The book suggests a new perspective on the essence of human language. This enormous achievement of our species is best characterized as a communication technology - not unlike the social media on the Net today - that was collectively invented by ancient humans for a very particular communicative function: the instruction of imagination. All other systems of communication in the biological world target the interlocutors' senses; language allows speakers to systematically instruct their interlocutors in the process of imagining the intended meaning - instead of directly experiencing it. This revolutionary function has changed human life forever, and in the book it operates as a unifying concept around which a new general theory of language gradually emerges. Dor identifies a set of fundamental problems in the linguistic sciences - the nature of words, the complexities of syntax, the interface between semantics and pragmatics, the causal relationship between language and thought, language processing, the dialectics of universality and variability, the intricacies of language and power, knowledge of language and its acquisition, the fragility of linguistic communication and the origins and evolution of language - and shows with respect to all of them how the theory provides fresh answers to the problems, resolves persistent difficulties in existing accounts, enhances the significance of empirical and theoretical achievements in the field, and identifies new directions for empirical research. The theory thus opens a new way towards the unification of the linguistic sciences, on both sides of the cognitive-social divide.

Ezekiel's Visionary Temple in Babylonian Context examines evidence from Babylonian sources to better understand Ezekiel's vision of the future temple as it appears in chapters 40-48. Tova Ganzel argues that Neo-Babylonian temples provide a meaningful backdrop against which many unique features of Ezekiel's vision can and should be interpreted. In pointing to the similarities between Neo-Babylonian temples and the description in the book of Ezekiel, Ganzel demonstrates how these temples served as a context for the prophet's visions and describes the extent to which these similarities provide a further basis for broader research of the connections between Babylonia and the Bible. Ultimately, she argues the extent to which the book of Ezekiel models its temple on those of the Babylonians. Thus, this book suggests a comprehensive picture of the book of Ezekiel's worldview and to contextualize its visionary temple by comparing its vision to the actual temples surrounding the Judeans in exile.

Existing accounts of Australian Aboriginal English do not investigate the significant degree of variation found across the continent. This book presents the first description of English spoken on Croker Island, Northern Territory, Australia, in terms of its history, linguistic features and connections to local Aboriginal languages. It demonstrates that English on Croker Island shows an extremely high degree of intra- and inter-speaker variation and embedding in a longstanding multilingual contact situation, both of which challenge existing models of variation and language contact. These results have significant ramifications for how variation is modelled, for our understanding of how postcolonial Englishes develop, as well as for the dynamics of complex contact situations. The book also puts English on Croker Island into a typological context of World Englishes by establishing a profile according to the parameters of the World Atlas of Varieties of English (WAVE). It is of interest to academics interested in Australian Aboriginal English, language contact, World Englishes and Australian Aboriginal languages.

Dialect, Culture, and Society in Eastern Arabia is a three-volume study of the Arabic dialects spoken in Bahrain by its older generation in the mid-1970s, and the socio-cultural factors that produced them. Volume 1: Glossary, published in 2001, lists all the dialectal vocabulary, with extensive contextual exemplification, and cross-referenced to other lexica, which occurred in the complete set of texts recorded during fieldwork. Volume 2: Ethnographic Texts presents a selection of these texts, transcribed, annotated and translated, and with detailed background essays, covering major aspects of the pre-oil culture of the Gulf and the initial stages of the transition to the modern era: pearl diving, agriculture, communal relations, marriage, childhood, domestic life, work. Excerpts from local dialect poems concerned with these subjects are also included. Volume 3: Phonology, Morphology, Syntax, Style is based on an extensive archive of recorded material, gathered for its ethnographic as well as its purely linguistic interest.

Ten Lectures on Cognitive Linguistics as an Empirical Science details the relationship between form and meaning in language, especially at the systematic level of morphology. The role of metaphor and metonymy in elaborating meaning are investigated, as well as the structuring of semantics in terms of prototypes and radial categories. Implications for cultural studies and pedagogical applications are explored. The bulk of examples and data are drawn from the Slavic languages.

