Borean languages is a hypothetical language family proposed by Sergei Starostin that would include most languages of Eurasia, North Africa, Southeast Asia, and some or all of the Americas. It is named after the Northern Hemisphere (Boreal). This is a smaller proposal than Proto-World, but larger than Nostratic or Eurasiatic. Most notably, Borean would include Sino-Caucasian and therefore the Chinese language, and Austric which encompasses the other languages of South China and Southeast Asia, neither of which have been included in any of the Nostratic or Eurasiatic proposals. Dr. Sergei Anatolyevich Starostin (b. ... Insert non-formatted text here The Northern Hemisphere is the half of a planets surface (or celestial sphere) that is north of the equator (the word hemisphere literally means half ball). On the Earth, the Northern Hemisphere contains most of the land and population. ... Boreal may refer to these: Northern from the eponymous Boreas, god of the North Wind in Greek mythology. ... It has been suggested that Ur language be merged into this article or section. ... Nostratic is a highly controversial language super-family that putatively links many Eurasian language families. ... The Eurasiatic languages are a hypotetical language group from which allegedly descend several language families of Europe and Asia, including Indo-European languages, Uralic and Altaic. ... The Dene-Caucasian (also called Sino-Dene) language family is a conjectural macrofamily containing the Sino-Tibetan, North Caucasian, Yenisseian, Burushaski and Na-Dene languages. ... Chinese (written) language (pinyin: zhōngw n) written in Chinese characters The Chinese language (汉语/漢語, 华语/華語, or 中文; Pinyin: H nyǔ, Hu yǔ, or Zhōngw n) is a member of the Sino-Tibetan family of languages. ... The Austric language superfamily is a large theoretical grouping of languages primarily spoken in South East Asia and the Pacific. ...

Nikita Krougly takes credit for suggesting the name in 2000, while George Starostin expresses the reservation that the name would imply a prejudgement that the Eurasian macrofamilies Nostratic, Sino-Caucasian, Afroasiatic and Austric are more closely related to each other than to the African families Nilo-Saharan and Niger-Congo. [1] Georgiy Sergeevich Starostin, (Russian: , born July 4, 1976) is a linguistics researcher, head of the Sinology Department of the Institute of Oriental Cultures at the Russian State University for the Humanities, where he also teaches. ... Nostratic is a highly controversial language super-family that putatively links many Eurasian language families. ... The Dene-Caucasian (also called Sino-Dene) language family is a conjectural macrofamily containing the Sino-Tibetan, North Caucasian, Yenisseian, Burushaski and Na-Dene languages. ... Map showing the distribution of Afro-Asiatic languages The Afro-Asiatic languages are a language family of about 240 languages and 285 million people widespread throughout North Africa, East Africa, the Sahel, and Southwest Asia. ... The Austric language superfamily is a large theoretical grouping of languages primarily spoken in South East Asia and the Pacific. ... Map showing the distribution of the Nilo-Saharan languages. ... Map showing the distribution of Niger-Congo languages The Niger-Congo languages constitute one of the worlds major language families, and Africas largest in terms of geographical area, number of speakers, and number of distinct languages. ...

External links

• Borean tree diagram
• Description of database of so-called "Borean" etymologies
• Database of long-range etymologies
• Afrasian and Its Closest Relatives: the Borean Hypothesis

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