This paper re-examines the linguistic relationship among the five major language stocks of East Asia: Sino-Tibetan, Austronesian, Austroasiatic, Kra-Dai, and Miao-Yao. Various issues related to current macrophyletic proposals can be traced back to the influential hypotheses of the past century, namely, the Indo-Chinese hypothesis, Austric, and Austro-Tai. Discussions focused on the relationship between Tai and Chinese, between Tai and Austronesian, and on the position of Miao-Yao with respect to Sino-Tibetan and Austroasiatic. Basic vocabulary lists are adapted to test the competing hypotheses and to justify genetic versus contact relationships.