The book presents unique literature in a minority ethnolect - the Germanic dialect of Wilamowice in Southern Poland. The manuscripts, written in the ethnolect at the beginning of the 20th century, were discovered in 1989. The book contains full versions of several texts of various length written by Florian Biesik, who decided to create a literary standard for Wilamowicean in order to prove its non-German, but possibly Anglo-Saxon, Dutch, Flemish or Frisian origin. Thus it presents both the dialectal literature and the most important elements of the local culture during the final stages of its extinction.

The last decade has seen a rise in popularity in construction-based approaches to grammar. Put simply, the various approaches within the rubric 'construction grammar' all see grammar (morphemes, words, idioms, etc.) as fundamentally constructions - pairings of form and meaning. This is distinct from formal syntax which sees grammar as a system of atomized units governed by formal rules. Construction Grammar is connected to cognitive linguistics and shares many of its philosophical and methodological assumptions. Advocates of Construction Grammar see it as a psychologically-plausible, generative theory of human language that can also account for all kinds of linguistic data. The research programs it has spawned range from theoretical morphological and syntactic studies to multidisciplinary cognitive studies in psycho-, neuro-, and computational linguistics. This Handbook is the first authoritative reference work solely dedicated to the theory, method, and applications of Construction Grammar, and will be a resource that students and scholars alike can turn to for a representative overview of its many sub-theories and applications. It has 24 chapters divided into 7 sections, with an introduction covering the theory's basic principles and its relationship with other theories including Chomskyan syntax. The book's readership lies in a variety of diverse fields, including corpus linguistics, thoeretical syntax, psycho and neurolinguistics, language variation, acquisition, and computational linguistics.

This 1901 volume of "A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language" completely updates the classic reference work first published in 1882. Skeat provides a staggering number of words, including those most frequently used in everyday speech and those most prominent in literature. They appear along with their definitions, their language of origin, their roots, and their derivatives. Those who are fascinated with the English language will find much to explore here and many overlooked but interesting tidbits and treasures of an ever-evolving language. Walter W. Skeat was a scholar of Old English, Mathematics, English place names, and Anglo-Saxon. He founded the English Dialect Society in 1873 and was a professor at Cambridge University. Skeat edited many classic works, including "Lancelot of the Laik", "Piers Plowman", "The Bruce", "Lives of Saints", and a seven-volume edition of Chaucer.

This book brings together new and original work by forty two of the world's leading scholars of Indo-European comparative philology and linguistics from around the world. It shows the breadth and the continuing liveliness of enquiry in an area which over the last century and a half has opened many unique windows on the civilizations of the ancient world. The volume is a tribute to Anna Morpurgo Davies to mark her retirement as the Diebold Professor of Comparative Philology at the University of Oxford.
The book's six parts are concerned with the early history of Indo-European (Part I); language use, variation, and change in ancient Greece and Anatolia (Parts II and III); the Indo-European languages of Western Europe, including Latin, Welsh, and Anglo-Saxon (Part IV); the ancient Indo-Iranian and Tocharian languages (Part V); and the history of Indo-European linguistics (Part VI).
Indo-European Perspectives will interest scholars and students of Indo-European philology, historical linguistics, classics, and the history of the ancient world.

The Cairo Genizah has preserved a vast number of medieval and post-medieval letters written in the Jewish variety of Arabic. The linguistic peculiarities of these letters provide an invaluable source for the understanding of the history of the Arabic language and the development of Arabic dialects. This work compares and contrasts various linguistic features of Judaeo-Arabic letters from different periods, and is one of the first studies to present a comprehensive linguistic investigation into non-literary Judaeo-Arabic. Its main focus is to provide an extensive diachronic linguistic description, while distinguishing between features of epistolary Arabic and vernacular phenomena. This study should be of interest to anyone working on the Arabic language, sociolinguistics, general historical linguistics and language typology. "...in the extant volume she [Wagner] has clearly demonstrated that Judeo-Arabic letters are to be viewed as primary source material, capturing important aspects of language understanding of Jews and Judaism in the medieval and early modern Islamic world, and therefore providing essential insights into the linguistic function of a substandard language or ethnolect like Judeo-Arabic." Wout van Bekkum, BiOr no. LXX 3/4

The ability to compare is fundamental to human cognition. Expressing various types of comparison is thus essential to any language. The present volume presents detailed grammatical descriptions of how comparison and gradation are expressed in ancient Indo-European languages. The detailed chapters devoted to the individual languages go far beyond standard handbook knowledge. Each chapter is structured the same way to facilitate cross-reference and (typological) comparison. The data are presented in a top-down fashion and in a format easily accessible to the linguistic community. The topics covered are similatives, equatives, comparatives, superlatives, elatives, and excessives. Each type of comparison is illustrated with glossed examples of all its attested grammatical realizations. The book is an indispensable tool for typologists, historical linguists, and students of the syntax and morphosyntax of comparison.

