Were the typical unanalyzable word of the language truly a pure concept-word [...] instead of being of a strangely transitional type [...], our 'sing' and 'work' [...] and thousands of others would compare with the genuine radical words of numerous other languages.
- Sapir (1921), a pag.28

There is something irresistible about a method of classification that starts with two poles, exemplified, say, by Chinese and Latin, clusters what it conveniently can about these poles, and throws everything else into a 'transitional type.'
- Sapir (1921), a pag.123