Language Typology and Historical Contingency
In honor of Johanna Nichols
Editors
What is the range of diversity in linguistic types, what are the geographical distributions for the attested types, and what explanations, based on shared history or universals, can account for these distributions? This collection of articles by prominent scholars in typology seeks to address these issues from a wide range of theoretical perspectives, utilizing cutting-edge typological methodology. The phenomena considered range from the phonological to the morphosyntactic, the areal coverage ranges in scale from micro-areal to worldwide, and the types of historical contingency range from contact-based to genealogical in nature. Together, the papers argue strongly for a view in which, although they use distinct methodologies, linguistic typology and historical linguistics are one and the same enterprise directed at discovering how languages came to be the way they are and how linguistic types came to be distributed geographically as they are.
[Typological Studies in Language, 104] 2013. viii, 512 pp.
Publishing status: Available
© John Benjamins
Table of Contents
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Preface | pp. vii–viii
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Part I. Structures and typologies
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Discourse semantics and the form of the verb predicate in Karachay-Balkar: A corpus-based and experimental studyAndrej A. Kibrik | pp. 3–46
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Typology and channel of communication: Where do signed languages fit inDan I. Slobin | pp. 47–68
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Marking versus indexing: Revisiting the Nichols marking-locus typologyNicholas Evans and Eva Fenwick | pp. 69–90
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Head-marking languages and linguistic theoryRobert D. Van Valin Jr. | pp. 91–124
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Lessons of variability in clause coordination: Evidence from North Caucasian languagesAleksandr E. Kibrik | pp. 125–152
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Noun classes grow on trees: Noun classification in the North-East CaucasusKeith Plaster, Maria Polinsky and Boris Harizanov | pp. 153–170
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Affecting valence in KhumiDavid A. Peterson | pp. 171–194
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Capturing diversity in language acquisition researchSabine Stoll and Balthasar Bickel | pp. 195–216
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Part II. Distributions in time and space
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Who inherits what, when? Toward a theory of contact, substrates, and superimposition zonesMark Donohue | pp. 219–240
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Polysynthesis in the Arctic/Sub-Arctic: How recent is it?Michael Fortescue | pp. 241–264
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A (micro-)accretion zone in a remnant zone? Lower Fungom in areal-historical perspectiveJeff Good | pp. 265–282
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A history of Iroquoian gender markingMichael Cysouw | pp. 283–298
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The satem shift, Armenian siseṙn, and the early Indo-European of the BalkansBill J. Darden | pp. 299–308
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Penultimate lengthening in Bantu: Analysis and spreadLarry M. Hyman | pp. 309–330
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Culture and the spread of SlavicAlan Timberlake | pp. 331–356
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The syntax and pragmatics of Tungusic revisitedLenore A. Grenoble | pp. 357–382
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Some observations on typological features of hunter-gatherer languagesMichael Cysouw and Bernard Comrie | pp. 383–394
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Typologizing phonetic precursors to sound changeAlan C.L. Yu | pp. 395–414
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Distributional biases in language familiesBalthasar Bickel | pp. 415–444
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The morphology of imperatives in Lak: Stem vowels in the second singular simplex transitive affirmativeVictor A. Friedman | pp. 445–462
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Subgrouping in Tibeto-Burman: Can an individual-identifying standard be developed? How do we factor in the history of migrations and language contact?Randy J. LaPolla | pp. 463–474
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Part III. A (cautionary) note on methodology
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Real data, contrived data, and the Yokuts CanonWilliam F. Weigel | pp. 477–494
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Language index | pp. 495–498
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Name index | pp. 499–504
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Subject index | pp. 505–512
Subjects
Main BIC Subject
CFF: Historical & comparative linguistics
Main BISAC Subject
LAN009000: LANGUAGE ARTS & DISCIPLINES / Linguistics / General
U.S. Library of Congress Control Number: 2013038029