This volume examines relationships between native languages and Yiddish. It highlights the historical and sociolinguistic development of Turkic, Iranian, South Asian, Slavic, Greek, Balkan, Judezmo, Armenian, Georgian, and Basque languages. One of the main focuses is on the adopted post-medieval and pre-modern Yiddish-speaking Ashkenazi homelands of Eastern Europe. The book emphasizes the role of ludic or playful modifications of a language's structures at the colloquial level as sources of linguistic change. And, it goes further to say that expressive language, linguistic iconicity, and etymological analysis can all complement and enrich each other.

Cognitive Approaches to Early Modern Spanish Literature is the first anthology exploring human cognition and literature in the context of early modern Spanish culture. It includes the leading voices in the field, along with the main themes and directions that this important area of study has been producing. The book begins with an overview of the cognitive literary studies research that has been taking place within early modern Spanish studies over the last fifteen years. Next, it traces the creation of self in the context of the novel, focusing on Cervantes's Don Quixote in relation to the notions of embodiment and autopoiesis as well as the faculties of memory and imagination as understood in early modernity. It continues to explore the concept of embodiment, showing its relevance to delve into the mechanics of the interaction between actors and audience both in the jongleuresque and the comedia traditions. It then centers on cognitive theories of perception, the psychology of immersion in fictional worlds, and early modern and modern-day notions of intentionality to discuss the role of perceiving and understanding others in performance, Don Quixote, and courtly conduct manuals. The last section focuses on the affective dimension of audience-performer interactions in the theatrical space of the Spanish corrales and how emotion and empathy can inform new approaches to presenting Las Casas's work in the literature classroom. The volume closes with an afterword offering strategies to design a course on mind and literature in early modernity.

Die Frage der Beziehung zwischen dem Jesajabuch und dem Buch der Zwoelf Propheten ist angesichts vielfaltiger Beruhrungen sprachlicher und motivischer Art zentral, jedoch hinsichtlich der damit verbundenen moeglichen Implikationen bislang nur ungenugend bearbeitet. Im Rahmen eines internationalen Kongresses, der vom 31.Mai bis 3.Juni 2018 an der Katholischen Universitat Eichstatt-Ingolstadt stattfand, suchten Fachleute des Zwoelfprophetenbuches bzw. des Jesajabuches mit unterschiedlichen methodischen Ansatzen ein umfassenderes Bild der verschiedenen Arten von Beziehungen oder thematischen Beruhrungen zu erarbeiten, die entweder fur die beiden Corpora als ganze oder fur spezifische Teile beider charakteristisch sind, um daraus entsprechende Schlussfolgerungen zu ziehen. Das Ergebnis ist ein UEberblick zur Vielfalt der semantischen, intertextuellen, literarischen, redaktionellen, historischen und theologischen Aspekte der Beziehungen zwischen dem Jesajabuch und dem Zwoelfprophetenbuch, die einlinigen Loesungsvorschlagen zur Erklarung des Zustandekommens dieser Bezuge widerstreiten.

Setting forth the state of the art, leading researchers present a survey on the fast-developing field of Connectionist Psycholinguistics: using connectionist or "neural" networks, which are inspired by brain architecture, to model empirical data on human language processing. Connectionist psycholinguistics has already had a substantial impact on the study of a wide range of aspects of language processing, ranging from inflectional morphology, to word recognition, to parsing and language production. Christiansen and Chater begin with an extended tutorial overview of Connectionist Psycholinguistics which is followed by the latest research by leading figures in each area of research. The book also focuses on the implications and prospects for connectionist models of language, not just for psycholinguistics, but also for computational and linguistic perspectives on natural language. The interdisciplinary approach will be relevant for, and accessible to psychologists, cognitive scientists, linguists, philosophers, and researchers in artificial intelligence.

