In the mid-twentieth century, historical linguists widely accepted that the Indo-European languages spread primarily through rapid, militaristic conquests. To challenge this conventional model, archaeologist Colin Renfrew proposed the Anatolian hypothesis, which linked language dispersal to the gradual expansion of early agricultural practices. By framing the spread as a peaceful, demographic byproduct of farming rather than sudden warfare, Renfrew shifted the scholarly focus from archaeological evidence of weapons to pollen records indicating forest clearing. Although later genetic studies have partially vindicated the migration of steppe pastoralists, Renfrew's work fundamentally restructured how researchers evaluate the relationship between material culture and language transition.
Which choice best describes the function of the underlined sentence in the text as a whole?
- AIt summarizes the final resolution of the academic debate detailed across the entire passage.
- BIt provides empirical evidence of agricultural changes to disprove the military conquest model.
- It introduces a competing hypothesis to challenge the conventional viewpoint presented in the opening sentence.Answer
- DIt suggests that historical linguists have now completely abandoned the military conquest theory.