Project description
Reconstructing the past of the Near East indigenous communities
For millennia, Jewish and Christian minorities with their own unique Aramaic traditions have coexisted alongside mainly Iranian speech communities. But the origin and development of this cultural-linguistic mosaic remain a mystery due to superimposed nationalism and scarcity of historical records. The ERC-funded ALHOME project will reconstruct the composite socioreligious past of the disappearing indigenous communities from the first millennium BC well into the Islamic period. The project will study social interrelations and use linguistic evidence from the history of Jewish, Christian and Kurdish communities as well as the recently enhanced database of spoken Neo-Aramaic languages.
Objective
Mesopotamia is the home of remarkably diverse ethnoreligious and linguistic microcommunities with historical roots in the ancient Near East. Jewish and Christian minorities with their own unique Ara-maic traditions have co-existed alongside mainly Iranian speech communities for millennia. Today the origin and development of this rich cultural-linguistic mosaic remains elusive due to superimposed nationalisms and paucity of historical records. ALHOME aims to reconstruct the complex, socioreligious past of the disappearing indigenous communities who were once more widespread across West Asian from the first millennium BC well into the Islamic period. Studying their genetic and social interrelations through their linguistic traditions will radically change our ideas about their origins. Using linguistic evidence hitherto untapped for this aim, we can untangle the intertwined his-tories of Jewish, Christian and Kurdish (i.e. Iranian) communities. This evidence comes from the recently richly enhanced database of spoken Neo-Aramaic languages which stretch back 3,000 years. This promises to mark a sea change in linguistic studies which have focused on the documentation of endangered languages as well as in sociological studies that have focused on the historical context giving rise to nationalisms. For the first time an interdisciplinary team of both Aramaic and Iranian specialists and computational linguists will study the interactions between two speech communities. We will apply groundbreaking quantitative, phylogenetic models to unearth relations between speech communities over millennia. Studying this period of multiculturalism and multilingualism of virtually unparalleled duration promises to challenge existing models of contact. Aramaic-Iranian exchanges fit into models based neither purely on linguistic-cultural prestige nor on agentivity of a single language. Thus ALHOME will have major implications for our understanding of areal convergence and contact.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
This project's classification has been human-validated.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
This project's classification has been human-validated.
Keywords
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
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H2020-EU.1.1. - EXCELLENT SCIENCE - European Research Council (ERC)
MAIN PROGRAMME
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Topic(s)
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Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Funding Scheme
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
ERC-ADG - Advanced Grant
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Call for proposal
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
(opens in new window) ERC-2020-ADG
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Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.
CB2 1TN CAMBRIDGE
United Kingdom
The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.