Nominal Classification
A history of its study from the classical period to the present
Author
This book offers the first comprehensive survey of the study of gender and classifiers throughout the history of Western linguistics. Based on an analysis of over 200 genetically and typologically diverse languages, the author shows that these seemingly arbitrary and redundant categories play in fact a central role in the lexicon, grammar and the organization of discourse. As a result, the often contradictory approaches to their functionality and semantic motivation encapsulate the evolving conceptions of such issues as cognitive and cultural correlates of linguistic structure, the diverse functions of grammatical categories, linguistic complexity, agreement phenomena and the interplay between lexicon and grammar. The combination of a typological and historiographic perspective adopted here allows the reader to appreciate the detail and insight of earlier, supposedly ‘prescientific’ accounts in light of the data now available and to examine contemporary discussions in the context of prevailing conceptions in the study of language at different points in its history since antiquity.
[Studies in the History of the Language Sciences, 121] 2013. xiv, 405 pp.
Publishing status: Available
© John Benjamins
Table of Contents
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Preface & Acknowledgments | pp. xi–xii
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List of abbreviations | pp. xiii–xv
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1.Preliminaries | pp. 1–6
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2. Nominal classification systems: An overview | pp. 7–58
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3. From Protagoras to the philosophical grammars | pp. 59–116
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4. From the ‘Romantics’ to the Neogrammarians | pp. 117–158
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5. Structuralism | pp. 159–198
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6. Contemporary studies of gender/noun classes | pp. 199–272
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7. Contemporary studies of classifiers | pp. 273–320
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8. Final discussion | pp. 321–336
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Index | pp. 381–??
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Index of biographical names | pp. 381–390
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Index of subjects and terms | pp. 391–400
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Language index | pp. 401–406
“[A] comprehensive work; the extensive discussion makes good use of the 44 pages of references that cover more than 200 languages. In other words, the book lives up to its subtitle by presenting a history of studies of nominal classification since the classical period. [...] This is a text that will be required reading for anyone researching one or another aspect of nominal classification.”
Keith Allan, Monash University, in Historiographia Linguistica Vol. 41:2/3 (2014)
“[A] refreshing contribution to the field of nominal classification. Although framed as a historical work it also makes a significant contribution to our understanding of the typology of nominal classification [...]. In addition to the historical angle, what makes this book unique is its emphasis on the semantic motivations of categories and the functionality of nominal classification.”
Ruth Singer, University of Melbourne, in Studies in Language Vol 39:1 (2015)
Cited by
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2017. A Typology of Noun Categorization Devices. In The Cambridge Handbook of Linguistic Typology, ► pp. 361 ff. 
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2020. Numeral base, numeral classifier, and noun. Language and Linguistics. 語言暨語言學 21:4 ► pp. 511 ff.
Chacon, Thiago Costa & Rodrigo do Prado Sateles
2019. Explorações sobre padrões de indexação e classificação nominal de argumentos em línguas indígenas da América do Sul. LIAMES: Línguas Indígenas Americanas 19 ► pp. e019016 ff.
CORBETT, GREVILLE G. & SEBASTIAN FEDDEN
2016. Canonical gender. Journal of Linguistics 52:3 ► pp. 495 ff.
Costaouec, Denis & Michael Swanton
2015. Classification nominale en Ixcatèque. La linguistique Vol. 51:2 ► pp. 201 ff.
Erben Johansson, Niklas & Sandra Cronhamn
2023. Vocal iconicity in nominal classification. Language and Cognition 15:2 ► pp. 266 ff.
Frankowsky, Maximilian, Dan Ke, Pienie Zwitserlood, René Michel & Jens Bölte
2022. The interplay between classifier choice and animacy in Mandarin-Chinese noun phrases: an ERP study. Language, Cognition and Neuroscience 37:7 ► pp. 866 ff.
Güldemann, Tom & Ines Fiedler
2022. Restructured Niger-Congo gender systems as another type of concurrent nominal classification. Journal of African Languages and Linguistics 43:2 ► pp. 139 ff.
Her, One-Soon, Harald Hammarström & Marc Allassonnière-Tang
2022. Defining numeral classifiers and identifying classifier languages of the world. Linguistics Vanguard 8:1 ► pp. 151 ff.
Kavčič, Jerneja
2020. Opombe o izvoru in rabi slovničnih izrazov »moški« in »ženski« spol. Jezikoslovni zapiski 26:1
Kilarski, Marcin
2014. The Place of Classifiers in the History of Linguistics. Historiographia Linguistica 41:1 ► pp. 33 ff.
Kilarski, Marcin
2016. Gender Asymmetries in Iroquoian Languages and their Cultural Correlates. Historiographia Linguistica 43:3 ► pp. 363 ff.
Kilarski, Marcin
2018. American Indian Languages in the Eyes of 17th-Century French and British Missionaries. Studia Anglica Posnaniensia 53:s1 ► pp. 295 ff.
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Kilarski, Marcin & Rafał Szeptyński
2022. The Place of Jakób Handel (1888–c.1942) in the History of Language Study in Poland. Historiographia Linguistica 49:1 ► pp. 71 ff.
Kramer, Ruth
2020. Grammatical Gender: A Close Look at Gender Assignment Across Languages. Annual Review of Linguistics 6:1 ► pp. 45 ff.
Kuteva, Tania, Bernd Heine, Bo Hong, Haiping Long, Heiko Narrog & Seongha Rhee
2019. World Lexicon of Grammaticalization,
Margetts, Anna, Katharina Haude, Nikolaus P. Himmelmann, Dagmar Jung, Sonja Riesberg, Stefan Schnell, Frank Seifart, Harriet Sheppard & Claudia Wegener
2022. Cross-linguistic patterns in the lexicalisation of bring and take. Studies in Language 46:4 ► pp. 934 ff.
Nübling, Damaris
2020. Die Capital – der Astra – das Adler. In Walking on the Grammaticalization Path of the Definite Article [Studies in Language Variation, 23], ► pp. 228 ff.
Rojas Berscia, Luis Miguel & Rita Eloranta
2019. The Marañón-Huallaga exchange route. LIAMES: Línguas Indígenas Americanas 19 ► pp. e019011 ff.
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Sheppard, Harriet
2022. Directed caused accompanied motion events in Sudest, an Oceanic language with classificatory verbs. In Caused Accompanied Motion [Typological Studies in Language, 134], ► pp. 187 ff.
Stoch, Nastazja
2020. The grammatical distinction between count nouns and mass nouns in Mandarin Chinese. Lingua Posnaniensis 62:1 ► pp. 55 ff.
Werner, Martina & Gianina Iordachioaia
2019. Chapter 6. The development of gender and countability effects in German ung- and English ing-nominals. In Historical Linguistics 2015 [Current Issues in Linguistic Theory, 348], ► pp. 116 ff.
Wichmann, Søren
2018. Introduction. In The Diachrony of Classification Systems [Current Issues in Linguistic Theory, 342], ► pp. 1 ff.
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Subjects
Main BIC Subject
CFK: Grammar, syntax
Main BISAC Subject
LAN009000: LANGUAGE ARTS & DISCIPLINES / Linguistics / General