Abstract：
This paper examines the controversy that followed the 1987 publication of Joseph Greenberg\'s book, Language in the Americas, attending to the role of language and linguistic research within overlapping disciplinary traditions. With this text, Greenberg presented a macro-level tripartite classification that opposed then dominant fine-grained analyses recognizing anywhere from 150 to 200 distinct language families. His proposal was the subject of a landmark conference, examining strengths and weaknesses, the unpublished proceedings of which are presented here for the first time. For specialists in the anthropological and comparative-historical study of Indigenous American languages, Greenberg\'s intervention highlighted the tension between language, conceived as an abstract object of study, and languages, understood to be carriers of specific cultural knowledge. For physical anthropologists and archaeologists, his theory was initially fortuitous on programmatic, substantive, and methodological grounds. The essay will show how interdisciplinary appeals were figured by supporters as a virtue, and by critics as a vice. The essay further highlights ethical reasons for integrating historical narratives of science and the humanities.
摘要：
本文考察了1987年约瑟夫·格林伯格的书出版后的争议，美洲的语言,参与语言和语言研究在重叠的学科传统中的作用。有了这个文本，格林伯格提出了一个宏观层面的三方分类，反对当时占主导地位的细粒度分析，识别150到200个不同的语言家族。他的提议是一个具有里程碑意义的会议的主题，检查优点和缺点，未发表的会议记录是第一次在这里提出。对于美国土著语言的人类学和比较历史研究的专家来说，格林伯格的干预强调了语言之间的紧张关系，被认为是一个抽象的研究对象，和语言，被理解为特定文化知识的载体。对于物理人类学家和考古学家来说，他的理论最初是偶然的，实质性的，和方法论依据。这篇文章将展示支持者如何将跨学科的呼吁视为一种美德，被评论家视为恶习。本文进一步强调了整合科学和人文科学历史叙事的伦理原因。
