The comparative method is a way to compare two or more things in order to find out what they have in common and how they are different. The comparative method can be used to compare anything, from countries to companies, from people to products.
When using the comparative method, it is important to first choose a metric by which to compare the things you are interested in. This metric could be anything, from GDP to life expectancy, from market share to customer satisfaction. Once you have chosen a metric, you can then start to compare the things you are interested in.
The comparative method is a powerful tool that can be used to find out a lot of information about the things you are interested in. However, it is important to remember that the comparative method is not perfect. There are always going to be some limitations when using this method. For example, it can be difficult to compare two things that are very different from each other. Additionally, the comparative method can only give you a snapshot of what is happening at a specific moment in time. things can always change, so it is important to keep this in mind when using the comparative method.
Despite its limitations, the comparative method is still a valuable tool that can be used to learn a lot about the things you are interested in. If you are looking for a way to compare two or more things, the comparative method is definitely something you should consider.
In linguistics, the comparative method is a technique for studying the development of languages by performing a feature-by-feature comparison of two or more languages with common descent from a shared ancestor, as opposed to the method of internal reconstruction, which analyses the internal development of a single language over time.
Ordinarily both methods are used together to reconstruct prehistoric phases of languages, to fill in gaps in the historical record of a language, to discover the development of phonological, morphological, and other linguistic systems, and to confirm or refute hypothesized relationships between languages.
The comparative method was developed over the 19th century. Key contributions were made by the Danish scholars Rasmus Rask and Karl Verner and the German scholar Jacob Grimm. The first linguist to offer reconstructed forms from a proto-language was August Schleicher, in his Compendium der vergleichenden Grammatik der indogermanischen Sprachen, originally published in 1861. Here is Schleicher’s explanation of why he offered reconstructed forms: In the present work an attempt is made to set forth the inferred Indo-European original language side by side with its really existent derived languages. Besides the advantages offered by such a plan, in setting immediately before the eyes of the student the final results of the investigation in a more concrete form, and thereby rendering easier his insight into the nature of particular Indo-European languages, there is, I think, another of no less importance gained by it, namely that it shows the baselessness of the assumption that the non-Indian Indo-European languages were derived from Old-Indian (Sanskrit).