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Free Animated Linguistics Diagrams

Language families, phonetics, change. The shapes of language.

21 live For: Linguistics blogs · Language-learning sites · Linguists · Educators

For linguistics bloggers, language-learning sites, and educators. Language family trees, the IPA chart, language change S-curves, Zipf distributions, vowel space charts, sound shifts.

What this is: Free, embeddable, animated diagrams covering linguistics topics (language families, phonetics & phonology, language change).
Who uses it: Linguistics blogs · Language-learning sites · Linguists · Educators
How to embed: Copy one line of HTML per diagram. No signup. No watermark. Works in WordPress, Webflow, Ghost, Substack, plain HTML.
Diagrams in this category: 21 live (total in catalog: 21).
License: Free forever. The diagram and editorial explainer text are served from scrollchart.com so they can be updated over time to reflect new research.
URL: scrollchart.com/categories/linguistics

Highlights

What you will find here

Families: Indo-European, Sino-Tibetan, Afroasiatic
Phonetics: IPA chart, vowel space, articulation
Change: S-curves of innovation, sound shifts, borrowing

Sub-categories

3 topic areas in Linguistics

Language families

IE, Sino-Tibetan, Afroasiatic, Niger-Congo trees.

8 live

Phonetics & phonology

IPA chart, vowel space, articulation, consonant typology.

8 live

Language change

S-curves of innovation, sound shifts, borrowing, Zipf.

5 live

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Browse Linguistics diagrams

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Language families 8 live

IE, Sino-Tibetan, Afroasiatic, Niger-Congo trees.

Linguistics Medium

Indo-European Family Tree

From Proto-Indo-European to modern languages - branches and major sub-branches.

Linguistics Medium

World Language Families Map

IE, Sino-Tibetan, Niger-Congo, Afroasiatic, Austronesian - the major families and where they spread.

Linguistics Medium

Sino-Tibetan Family Tree

Chinese (Mandarin, Cantonese, Wu) and Tibeto-Burman branches.

Linguistics Medium

Afroasiatic Family Tree

Semitic, Cushitic, Berber, Chadic, Egyptian - the cradle-of-civilization family.

Linguistics Simple

Language Isolates

Basque, Korean, Japanese, Ainu, Burushaski - languages with no proven relatives.

Linguistics Medium

Austronesian Spread

From Taiwan to Madagascar to Easter Island - the most geographically spread family.

Linguistics Medium

Niger-Congo Family

The largest African family - over 1,500 languages, dominated by Bantu spread.

Linguistics Simple

Speakers by Language

Mandarin, Spanish, English, Hindi, Arabic - the top languages by speaker count.

Phonetics & phonology 8 live

IPA chart, vowel space, articulation, consonant typology.

Linguistics Medium

IPA Consonant Chart

Place x manner of articulation - the universal phonetic alphabet for consonants.

Linguistics Medium

IPA Vowel Space

Tongue height x backness - the trapezoid map of vowel articulation.

Linguistics Simple

Articulation Anatomy

Lips, teeth, alveolar ridge, palate, velum, pharynx - the speech-organ map.

Linguistics Medium

Phonemes vs Allophones

Same phoneme, different surface forms - aspirated vs unaspirated /p/ in English.

Linguistics Medium

Tone Systems

Mandarin's four tones, Vietnamese's six, Cantonese's six - pitch as phoneme.

Linguistics Simple

Syllable Structure

Onset, nucleus, coda - the universal syllable template with language-specific constraints.

Linguistics Simple

Minimal Pairs

Words differing in one phoneme - the test for phonemic contrast.

Linguistics Medium

Spectrogram Basics

Frequency vs time vs intensity - acoustic fingerprint of speech.

Language change 5 live

S-curves of innovation, sound shifts, borrowing, Zipf.

Linguistics Medium

S-Curve of Language Change

New variants spread slowly, then rapidly, then plateau - the universal shape of innovation.

Linguistics Medium

The Great Vowel Shift

English long vowels rotated through the vowel space between 1400 and 1700 - why spelling diverged from sound.

Linguistics Medium

Types of Sound Change

Lenition, fortition, assimilation, dissimilation, deletion, epenthesis - the toolkit of phonological evolution.

Linguistics Medium

Zipf's Law

Word frequency vs rank is roughly 1/r - the most-frequent word appears twice as often as the second.

Linguistics Medium

Grimm's Law

Proto-Indo-European stops shifted systematically into Germanic - p->f, t->th, k->h.

FAQ

Common questions about Linguistics diagrams

Where can I get free animated linguistics diagrams for my website?

Scrollchart is a free library of animated, embeddable diagrams. The Linguistics section covers the most common concepts and frameworks in the field. Each diagram embeds with one line of HTML, no account required, no watermark.

How do I embed a free animated linguistics diagram in WordPress?

Copy the embed snippet from the diagram page on Scrollchart and paste it into a custom HTML block in your WordPress editor. The diagram loads automatically and scroll-paints into view. No plugin or API key needed.

Is there a free library of animated linguistics diagrams I can embed without coding?

Scrollchart provides ready-to-embed animated diagrams across linguistics and 35 other categories. The embed is a single line of HTML that works in any CMS, including WordPress, Webflow, Ghost, Substack, and plain HTML pages.

Do Scrollchart linguistics diagrams include explanatory text?

Yes. Each diagram ships with a tabbed explainer panel covering what the diagram shows, the research behind it, and how to interpret it. The text is served from scrollchart.com and rendered directly in your page's DOM so it is indexed by search engines.

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