Word Frequency and Lexical Diffusion

Word Frequency and Lexical Diffusion

Author: B. Phillips

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2006-09-29

Total Pages: 267

ISBN-13: 0230286615

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This study of word frequency effects on sound change provides a resolution of the Neogrammarian controversy. Betty S. Phillips discusses the implications for phonology and historical linguistics of certain types of change affecting the most frequent words first and other types of change affecting the least frequent words first.


Frequency and the Emergence of Linguistic Structure

Frequency and the Emergence of Linguistic Structure

Author: Joan L. Bybee

Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing

Published: 2001-10-15

Total Pages: 502

ISBN-13: 9027298033

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A mainstay of functional linguistics has been the claim that linguistic elements and patterns that are frequently used in discourse become conventionalized as grammar. This book addresses the two issues that are basic to this claim: first, the question of what types of elements are frequently used in discourse and second, the question of how frequency of use affects cognitive representations. Reporting on evidence from natural conversation, diachronic change, variability, child language acquisition and psycholinguistic experimentation the original articles in this book support two major principles. First, the content of people’s interactions consists of a preponderance of subjective, evaluative statements, dominated by the use of pronouns, copulas and intransitive clauses. Second, the frequency with which certain items and strings of items are used has a profound influence on the way language is broken up into chunks in memory storage, the way such chunks are related to other stored material and the ease with which they are accessed to produce new utterances.


Frequency and the Emergence of Linguistic Structure

Frequency and the Emergence of Linguistic Structure

Author: Joan L. Bybee

Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing

Published: 2001-01-01

Total Pages: 508

ISBN-13: 9789027229489

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A mainstay of functional linguistics has been the claim that linguistic elements and patterns that are frequently used in discourse become conventionalized as grammar. This book addresses the two issues that are basic to this claim: first, the question of what types of elements are frequently used in discourse and second, the question of how frequency of use affects cognitive representations. Reporting on evidence from natural conversation, diachronic change, variability, child language acquisition and psycholinguistic experimentation the original articles in this book support two major principles. First, the content of people s interactions consists of a preponderance of subjective, evaluative statements, dominated by the use of pronouns, copulas and intransitive clauses. Second, the frequency with which certain items and strings of items are used has a profound influence on the way language is broken up into chunks in memory storage, the way such chunks are related to other stored material and the ease with which they are accessed to produce new utterances.


The Handbook of Historical Linguistics, Volume II

The Handbook of Historical Linguistics, Volume II

Author: Richard D. Janda

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Published: 2020-09-15

Total Pages: 705

ISBN-13: 111873226X

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An entirely new follow-up volume providing a detailed account of numerous additional issues, methods, and results that characterize current work in historical linguistics. This brand-new, second volume of The Handbook of Historical Linguistics is a complement to the well-established first volume first published in 2003. It includes extended content allowing uniquely comprehensive coverage of the study of language(s) over time. Though it adds fresh perspectives on several topics previously treated in the first volume, this Handbook focuses on extensions of diachronic linguistics beyond those key issues. This Handbook provides readers with studies of language change whose perspectives range from comparisons of large open vs. small closed corpora, via creolistics and linguistic contact in general, to obsolescence and endangerment of languages. Written by leading scholars in their respective fields, new chapters are offered on matters such as the origin of language, evidence from language for reconstructing human prehistory, invocations of language present in studies of language past, benefits of linguistic fieldwork for historical investigation, ways in which not only biological evolution but also field biology can serve as heuristics for research into the rise and spread of linguistic innovations, and more. Moreover, it: offers novel and broadened content complementing the earlier volume so as to provide the fullest available overview of a wholly engrossing field includes 23 all-new contributed chapters, treating some familiar themes from fresh perspectives but mostly covering entirely new topics features expanded discussion of material from language families other than Indo-European provides a multiplicity of views from numerous specialists in linguistic diachrony. The Handbook of Historical Linguistics, Volume II is an ideal book for undergraduate and graduate students in linguistics, researchers and professional linguists, as well as all those interested in the history of particular languages and the history of language more generally.


Frequency of Use and the Organization of Language

Frequency of Use and the Organization of Language

Author: Joan Bybee

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2006-12-07

Total Pages: 374

ISBN-13: 0198041292

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This volume collects three decades of articles by the distinguished linguist Joan Bybee. Her articles essentially argue for the importance off frequency of use as a factor in the analysis and explanation of language structure. Her work has been very influential for a broad range of researchers in linguistics, particularly in discourse analysis, corpus linguistics, phonology, phonetics, and historical linguistics.


