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Books > Language & Literature > Language & linguistics > Historical & comparative linguistics
This volume is about the morphosyntactic encoding of feelings and
emotions in Latin. It offers a corpus-based investigation of the
Latin data, benefiting from insights of the functional and
typological approach to language. Chiara Fedriani describes a
patterned variation in Latin Experiential constructions, also
revisiting the so-called impersonal constructions, and shows how
and why such a variation is at the root of diachronic change. The
data discussed in this book also show that Latin constitutes an
interesting stage within a broader diachronic development, since it
retains some ancient Indo-European features that gradually
disappeared and went lost in the Romance languages.
This volume features nine articles, covering various aspects of
Maltese linguistics: Part I, mostly dedicated to the Maltese
lexicon, opens with Bednarowicz's comparison of Maltese and Arabic
adjectives. Fabri then categorizes various types of constructions
involving the preposition ta' 'of'. The paper by Lucas and Spagnol
discusses Maltese words containing an innovative final /n/. Part II
deals with the syntax of Maltese: Azzopardi's paper focuses on a
construction in Maltese which consists of a sequence of two or more
finite verbs. Just and Ceploe present the first corpus based study
of differential object indexing in Maltese. In Part III on
morphosyntax, Turek analyzes Arabic prepositions in
Classical/Modern Standard Arabic and Arabic dialects and contrasts
them with their Maltese equivalents. Stolz and Vorholt then analyze
the structural and functional similarities and differences of
spatial interrogatives in Maltese and Spanish. Vorholt then
investigates the adpositions of sixteen European languages
including Maltese and examines the relationship between length and
frequency. The volume is closed with Part IV on phonology and
Avram's paper, in which the diachrony of voicing assimilation in
consonant clusters is reconstructed.
A basic property of human language is that it unfolds in time; the
left and right margin of discourse units do not behave in a
symmetrical fashion. The working hypothesis of this volume is that
discourse elements at the left periphery have mainly subjective and
discourse-structuring functions, whereas at the right periphery,
such elements play an intersubjective or modalising role. However,
the picture that emerges from the different contributions to this
volume is far more complex. While it seems clear that the working
hypothesis cannot be upheld in a "strong" way, most of the chapters
- especially those based on corpus data - show that an asymmetry
between left and right periphery does exist and that it is a matter
of frequency.
The book presents new and stimulating approaches to the study of
language evolution and considers their implications for future
research. Leading scholars from linguistics, primatology,
anthroplogy, and cognitive science consider how language evolution
can be understood by means of inference from the study of linked or
analogous phenomena in language, animal behaviour, genetics,
neurology, culture, and biology. In their introduction the editors
show how these approaches can be interrelated and deployed together
through their use of comparable forms of inference and the similar
conditions they place on the use of evidence. The Evolutionary
Emergence of Language will interest everyone concerned with this
intriguing and important subject, including those in linguistics,
biology, anthropology, archaeology, neurology, and cognitive
science.
Prompted by the 'linguistic turn' of the late 20th century,
intellectual and conceptual historians continue to devote a great
deal of attention to the study of concepts in history. This
innovative and interdisciplinary volume builds on such scholarship
by providing a new history of the term 'economy'. Starting from the
Greek idea of the law of the household, Luigi Alonzi traces the
different meanings assumed by the word 'economy' during the middle
ages and early modern era, highlighting the semantic richness of
the word and its uses in various political and cultural contexts.
Notably, there is a particular focus on the so-called Oeconomica
literature, tracking the reception of works by Plato, Aristotle,
the 'pseudo' Aristotle and Xenophon in the Italian and France
Renaissance. This tradition was incredibly influential in civic
humanism and in texts devoted to power and command and thus
affected later debates on Natural Law and the development of new
scientific disciplines in the 17th and 18th centuries. In exploring
this, the analysis of the function of translations in the
transmission and transformation of meanings becomes central.
'Economy' in European History shines much-needed light on an
important challenge that many historians repeatedly face: the fact
that words can, and do, change over time. It will thus be a vital
resource for all scholars of early modern and European economic
history.
This volume offers several empirical, methodological, and
theoretical approaches to the study of observable variation within
individuals on various linguistic levels. With a focus on German
varieties, the chapters provide answers on the following questions
(inter alia): Which linguistic and extra-linguistic factors explain
intra-individual variation? Is there observable intra-individual
variation that cannot be explained by linguistic and
extra-linguistic factors? Can group-level results be generalised to
individual language usage and vice versa? Is intra-individual
variation indicative of actual patterns of language change? How can
intra-individual variation be examined in historical data?
Consequently, the various theoretical, methodological and empirical
approaches in this volume offer a better understanding of the
meaning of intra-individual variation for patterns of language
development, language variation and change. The inter- and
transdisciplinary nature of the volume is an exciting new frontier,
and the results of the studies in this book provide a wealth of new
findings as well as challenges to some of the existing findings and
assumptions regarding the nature of intra-individual variation.
