Out of India Theory - Linguistics

Linguistics

See also linguistics or historical linguistics.

According to Bryant (2001:75), OIT proponents tend to be linguistic dilettantes who either ignore the linguistic evidence completely, dismiss it as highly speculative and inconclusive (e.g. Chakrabarti 1995 and Rajaram 1995, as cited in Bryant 2001:74, or attempt to tackle it with hopelessly inadequate qualifications; this attitude and neglect significantly minimizes the value of most OIT publications.

Talageri (2000) and Kazanas (2002) have adapted the language dispersal model proposed by Johanna Nichols (in Blench & Spriggs 1997) to support OIT by moving Nichols' proposed Indo-European point of origin from Bactria-Sogdiana to India. These ideas have not been accepted in mainstream linguistics.

Elst (1999) argues that it is altogether more likely that the Urheimat was in satem territory. The alternative from the angle of an Indian Urheimat theory (IUT) would be that India had originally had the centum form, that the dialects which first emigrated (Hittite, Italo-Celtic, Germanic, Tokharic) retained the centum form and took it to the geographical borderlands of the IE expanse (Europe, Anatolia, China), while the dialects which emigrated later (Baltic, Thracian, Phrygian) were at a halfway stage and the last-emigrated dialects (Slavic, Armenian, Iranian) plus the staybehind Indo-Aryan languages had adopted the satem form. This would satisfy the claim of the so-called Lateral Theory that the most conservative forms are to be found at the outskirts rather than in the metropolis.