LINGUIST List 12.1994

Thu Aug 9 2001

Books: Structural Linguistics, Language Contact

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

Directory

1. Joyce Reid, A Short History of Structural Linguistics by Peter Matthews
2. Joyce Reid, Cambridge Approaches to Language Contact

A Short History of Structural Linguistics

Peter Matthews, University of Cambridge, U.K.


This book is a concise historical survey of structural linguistics,
charting its development from the 1870s to the present day. Peter
Matthews examines the beginnings of structuralism and analyzes the
vital role played in it by the study of sound systems and the problems
of how systems change. He discusses theories of the overall structure
of a language, the "Chomskyan revolution" in the 1950s, and the
structuralist theories of meaning. The book includes exposition, in
particular, of the contributions of Saussure, Bloomfield and Chomsky.

Contents:

1. Introduction; 2. Languages; 3. Sound systems; 4. Diachrony; 5. The
architecture of a language system; 6. Internalised language;
7. Structural semantics; 8. Structuralism in 2000.

2001/174 pp.
0-521-62367-7/Hb/List: $59.95
0-521-62568-8/Pb/List: $21.95

Cambridge Approaches to Language Contact

Salikoko Mufwene, Univeristy of Chicago
Series Editor

Cambridge Approaches to Language Contact is an interdisciplinary
series bringing together work in language contact from a diverse range
of research areas. The series focuses on key topics in the study of
contact between languages or dialects including the development of
pidgins an creoles, language evolution and change, world Englishes,
code-switching and code-mixing, bilingualism and second language
acquisition, borrowing, interference and convergence phenomena.


Book Announcement for review

The Ecology of Language Evolution

Salikoko S. Mufwene, University of Chicago, IL

This major new work explores the development of creoles and other new
languages, focusing on the conceptual and methodological issues they
raise for genetic linguistics. Written by an internationally renowned
linguist, the book surveys a wide range of examples of changes in the
structure, function and vitality of languages, and suggests that
similar ecologies have played the same kinds of roles in all cases of
language evolution. The Ecology of Language Evolution will be
welcomed by students and researchers in sociolinguistics, creolistics,
theoretical linguistics and theories of evolution.

Contents: 1. Introduction; 2. The founder principle in the development
of creoles; 3. The development of American Englishes: factoring
contact in and the social bias out; 4. The legitimate and illegitimate
offspring of English; 5. What research on the development of creoles
can contribute to genetic linguistics; 6. Language contact, evolution
and death: how ecology rolls the dice; 7. Past and recent population
movements in Africa: their impact on its linguistic landscape;
8. Conclusions for the big picture.

Cambridge Approaches to Language Contact

2001/282 pp./3 line diagrams/7 maps/6 tables
0-521-79138-3/Hb/List: $59.95*
0-521-79475-7/Pb/List: $22.95*