Handwritten in the seventeenth century, the "Arte de la lengua chio
chiu" is the oldest extant grammar of the Chinese vernacular known
as Southern Min or Hokkien, and a spectacular source text for
present-day linguistics. Its author, a Spanish Dominican
missionary, worked among the Chinese settlers in Manila or Sangleys
. The first part of "The Language of the Sangleys" is an in-depth
analysis of the "Arte" in its historical, social and linguistic
contexts. The second part offers an annotated transcript and
translation of the "Arte," including facsimiles of the original
manuscript, making this study eminently fit for classroom use.
Combining sophisticated theory and method with meticulous
philology, "The Language of the Sangleys" presents a fascinating,
new chapter in the history of Chinese and general linguistics.
Linguistic variation has most commonlu been studied in communities
that have the dominant social organization of our time: occupation
and ethnic diversity, socioeconomic stratification, and a
population size that precludes community-wide face-to-face
interaction. In such communities literacy introduces overarching,
extra-community linguistic norms, and linguistic variation
correlates with socioeconomic class. Investigating Variation
explores a different kind of social organization: small size,
enclavement, common occupation, absence of social stratification,
bilingualism with extremely weak extra-community norming for the
local minority language, which shows a very high level of
individual variation. Nancy C. Dorian's examination of the
fisherfolk Gaelic spoken in a Highland Scottish village offers a
number of explanations for delayed recognition of linguistic
variation unrelated to social class or other social sub-groups.
Reports of similar variation phenomena in locations with similar
social-setting and social-organization features (contemporary
minority-language pockets in Ireland, Russia, Norway, Canada, and
Cameroon) make it possible to recognize a particular set of factors
that contribute to the emergence and persistence of socially
neutral inter-speaker and intra speaker variation. The documented
existence of still other forms of social organization, rare now but
once more widespread, suggests that additional forms of linguistic
variation, as well as other facets of language use related to
social organization, remain unexamined, calling for attention
before the few communities that represent them disappear
altogether.
This book examines diachronic change and diversity in the
morphosyntax of Romance varieties spoken in Italy. These varieties
offer an especially fertile terrain for research into language
change, because of both the richness of dialectal variation and the
length of the period of textual attestation. While attention in the
past has been focussed on the variation found in phonology,
morphology, and vocabulary, this volume examines variation in
morphosyntactic structures, covering a range of topics designed to
exploit and explore the interaction of the geographical and
historical dimensions of change. The opening chapter sets the scene
for specialist and non-specialist readers alike, and establishes
the conceptual and empirical background. There follow a series of
case studies investigating the morphosyntax of verbal and
(pro)nominal constructions and the organization of the clause. Data
are drawn from the full range of Romance dialects spoken within the
borders of modern Italy, ranging from Sicily and Sardinia through
to Piedmont and Friuli. Some of the studies narrow the focus to a
particular construction within a particular dialect; others broaden
out to compare different patterns of evolution within different
dialects. There is also diversity in the theoretical frameworks
adopted by the various contributors. The book aims to take stock of
both the current state of the field and the fruits of recent
research, and to set out new results and new questions to help move
forward the frontiers of that research. It will be a valuable
resource not only for those specializing in the study of
Italo-Romance varieties, but also for other Romanists and for those
interested in exploring and understanding the mechanisms of
morphosyntactic change more generally.
A volume in Advances in Cultural PsychologySeries Editor: Jaan
Valsiner, Clark University"This is a remarkable and highly original
work on dialogism, dialogical theories and dialogue. With his
erudite and broadly based scholarship PerLinell makes a
path-breaking contribution to the study of the human mind,
presenting a novel alternative to traditional monologism and
exploring thedynamics of sense-making in different forms of
interaction and communicative projects. Although Per Linell
discusses complex dialogical concepts, the text is written with
exceptional clarity, taking the reader through critique as well as
appreciation of great intellectual traditions of our
time."(Professor Ivana Markov, University of Stirling, U.K.)"Per
Linells Rethinking Language, Mind And World Dialogically represents
a landmark in the development ofa transdisciplinary dialogically
basedparadigm for the human sciences. The author?'s lucid analysis
and constructive rethinking ranges all the way from integrating
explanations ofsignificant empirical contributions across the
entire range of human sciences dealing with language, thought and
communication to foundational, epistemological and ontological
issues."(Professor Ragnar Rommetveit, University of Oslo,
Norway)Per Linell took his degree in linguistics and is currently
professor of language and culture, with a specialisation on
communication and spokeninteraction, at the University of Link
ping, Sweden. He has been instrumental in building up an
internationally renowned interdisciplinary graduateschool in
communication studies in Link ping. He has worked for many years on
developing a dialogical alternative to mainstream theories
inlinguistics, psychology and social sciences. His production
comprises more than 100 articles on dialogue, talk-in-interaction
and institutionaldiscourse. His more recent books include
Approaching Dialogue (1998), The Written Language Bias in
Linguistics (2005) and Dialogue in FocusGroups (2007, with I.
Markov, M. Grossen and A. Salazar Orvig).
