Talk:Māori language

Treatment of Austronesian languages

Looking at the language box I've created here, and thinking which groupings should have their own articles, and which ones should be subheadings of levels above. Austronesian and Polynesian should definitely have their own articles. Eastern Polynesian can probably have its own article. Oceanic and Nuclear Polynesian might have their own. Malayo-Polynesian probably wouldn't, and Tahitic almost certainly wouldn't.

Something of the history of the term "Malayo-Polynesian" is needed in the Austronesian article. Originally a name for the whole family, it was ousted in favour of "Austronesian". The Formosan languages were then considered as a sub-branch of the Indonesian branch. When it was realised that the Formosan languages comprised several distinct branches of Austronesian that were co-ordinate with all the rest as a group, "Malayo-Polynesian" was reinstated as a name for the non-Formosan branch.

I understand there is a question over the Nuclear Polynesian classification, which groups Samoic-Outlier with Eastern Polynesian. I believe some scholars prefer to group Western Polynesian and Samoic-Outlier together, while others treat all three branches as distinct. The last option may simply be non-commitment to choosing either of the other options. There is a parallel here to the situation of the Celtic languages (leaving aside Celtiberian), where some group the Gaelic and British branches together as insular Celtic, while others group British and Continental together (the p-Celtic languages). Neil Copeland 11:56, 30 January 2010 (UTC)