LINGUIST List 11.2659

Thu Dec 7 2000

Books: Romani Lang/Ling, History of Linguistics

Editor for this issue: Naomi Ogasawara <naomilinguistlist.org>

Directory

1. Paul Peranteau, Romani Language/Linguistics: Grammatical Relations in Romani
2. Paul Peranteau, History of Linguistics: Limiting the Arbitrary by J. E. Joseph

John Benjamins Publishing announces a new work on Romani:

Grammatical Relations in Romani.
The Noun Phrase.
with a Foreword by Frans Plank (Universit�t Konstanz).
Viktor ELS�K and Yaron MATRAS (eds.) (University of Manchester)
Current Issues in Linguistic Theory 211
1 58811 022 2 / USD 78.00 (Hardcover)
90 272 3718 2 / NLG 156.00 (Hardcover)

This is the first typologically-oriented collection on Romani that is
devoted to a particular thematic domain - that of noun phrase
grammar. The approach taken is unique in that it places this
typologically hybrid language in the centre of a general linguistic,
universal discussion of the relevant noun phrase phenomena. The book
is also the first assembly of articles to deal with Romani as a whole
on the basis of cross-dialectal samples, offering areal-typological,
dialectological, and historicalinterpretations. The individual
contributions discuss morphological and syntactic aspects of nominal
and pronominal inflection, definite articles, demonstratives, genitive
compounding, external possession, pronominal object doubling and
morphosyntactic alignment. Contributors include leading experts in the
fields of noun phrase grammar, Romani dialectologists, typologists and
historical linguists.

Contributions by: Frans Plank; Viktor Elsik; Norbert Boretzky;
 Yaron Matras; Maria Koptjevskaja-Tamm; Mily Crevels & 
 Peter Bakker; Victor A. Friedman; V�t Buben�k.



			John Benjamins Publishing Co.
Offices:	Philadelphia			Amsterdam:
Websites: 	http://www.benjamins.com	http://www.benjamins.nl
E-mail:		servicebenjamins.com		customer.servicesbenjamins.nl
Phone:		+215 836-1200			+31 20 6762325
Fax: 		+215 836-1204			+31 20 6739773

John Benjamins Publishing announces this new work in the History of 
Linguistics:


Limiting the Arbitrary.
Linguistic naturalism and its opposites in Plato's Cratylus and modern
theories of language.
John E. JOSEPH (University of Edinburgh)
Studies in the History of the Language Sciences 96
US & Canada: 1 55619 749 7 / USD 67.00 (Hardcover)
Rest of World: 90 272 4585 1 / NLG 134.00 (Hardcover)

The idea that some aspects of language are 'natural', while others are
arbitrary, artificial or derived, runs all through modern linguistics,
from Chomsky's GB theory and Minimalist program and his concept of E-
and I-language, to Greenberg's search for linguistic universals,
Pinker's views on regular and irregular morphology and the brain, and
the markedness-based constraints of Optimality Theory. This book
traces the heritage of this linguistic naturalism back to its locus
classicus, Plato's dialogue Cratylus. The first half of the book is a
detailed examination of the linguistic arguments in the Cratylus. The
second half follows three of the dialogue's naturalistic themes
through subsequent linguistic history -- natural grammar and
conventional words, from Aristotle to Pinker; natural dialect and
artificial language, from Varro to Chomsky; and invisible hierarchies,
from Jakobson to Optimality Theory - in search of a way forward beyond
these seductive yet spurious and limiting dichotomies.



			John Benjamins Publishing Co.
Offices:	Philadelphia			Amsterdam:
Websites: 	http://www.benjamins.com	http://www.benjamins.nl
E-mail:		servicebenjamins.com		customer.servicesbenjamins.nl
Phone:		+215 836-1200			+31 20 6762325
Fax: 		+215 836-1204			+31 20 6739773