Explanation in typology : Diachronic sources, functional motivations and the nature of the evidence
eBook - PDF

Explanation in typology : Diachronic sources, functional motivations and the nature of the evidence

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

Explanation in typology : Diachronic sources, functional motivations and the nature of the evidence

About this book

This volume provides an up-to-date discussion of a foundational issue that has recently taken centre stage in linguistic typology and which is relevant to the language sciences more generally: To what extent can cross-linguistic generalizations, i.e. statistical universals of linguistic structure, be explained by the diachronic sources of these structures? Everyone agrees that typological distributions are the result of complex histories, as "languages evolve into the variation states to which synchronic universals pertain" (Hawkins 1988). However, an increasingly popular line of argumentation holds that many, perhaps most, typological regularities are long-term reflections of their diachronic sources, rather than being 'target-driven' by overarching functional-adaptive motivations.

Frequently asked questions

Yes, you can cancel anytime from the Subscription tab in your account settings on the Perlego website. Your subscription will stay active until the end of your current billing period. Learn how to cancel your subscription.
At the moment all of our mobile-responsive ePub books are available to download via the app. Most of our PDFs are also available to download and we're working on making the final remaining ones downloadable now. Learn more here.
Perlego offers two plans: Essential and Complete
  • Essential is ideal for learners and professionals who enjoy exploring a wide range of subjects. Access the Essential Library with 800,000+ trusted titles and best-sellers across business, personal growth, and the humanities. Includes unlimited reading time and Standard Read Aloud voice.
  • Complete: Perfect for advanced learners and researchers needing full, unrestricted access. Unlock 1.4M+ books across hundreds of subjects, including academic and specialized titles. The Complete Plan also includes advanced features like Premium Read Aloud and Research Assistant.
Both plans are available with monthly, semester, or annual billing cycles.
We are an online textbook subscription service, where you can get access to an entire online library for less than the price of a single book per month. With over 1 million books across 1000+ topics, we’ve got you covered! Learn more here.
Look out for the read-aloud symbol on your next book to see if you can listen to it. The read-aloud tool reads text aloud for you, highlighting the text as it is being read. You can pause it, speed it up and slow it down. Learn more here.
Yes! You can use the Perlego app on both iOS or Android devices to read anytime, anywhere — even offline. Perfect for commutes or when you’re on the go.
Please note we cannot support devices running on iOS 13 and Android 7 or earlier. Learn more about using the app.
Yes, you can access Explanation in typology : Diachronic sources, functional motivations and the nature of the evidence by Karsten Schmidtke-Bode, Ilja Seržant, Susanne Maria Michaelis, Natalia Levshina 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. Contents
  2. Introduction Karsten Schmidtke-Bode
  3. 1 Can cross-linguistic regularities be explained by constraints on change? Martin Haspelmath
  4. 2 Taking diachronic evidence seriously: Result-oriented vs. source-oriented explanations of typological universals Sonia Cristofaro
  5. 3 Some language universals are historical accidents Jeremy Collins
  6. 4 Grammaticalization accounts of word order correlations Matthew S. Dryer
  7. 5 Preposed adverbial clauses: Functional adaptation and diachronic inheritance Holger Diessel
  8. 6 Attractor states and diachronic change in Hawkins’s “Processing Typology” Karsten Schmidtke-Bode
  9. 7 Weak universal forces: The discriminatory function of case in differential object marking systems Ilja A. Seržant
  10. 8 Support from creole languages for functional adaptation in grammar: Dependent and independent possessive person-forms Susanne Maria Michaelis
  11. 9 Linguistic Frankenstein, or How to test universal constraints without real languages Natalia Levshina
  12. 10 Diachronic sources, functional motivations and the nature of the evidence: A synthesis Karsten Schmidtke-Bode & Eitan Grossman
  13. Index