This series of HANDBOOKS OF LINGUISTICS AND COMMUNICATION SCIENCE is designed to illuminate a field which not only includes general linguistics and the study of linguistics as applied to specific languages, but also covers those more recent areas which have developed from the increasing body of research into the manifold forms of communicative action and interaction. For "classic" linguistics there appears to be a need for a review of the state of the art which will provide a reference base for the rapid advances in research undertaken from a variety of theoretical standpoints, while in the more recent branches of communication science the handbooks will give researchers both an overview and orientation. To attain these objectives, the series aims for a standard comparable to that of the leading handbooks in other disciplines, and to this end strives for comprehensiveness, theoretical explicitness, reliable documentation of data and findings, and up-to-date methodology. The editors, both of the series and of the individual volumes, and the individual contributors, are committed to this aim. The language of publication is English. The main aim of the series is to provide an appropriate account of the state of the art in the various areas of linguistics and communication science covered by each of the various handbooks; however no inflexible pre-set limits will is imposed on the scope of each volume. The series is open-ended, and can thus take account of further developments in the field. This conception, coupled with the necessity of allowing adequate time for each volume to be prepared with the necessary care, means that there is no set time-table for the publication of the whole series. Each volume is a self-contained work, complete in itself. The order in which the handbooks are published does not imply any rank ordering, but is determined by the way in which the series is organized; the editors of the whole series enlist a competent editor for each individual volume. Once the principal editor for a volume has been found, he or she then has a completely free hand in the choice of co-editors and contributors. The editors plan each volume independently of the others, being governed only by general formal principles. The series editors only intervene where questions of delineation between individual volumes are concerned. It is felt that this (modus operandi) is best suited to achieving the objectives of the series, namely to give a competent account of the present state of knowledge and of the perception of the problems in the area covered by each volume. To discuss your handbook idea or submit a proposal, please contact Birgit Sievert.

The essays reflect the work of a broad spectrum of disciplines in humanities and cultural studies. They present a new vision of the early modern era, which attempts to register the diverse and contradictory nature of early modern culture, transcending unambiguous notions of development such as modernization or secularization. "

This volume sheds light on plurilingualism in Spanish-occupied Italy during the early modern period from a variety of perspectives. Topics include written language in pragmatic contexts (such as administrative documents), plurilingual literature and theater, and early modern thought on plurilingualism.

This standard introduction to the spoken romance languages, which has long been out of print, is now being released in an up-to-date and revised new edition. The topic spoken language has developed into one of the most interesting fields of research and not only in linguistics. From linguistic theory-based preliminary observations on speech and writing to the topic of language variation, the objective of this book is to present the most significant problems of spoken language, in contrast to written language, for the three major romance languages. The main chapters of this work focus, on the one hand, on the universal characteristics of the spoken word, in particular the textual-pragmatic, syntactic and semantic phenomena. On the other hand, the special features of each of the spoken varieties of French, Italian and Spanish are taken into consideration. This is initially approached from a diachronic (historical) linguistic perspective; the focus here is on the development of individual linguistic spatial variety. This is followed by an exact synchronic description of the characteristics of the individual linguistic varieties at the phonological, morphosyntactic and lexical levels. All linguistic phenomena of today s synchrony are interpreted on the basis of original corpus material. This work regards itself as a contribution to variety linguistics focused on speech and writing."

This book deals with the evangelization of Spanish-speaking America between the European conquest and independence. The study investigates the concepts and strategies of catechesis, the general conditions of Church law and national politics as well as the prerequisites and conditions on the part of the Indians. New and specific forms of mutual understanding, of mediation and resistance developed through the transfer of European knowledge to a second geographical area and through the contact of cultures and religions. These new forms evolved beyond the sphere of religion and determine cultural traditions, literary forms, handling of law and language research.

The contributions of this volume discuss the usability of the concept of "pluralization" as the guiding concept for analyzing the early modern era. The first meaning of pluralization is the increase of the representations of reality which are relevant in an area of life and culture; furthermore this term expresses the emergence of "new" and/or alternative knowledge and the development of competitive partial realities. These have to be coordinated or mediated with each other. The contributions and case studies of this volume analyze this process and give important impulses for fundamental research on the early modern era. Key features: Basic methodological contributions on research on the early modern era The volume analyzes an important paradigm of the history of ideas from 1500 on Written by a team of internationally renowned experts