Routledge Dictionary of Language and Linguistics
Research on the South American languages started in the sixteenth century (primarily grammatical descriptions by Spanish and Portuguese missionaries); today the knowledge of individual languages and the reconstruction of language families still has some gaps. Since numerous languages have various names, the exact number of languages in this group is still unknown; usual estimates range from 550 to 2000 with about 11 million speakers (before colonization). Today a large number of languages are either dead or dying out. An important first work on the classification of these languages was undertaken by F.S.Gilij (1782); more recent classifications by Loukotka (latest 1968, with 108 language families), Greenberg (1956; four families with considerable deviation in details), and Suarez (1974, 1982; 82 families). Greenberg (1987) believes that all South American languages as well as the Central American and most North American languages belong to one language group, Amer-indian.
References
Derbyshire, D.C. and G.K.Pullum (eds) 1986–8. Handbook of Amazonian languages, 2 vols. Berlin.
Gilij, F.S. 1780–84. Saggio di storia americana o sia storia naturale, civile e sacra, de’ regni e delle provincie spagnuole de terra ferma nell’ America Meridionale. 4 vols. Rome.
Greenberg, J. 1960. The general classification of Central and South American languages. In: A.
Wallace, (ed.) Selected Papers of the Fifth International Congress of Anthropological and Ethnological Sciences. 791–794. Philadelphia.
——1987. Language in the Americas. Stanford, CA.
Key, M.R. 1979. The grouping of South American Indian languages. Tübingen.
Klein, H.E.M. and L.R.Stark. 1985. South American Indian languages: retrospect and prospect. Austin, TX.
Loukotka, Č. 1968. Classification of South American Indian languages. Los Angeles, CA.
Sebeok, T.A. 1977. Native languages of the Americas. New York.
Suarez, B. 1974. South American Indian Languages. Encyclopaedia Britannica. 792–9.
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