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Spanish Through Time is an introduction to the development of the Spanish
language, designed for readers with little or no prior experience in
linguistics. It therefore stresses explanation of the workings of language
and its development over time: they are viewed as attributable to
characteristics of human speakers, in particular social and historical
circumstances, as illustrated by the history of Spanish. The development of
Spanish from Latin is presented divided into three broad periods--"Vulgar
Latin", Castilian, and Spanish--characterized by specific linguistic
developments and the historical circumstances in which they occurred. In
each case the mechanics of particular language changes are explained in
detail, in everyday terms. Emphasis is on the more general developments
that differentiate, first, various Romance languages, and finally different
current varieties of Castilian-- Peninsular and Atlantic (American).
Evidence is also presented for the chronology of some major changes, so as
to familiarize the reader with traditional linguistic reasoning. The
presentation is designed to be covered in a normal semester or trimester
unit, and is based on the author's experience teaching the subject for more
than twenty years in U.S. Universities.
Contents:
l. Introduction: On language and language change
Part I: Romance
2. Spanish as a Romance language: theory and evidence
3. ‘Vulgar Latin’
4. Vulgar Latin Lexicon
5. Developments in grammar
6. Another word on words and reinterpretations
7. The production of speech sounds, and the sounds of Classical Latin
8. Early changes in consonants
9. Changes in vowels
10. Evidence of early developments
11. The Germanic invasions
12. The Arab invasions
13. French influence
Part II: Castilian
14. Characteristics of Castilian
15. Early evidence of Castilian
16. Morphology: Developments in form
17. The Rise of Castilian
18. Standardization
19. Modern changes in sound and major current varieties
20. More reinterpretations
Part III: Spanish
21. Spanish beyond Spain
22. The Academy. Modern changes in spelling.
23. Spanish in our time: Some ongoing developments.
ISBN 9783895864308. LINCOM Coursebooks in Linguistics 17. 209pp. 2010.
Students' discounts available! Please ask.
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