The End of the Altaic Controversy

Alexander Vovin's The End of the Altaic Controversy, published in the Central Asiatic Journal in 2005, is a peer-reviewed review article examining the Etymological Dictionary of the Altaic Languages by Starostin, Dybo and Mudrak, arguing that the shared vocabulary it assembles across Turkic, Mongolic, Tungusic, Korean and Japanese reflects historical language contact rather than common descent from a single Altaic ancestor language. Vovin was a specialist historical linguist in exactly this field, and the article rests on standard peer review and detailed comparative-linguistic argument. It represents the now-dominant position in historical linguistics that a genetic Altaic family is not established, though a handful of specialists continue to argue otherwise.