The Genesis of Grammar

The Genesis of Grammar
Author: Bernd Heine
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
Total Pages: 437
Release: 2007-10-04
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 0199227764

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This book reconstructs what the earliest grammars might have been and shows how they could have led to the languages of modern humankind. It considers whether these languages derive from a single ancestral language; what the structure of language was when it first evolved; and how the properties associated with modern human languages first arose.

Grammatical Borrowing in Cross-Linguistic Perspective

Grammatical Borrowing in Cross-Linguistic Perspective
Author: Yaron Matras
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter
Total Pages: 609
Release: 2008-08-27
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 311019919X

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The book contains 30 descriptive chapters dealing with a specific language contact situation. The chapters follow a uniform organisation format, being the narrative version of a standard comprehensive questionnaire previously distributed to all authors. The questionnaire targets systematically the possibility of contact influence / grammatical borrowing in a full range of categories. The uniform structure facilitates a comparison among the chapters and the languages covered. The introduction describes the setup of the questionnaire and the methodology of the approach, along with a survey of the difficulties of sampling in contact linguistics. Two evaluative chapters, each authored by one of the co-editors, draws general conclusions from the volume as a whole (one in relation to borrowed grammatical categories and meaningful hierarchies, the other in relation to the distribution of Matter and Pattern replication).

Phonological Typology

Phonological Typology
Author: Matthew Kelly Gordon
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 378
Release: 2016
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 0199669007

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This book provides an overview of phonological typology: the study of how sounds are distributed across the languages of the world and why they display these distributions and patterns. Matthew Gordon analyses cross-linguistic data from a range of sources to gain insight into the driving forces behind a variety of phonological phenomena.

Cross-Linguistic Variation and Efficiency

Cross-Linguistic Variation and Efficiency
Author: John A. Hawkins
Publisher:
Total Pages: 292
Release: 2014
Genre: Computers
ISBN: 0199664994

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This book argues that major patterns of variation across languages are structured by general principles of efficiency in language use and communication, an approach that has far-reaching theoretical consequences for issues such as ease of processing, language universals, complexity, and competing and cooperating principles.

Grammaticalization from a Typological Perspective

Grammaticalization from a Typological Perspective
Author: Heiko Narrog
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 448
Release: 2018-10-18
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 0192515357

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This volume explores the way in which grammaticalization processes - whereby lexical words eventually become markers of grammatical categories - converge and differ across various types of language. While grammaticalization at its core is a unidirectional phenomenon, in which the same pathways of change are replicated across languages, certain language types and language areas have distinct preferences with respect to what they grammaticalize and how. Previous work has principally addressed this question with specific reference to languages of Southeast and East Asia that do not seem to grammaticalize paradigms of categories in the same manner as Indo-European languages, or form extensive grammaticalization chains. This volume takes a broader approach and proceeds systematically area by area: specialists in the field address the processes of grammaticalization in languages of Africa, Europe, Asia and the Pacific, and the Americas, and in creole languages. The studies reveal a number of unique pathways of grammaticalization in each language area, as well as identifying the universal shared features of the phenomenon.

Sign Languages in Village Communities

Sign Languages in Village Communities
Author: Ulrike Zeshan
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter
Total Pages: 422
Release: 2012-10-30
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 1614511497

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The book is a unique collection of research on sign languages that have emerged in rural communities with a high incidence of, often hereditary, deafness. These sign languages represent the latest addition to the comparative investigation of languages in the gestural modality, and the book is the first compilation of a substantial number of different "village sign languages".Written by leading experts in the field, the volume uniquely combines anthropological and linguistic insights, looking at both the social dynamics and the linguistic structures in these village communities. The book includes primary data from eleven different signing communities across the world, including results from Jamaica, India, Turkey, Thailand, and Bali. All known village sign languages are endangered, usually because of pressure from larger urban sign languages, and some have died out already. Ironically, it is often the success of the larger sign language communities in urban centres, their recognition and subsequent spread, which leads to the endangerment of these small minority sign languages. The book addresses this specific type of language endangerment, documentation strategies, and other ethical issues pertaining to these sign languages on the basis of first-hand experiences by Deaf fieldworkers.

Concise Encyclopedia of Languages of the World

Concise Encyclopedia of Languages of the World
Author:
Publisher: Elsevier
Total Pages: 1320
Release: 2010-04-06
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 0080877753

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Concise Encyclopedia of Languages of the World is an authoritative single-volume reference resource comprehensively describing the major languages and language families of the world. It will provide full descriptions of the phonology, semantics, morphology, and syntax of the world’s major languages, giving insights into their structure, history and development, sounds, meaning, structure, and language family, thereby both highlighting their diversity for comparative study, and contextualizing them according to their genetic relationships and regional distribution. Based on the highly acclaimed and award-winning Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics, this volume will provide an edited collection of almost 400 articles throughout which a representative subset of the world's major languages are unfolded and explained in up-to-date terminology and authoritative interpretation, by the leading scholars in linguistics. In highlighting the diversity of the world’s languages — from the thriving to the endangered and extinct — this work will be the first point of call to any language expert interested in this huge area. No other single volume will match the extent of language coverage or the authority of the contributors of Concise Encyclopedia of Languages of the World. Extraordinary breadth of coverage: a comprehensive selection of just under 400 articles covering the world's major languages, language families, and classification structures, issues and dispute Peerless quality: based on 20 years of academic development on two editions of the leading reference resource in linguistics, Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics Unique authorship: 350 of the world's leading experts brought together for one purpose Exceptional editorial selection, review and validation process: Keith Brown and Sarah Ogilvie act as first-tier guarantors for article quality and coverage Compact and affordable: one-volume format makes this suitable for personal study at any institution interested in areal, descriptive, or comparative language study - and at a fraction of the cost of the full encyclopedia

A Typological Study of the Existential Clause

A Typological Study of the Existential Clause
Author: Wang Yong
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Total Pages: 209
Release: 2024-06-21
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 1040051359

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This book investigates the existential clause (EC) from a cross-linguistic perspective and within the framework of Systemic Functional Linguistics. The prototypical EC in the less familiar languages is identified through its functional equivalents in the more familiar ones, which share the common semantic basis of ‘there exists something in some location’. Topics addressed include the morpho-syntactic features of the EC, the subject of the EC, the definiteness effect and its manifestations in the EC, the EC as impersonals, the distinction between entity- vs. event-existentials, and the EC and its related constructions. Drawing on both cross-linguistic observations based on the language sample and in-depth investigations in particular languages (e.g., in Chinese and English), the study aims to unravel how the lexico-grammar of EC is related to its meanings and functions, that is, how meaning is realised in form. The title will appeal to scholars and students in the field of linguistics, especially functional linguistics, and syntax.

Explaining Language Structure Through Systems Interaction

Explaining Language Structure Through Systems Interaction
Author: Zygmunt Frajzyngier
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
Total Pages: 334
Release: 2003-01-01
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9789027229632

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This book proposes a framework for describing languages through the description of relationships among lexicon, morphology, syntax, and phonology. The framework is based on the notion of formal coding means; the principle of functional transparency; the notion of functional domains; and the notion of systems interaction in the coding of functional domains. The study is based on original analyses of cross-linguistic data.The fundamental finding of the study is that different languages may code different functional domains, which must be discovered by analyzing the formal means available in each language. The first part of the book proposes a methodology for discovering functional domains and the second part describes the properties of various functional domains. The book presents new cross-linguistic analyses of theoretical issues including agreement; phenomena attributed to government; nominal classification; prerequisites for and implications of linear order coding; and defining characteristics of lexical categories. The study also contributes new analyses of specific problems in individual languages.