyllable languages (e.g. Arem, Ma Lieng, Sach, Ruc, Aheu of the Mon-Khmer in the Austroasiatic family) and the Chamic language are carefully investigated. Despite the shared basic vocabulary, this kind of equivalence lends further weight to the view that preference is given to the borrowing relationship. For that reason, these lexical resemblances are of a restricted range which supports the viewpoint of a specially borrowedrelationship between the two language families.