Possible Khoe contact with Afroasiatic languages: systematic click-sibilant correspondences

Genetic evidence (Pickrell et al. 2014; Breton et al. 2014) points to partial Khoe ancestry from Eastern Africa within the past two millennia. The recency of this migration points towards potential linguistic influence on Khoe languages by those in the Eastern African area, such as Afroasiatic languages. This research aims to uncover possible sound correspondences between Proto-Khoe reconstructions (Vossen 1997) and various Afro-Asiatic reconstructions (Ehret 1995, Orel & Stolbova 1995, Bender 2020). Ongoing findings are a correspondence between Afro-Asiatic #C1-V-C2 to Proto-Khoe #C1-C2-V, and a click-sibilant correspondence on C1 where *s corresponds with Proto-Khoe *|, and where the identity of Afro-asiatic *C2 predicts the click accompaniments of Proto-Khoe. Several other possible click-sibilant correspondences will be presented.Note: This talk has not gone through a process of peer review, and findings should therefore be treated as preliminary and subject to change. Acknowledgement and citation: Schwab, Andre. 2021. Possible Khoe contact with Afroasiatic languages. Talk given at the Rift Valley Network Webinar Series. 06/10/2021