This book examines the historical development of discourse and pragmatic markers across the Romance languages. These markers serve to indicate the organization of the discourse, the speaker's relationship with the interlocutor, and the speaker's stance with regard to the information expressed. Their relevance is in assisting interpretation, despite the fact that they have little or no propositional content. In this book, distinguished scholars from different theoretical backgrounds analyse the different classes of discourse and pragmatic markers found in Latin and the Romance languages and explore both their diachronic development and their synchronic properties. Following an introduction and overview of the development of these markers, the book is divided into two parts: the first part investigates pragmatic markers developed from verbs, such as Latin quaeso, Romanian ma rog, and Spanish o sea; the second looks at adverbs as discourse markers, such as French deja and Italian gia, Romanian atunci and Portuguese alias. Chapters address a variety of theoretical issues such as the cyclic nature of functional developments, the nature of grammaticalization and pragmaticalization, semantic change, and the emergence of new pragmatic values. The arguments presented also have consequences for any analysis of the interfaces between grammar, discourse, and interaction.

Language is an essential part of what makes us human. Where did it come from? How did it develop into the complex system we know today? And what can an evolutionary perspective tell us about the nature of language and communication? Drawing on a range of disciplines including cognitive science, linguistics, anthropology and evolutionary biology, Speaking Our Minds explains how language evolved and why we are the only species to communicate in this way. Written by a rising star in the field, this groundbreaking book is required reading for anyone interested in understanding the origins and evolution of human communication and language.

The aim of this volume is to integrate the current literature about the psychological dimensions of bilingualism: that is, to analyze psychological, subjective, and internal perspectives on bilingualism. What is the internal world of bilinguals like? How do they perceive the world and how do they think? What are the advantages and disadvantages of being bilingual? How does bilingualism interact with personality? In what way does being bilingual impact the aging mind? Renowned and emerging scholars alike explore these questions in the collected chapters. The organization of the book features four main component parts: (1) the inner cognitive world of the bilingual mind (2) bilingual language representation, and (3) bilingualism across the lifespan, and 4) bilingual cognitive and personality dimensions. Taken collectively, the included chapters provide a multidimensional and up-to-date perspective on bilingual studies, specifically concentrating on the cognitive and emotional dimensions of the individual. Chapter topics include: Conceptual Metaphor Theory Bilingual Figurative Language Processing Aging in Bilinguals Psychopathology in Bilinguals Personality Traits in Bilinguals Addressing the growing demand for bilingual research, this collection provides a timely and much needed perspective on the bilingual as an individual, exploring his/her internal world and a range of phenomena, including emotional word processing, personality traits, language effects on the mind, and cognitive effects of bilingualism. As such, it will appeal to a wide range of readers across various intellectual and professional arenas, including cognitive psychologists, personality psychologists, psycholinguists, educational psychologists and second language teachers, among others.

A Linguistic History of Arabic presents a reconstruction of proto-Arabic by the methods of historical-comparative linguistics. It challenges the traditional conceptualization of an old, Classical language evolving into the contemporary Neo-Arabic dialects. Professor Owens combines established comparative linguistic methodology with a careful reading of the classical Arabic sources, such as the grammatical and exegetical traditions. He arrives at a richer and more complex picture of early Arabic language history than is current today and in doing so establishes the basis for a comprehensive, linguistically-based understanding of the history of Arabic. The arguments are set out in a concise, case by case basis, making it accessible to students and scholars of Arabic and Islamic culture, as well as to those studying Arabic and historical linguists.

This book is a new contribution to syntactic theory. The reader will find a clear overview of the central facts concerning Brazilian Portuguese (BP) word order, as well as a comparison to the facts in other Romance languages (Spanish, Italian, and French). In relating other Romance languages to BP, the book shows that BP word order has a number of interesting restrictions that set this language clearly apart from the other Romance languages. This volume provides accounts for declaratives and interrogatives found not only in BP but also in the other Romance languages discussed, taking into consideration parametric differences among the languages studied.