Macrosocial Regularities of Language Evolution

The aim of the article is to unite into a single conceptual whole studies of glottogenesis as the origin and early evolution of languages during the formation of Homo Sapiens and in preliterate epochs of prehistory, studies of the political evolution of tribes, chiefdoms, polities, studies of the formation of states, empires, world-economies, civilizational analysis, historical sociolinguistics, reconstruction of proto-languages - areas of research that are very heterogeneous and still almost isolated from each other. The main difficulty of the approach is the lack of direct data (empirical material) about linguistic evolution in the preliterate era. Therefore, the construction of a holistic picture of linguistic evolution is forced to rely on general macrosocial patterns, ethnographic analogies, and their comparison with indirect data from such areas as paleoclimatology, paleogeography, archeology, sociolinguistics. Not so much the conclusions as the most probable scenarios and patterns of global linguistic evolution are reconstructed on these foundations as follows. The African “cauldron of sapientation” up to 80-70 thousand years ago functioned thanks to the interaction of many groups of hominids and strict selection between them. The effect of the “volcanic winter” catastrophe approximately 74 thousand years ago led to depopulation as a result of which groups and alliances of early Sapiens (about 200 linguistic communities) with the highest level of cognitive abilities survived in Africa. This level was distinguished by the already fully developed languages, with which the Sapiens began to settle in Eurasia, on other continents, on the islands of Oceania. Probably, these ancient languages became the progenitors of all languages known today, traditionally united in 150-200 language families. It is shown that the further evolution of languages was closely associated with the political evolution according to Robert Carneiro (from villages and chiefdoms to states and empires). More or less well-known features of the societies and languages of North American Indians are used as an analogy for the social and linguistic evolution of the Sapiens in Eurasia. A summary of the known patterns of linguistic changes due to geopolitical, geocultural and geoeconomic shifts, as well as in connection with social dynamics within societies is presented. The main roles were played by conquests, resettlements, military-political alliances, religious and trade relations, and marriage policy. In societies, languages are influenced in a certain way by shifts in class and estate structure, in interethnic relations. Particular attention is paid to the transition to writing. Mastering writing has always been a creative process in which heterogeneous elements of the linguistic environment were used. Partly because of the prevailing political and cultural configuration, partly because of random and subjective factors, one or another language option was chosen, or, most likely, it was some kind of a compromise from the available options. It is this compromise variant that became the official national language, while the rest (previously equated to it) variants remained in the status of dialects.

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