This third and final volume of the Principles of Linguistic Change set examines the cognitive and cultural causes responsible for linguistic change, and traces the history of these developments, from triggering events to driving forces and endpoints.

Labov draws upon the newly-completed Atlas of North American English to look more deeply into questions of linguistic change, focusing on the cognitive factors that determine the capacity of the linguistic system to transmit information, and exploring social influences in the development of large-scale cultural patterns. The third volume also deals with the diffusion of change across dialect boundaries, and across racial and ethnic groups. It establishes an essential distinction between transmission within the community, which is dependent on child language acquisition and diffusion across communities, which is dependent on adult learning.

This final installment in the Principles of Linguistic Change series builds upon the foundations established by the groundbreaking first two volumes. Volume I (978-0-631-17914-6) investigates the internal factors that control change, examining the regularity of sound change and reviewing the evidence for functional explanations of linguistic change. Volume II (978-0-631-17916-0) follows by presenting the social factors governing linguistic change and proposed models for the transmission and incrementation of change. Written by the pioneering researcher of sociolinguistic inquiry, Principles of Linguistic Change is an essential resource for researchers, scholars, and students in the field.

Table of Contents: Forward. Chapter 1. Cognitive and cultural factors in linguistic change.

Part A. Cross dialectal comprehension. Chapter 2. Natural misunderstandings. Chapter 3. A controlled experiment on vowel identification. Chapter 4. The gating experiments.

Part B. The life history of linguistic change. Chapter 5. Triggering events. Chapter 6. Governing principles. Chapter 7. Forks in the road. Chapter 8. Divergence. Chapter 9. Driving forces. Chapter 10. Yankee cultural imperialism and the Northern Cities Shift. Chapter 11. Social evaluation of the Northern Cities Shift. Chapter 12. Endpoints.

Part C. The unit of linguistic change. Chapter 13. Words floating on the surface of sound change. Chapter 14. The binding force in linguistic change.

Part D. Transmission and diffusion. Chapter 15 The diffusion of language from place to place. Chapter 16. The diffusion of language from group to group. Chapter 17. Conclusion.