The Dravidian Languages

The Dravidian Languages

Author: Sanford B. Steever

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2015-04-15

Total Pages: 455

ISBN-13: 1136911642

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The Dravidian language family is the world's fourth largest with over 175 million speakers across South Asia from Pakistan to Nepal, from Bangladesh to Sri Lanka as well as having communities in Malaysia, North America and the UK. Four of the languages, Tamil, Kannada, Malayalam and Telugu are official national languages and the Dravidian family has had a rich literary and cultural influence. This authoritative reference source provides unique descriptions of 12 of these languages, covering their historical development alongside discussions of their specialised linguistic structures and features. Each chapter combines modern linguistic theory with traditional historical linguistics and a uniform structure allows for easy typological comparison between the individual languages. Two further chapters provide general information about the language family - the introduction, which covers the history, cultural implications and linguistic background, and a separate article on Dravidian writing systems. This volume includes languages from all 4 of the Dravidian family's subgroupings: South Dravidian e.g. Tamil, Kannada; South Central Dravidian e.g. Telugu, Konda; Central Dravidian e.g. Kolami; North Dravidian e.g. Brahui, Malto. Written by a team of expert contributors, many of whom are based in Asia, each language chapter offers a detailed analysis of phonology, morphology, syntax and followed by a list of the most relevant further reading to aid the independent scholar. The Dravidian Languages will be invaluable to students and researchers within linguistics and will also be of interest to readers in the fields of comparative literature, South Asian studies and Oriental studies.


Language, Usage and Cognition

Language, Usage and Cognition

Author: Joan Bybee

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2010-04-01

Total Pages: 263

ISBN-13: 1139487027

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Language demonstrates structure while also showing considerable variation at all levels: languages differ from one another while still being shaped by the same principles; utterances within a language differ from one another while exhibiting the same structural patterns; languages change over time, but in fairly regular ways. This book focuses on the dynamic processes that create languages and give them their structure and variance. It outlines a theory of language that addresses the nature of grammar, taking into account its variance and gradience, and seeks explanation in terms of the recurrent processes that operate in language use. The evidence is based on the study of large corpora of spoken and written language, what we know about how languages change, as well as the results of experiments with language users. The result is an integrated theory of language use and language change which has implications for cognitive processing and language evolution.


Language Change

Language Change

Author: Goparaju Sambasiva Rao

Publisher: Academic Foundation

Published: 1994

Total Pages: 188

ISBN-13: 9788171880577

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Studies in the History of the English Language

Studies in the History of the English Language

Author: Donka Minkova

Publisher: Walter de Gruyter

Published: 2008-08-22

Total Pages: 505

ISBN-13: 3110197146

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The 19 papers in this volume are a selection from a UCLA conference intended to take stock of the state of the field at the beginning of the new millenium and to stimulate research in English Historical Linguistics. The authors are predominantly U.S. scholars. The fields represented include morphosyntax and semantics, grammaticalization, discourse analysis, dialectology, lexicography, the diachronic study of code-switching, phonology and metrics.


Dutch Studies

Dutch Studies

Author: G. Geerts

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

Published: 2012-12-06

Total Pages: 332

ISBN-13: 9400988559

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The fourteen papers in this volume Studies in Dutch Phonology were collected by the editors in the course of 1977 and 1978, at the request of the editorial board of Dutch Studies. In their opinion the collection represents a fair cross-section of current research done in the field of phonology both inside and outside the Netherlands, and therefore con stitutes a very suitable starting point for the new series Dutch Studies of the Intemationale Vereniging voor Neerlandistiek. In the various contributions one will find treated several issues of current phonological interest, such as phonotactic constraints (by Brink), abstractness (by Goyvaerts, Robinson, Tiersma, Trommelen and Zonneveld), stress-assign ment and vowel-reduction (by Van MarIe and Predota), the interaction between phonology and morphology (by Kooij, De Rooij-Bronkhorst, and Schultink), rule ordering (Taeldeman), and lexical diffusion (Gerritsen and Jansen, and Zonneveld). These issues are discussed in relation to a number of well-known traditional topics of Dutch phonology, such as: affIxal stress-attraction; constraints on consonant-clusters; separable and inseparable verb-forms; stress and vowel reduction in derived vs. non derived, and 'native' vs. 'foreign' Dutch words; Auslautverhartung and assimilation of voice in obstruent-clusters; regularity and irregularity in open syllable lengthening, diminutive formation, plural formation, and the weakening of intervocalic d; and the properties and phonological represen tation of diphthongs. (Frans van Coetsem's paper "Loan Phonology: the Example of Dutch", originally intended as a contribution to this volume, but not completed as it went to the press, will appear elsewhere.