In The Dutch Language in Japan (1600-1900) Christopher Joby offers
the first book-length account of the knowledge and use of the Dutch
language in Tokugawa and Meiji Japan. For most of this period, the
Dutch were the only Europeans permitted to trade with Japan. Using
the analytical tool of language process, this book explores the
nature and consequences of contact between Dutch and Japanese and
other language varieties. The processes analysed include language
learning, contact and competition, code switching, translation,
lexical, syntactic and graphic interference, and language shift.
The picture that emerges is that the multifarious uses of Dutch,
especially the translation of Dutch books, would have a profound
effect on the language, society, culture and intellectual life of
Japan.
Drawing on usage-based theory, neurocognition, and complex systems,
Languaging Beyond Languages elaborates an elegant model
accommodating accumulated insights into human language even as it
frees linguistics from its two-thousand-year-old, ideological
attachment to reified grammatical systems. Idiolects are redefined
as continually emergent collections of context specific,
probabilistic memories entrenched as a result of domain-general
cognitive processes that create and consolidate linguistic
experience. Also continually emergent, conventionalization and
vernacularization operate across individuals producing the illusion
of shared grammatical systems. Conventionalization results from the
emergence of parallel expectations for the use of linguistic
elements organized into syntagmatic and paradigmatic relationships.
In parallel, vernacularization indexes linguistic forms to
sociocultural identities and stances. Evidence implying
entrenchment and conventionalization is provided in asymmetrical
frequency distributions.
This book sets out a new reconstruction for the Semitic case
system. It is based on a detailed analysis of the expression of
grammatical roles and relations in the attested Semitic languages
and, for the first time, brings typological methods to bear in the
study of these features in Semitic languages and their
reconstruction for proto-Semitic. Professor Hasselbach supports her
argument with detailed analyses of a wide range of data and
presents it in a way that will be accessible to both Semitists and
typologists. The volume is divided into seven chapters: the first
discusses basic methodologies used in Semitic linguistics and the
limitations thereof. The second presents the evidence for
morphological case-marking in the individual Semitic languages, the
conventional reconstruction of Proto-Semitic, and the evidence
which conflicts with it. The third introduces typological concepts
and methods and their deployment in Semitic. Chapter 4 considers
the case alignment of early Semitic. Chapter 5 presents a detailed
study of marking structures and patterns and considers what these
reveal about the nature of the original case system. Chapter 6
looks at the functions of case markers, considers the light they
cast on the nominal system, and shows that the reconstruction of
early Semitic as ergative is implausible. In the final chapter the
author argues that early Semitic had a different nominal system
from that of the later Semitic languages. She shows that the course
of its development has parallels in other Afroasiatic languages,
including Berber and Cushitic. Her book sheds important new light
on the history of the Semitic languages and on the early
development of the Afro-Asiatic language family as a whole.
According to UNESCO, it is believed that at least half of the
nearly 7,000 languages spoken around the world will cease to be
used within the next 100 years. If this issue is neglected, people
will lose not only their cultural heritage but also invaluable
understandings about the history of all humankind. Endangered
Languages of the Caucasus and Beyond includes the manuscripts of 19
papers that were presented at the 1st International CUA Conference
on Endangered Languages, organized by the Caucasus University
Association (CUA), at Ardahan, Turkey, on 13 to 16 October 2014.
The articles address issues such as the state of the field of
documentation, conservation and revitalization of endangered
languages with special reference to the endangered languages in the
Caucasus region and beyond.
This dictionary provides a full and authoritative guide to the
meanings of the terms, concepts, and theories employed in
pragmatics, the study of language in use.
Pragmatics is a central subject in linguistics and philosophy and
an increasingly important topic in fields such as cognitive
science, informatics, artificial intelligence, neuroscience, and
pathology. Its rapid development has produced new theories,
methods, approaches, and schools of thought. These in turn have
resulted in a vast vocabulary of new terms and in modified meanings
for existing terms. Such terms help advance research and facilitate
discussion, but they can also cause confusion and act as barriers
to understanding and communication. Yan Huang defines and explains
them all, from the most traditional to the most recent. Covering
every branch of research and all theoretical approaches and with
the needs of students and researchers firmly in mind he writes each
entry in the simplest possible terms for the subject in question,
gives references to relevant seminal and recent work, provides
numerous cross-references to related entries, and shows how each
term and concept is applied and used in different contexts.
Written by one of the leading experts in the field, Professor
Huang's dictionary, the first of its kind ever published, will be a
much valued resource for students and researchers in every aspect
of the field.
As its title suggests, this book is a selection of papers that use
English corpora to study language variation along three dimensions
- time, place and genre. In broad terms, the book aims to bridge
the gap between corpus linguistics and sociolinguistics and to
increase our knowledge of the characteristics of English language.
It includes eleven papers which address a variety of research
questions but with the commonality of a corpus-based methodology.
Some of the contributions deal with language variation in time,
either by looking into historical corpora of English or by adopting
the method known as diachronic comparable corpus linguistics, thus
illustrating how corpora can be used to illuminate either
historical or recent developments of English. Other studies
investigate variation in space by comparing different varieties of
English, including some of the "New Englishes" such as the South
Asian varieties of English. Finally, some of the papers deal with
variation in genre, by looking into the use of language for
specific purposes through the inspection of medical articles,
social reports and academic writing.
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