Number
eBook - PDF

Number

  1. English
  2. PDF
  3. Available on iOS & Android
eBook - PDF

Number

About this book

Number is the most underestimated of the grammatical categories. It is deceptively simple yet the number system which philosophers, logicians and many linguists take as the norm - namely the distinction between singular and plural (as in cat versus cats) - is only one of a wide range of possibilities to be found in languages around the world. Some languages, for instance, make more distinctions than English, having three, four or even five different values. Adopting a wide-ranging perspective, Greville Corbett draws on examples from many languages to analyse the possible systems of number. He reveals that the means for signalling number are remarkably varied and are put to a surprising range of special additional uses. By surveying some of the riches of the world's linguistic resources this book, first published in 2000, makes a major contribution to the typology of categories and demonstrates that languages are much more varied than is generally recognised.

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Yes, you can access Number by Greville G. Corbett in PDF and/or ePUB format, as well as other popular books in Languages & Linguistics & Linguistics. We have over one million books available in our catalogue for you to explore.

Table of contents

  1. Cover
  2. Half-title
  3. Series-title
  4. Title
  5. Copyright
  6. Dedication
  7. CONTENTS
  8. FIGURES
  9. TABLES
  10. PREFACE
  11. ABBREVIATIONS
  12. 1 Introduction
  13. 2 Meaning distinctions
  14. 3 Items involved in the nominal number system
  15. 4 Integrating number values and the Animacy Hierarchy
  16. 5 The expression of number
  17. 6 The syntax of number
  18. 7 Other uses of number
  19. 8 Verbal number
  20. 9 Conclusion and new challenges
  21. REFERENCES
  22. AUTHOR INDEX
  23. LANGUAGE INDEX
  24. SUBJECT INDEX