- 345 pages
- English
- PDF
- Available on iOS & Android
About this book
In The Power of Anology, Dieter Wanner argues for reinstating historical linguistics, especially in (morpho-)syntax, as constitutive of any theoretical account of language.
In the first part, he provides a critique of some foundational concepts of an object-oriented linguistic perspective, questioning the distinction between synchrony and diachrony, dichotomous parametrization, grammaticality judgments, and formal generalization. Instead, the immanent perspective of the linguistic individual, licensed by broad cognitive functions, highlights such relegated dimensions as similarity, (surface) redundancy, frequency of form, and social and environmental conditions on language use.
In the second part, Dieter Wanner relies on a systematic construct of analogy as the dynamic force enabling language, tying together acquisition, language use, and linguistic change. Such analogy is pervasive, driven by local models, and inevitably spreading through the social web of linguistic practice. The unpredictability, incompletion, and typical slowness of change thereby become the norm, while categorical closure remains a marked possibility. The framework of "Soft Syntax" spells out an operative model for syntax relying on precedence, cohesion, dependence, agreement, constructional identity, and concatenation. These six dimensions and their interplay undergo a detailed exploration of their diachronic operation and implications, applying them to typical examples taken from the history of the Romance languages.
The openness of the framework enables diachronic linguistics to approach old problems in a new light and to ask new questions about the mechanics and nature of language change.
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Information
Table of contents
- Acknowledgments
- List of figures
- List of tables
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- 0.1. The scenario
- 0.2. The prestige of historical linguistics
- 0.3. The limitations of historical linguistics
- 0.4. Goals of the essay
- 0.5. Plan of the study
- Part I
- Chapter 1. Diachrony: Positions and challenges
- 1.1. Proposals
- 1.2. Problematic aspects of historical linguistics
- 1.3. Language change
- Chapter 2. Domains in historical linguistics
- 2.1. Dimensions of diachrony
- 2.2. Philology broadly
- 2.3. Various formal proposals
- Chapter 3. Reintegrating diachrony: A critique of some theoretical constructs
- 3.1. Four polar notions
- 3.2. The immanent view
- 3.3. Innate and constructivist aspects
- 3.4. Communication and causation
- 3.5. The shape of language
- 3.6. Environmental dependence of language learning
- 3.7. Parameter setting as induction
- 3.8. The modeling of frequency
- 3.9. Conclusion: Language as the object of diachronic study
- Chapter 4. Critical issues: Grammaticality, representation, redundancy, and regularity
- 4.1. Types of grammaticality judgments
- 4.2. Grammaticality judgments as linguistic knowledge
- 4.3. Representation
- 4.4. Redundancy
- 4.5. Allocating computational resources
- 4.6. Regularity
- Part II
- Chapter 5. Analogy, categorization, and learning
- 5.1. Immanence and the linguistic individual
- 5.2. Learning
- 5.3. Analogy as an operative model
- 5.4. Analogy in diachrony
- 5.5. Change in social context
- 5.6. In brief
- Chapter 6. Soft Syntax
- 6.1. An overview of linguistic components
- 6.2. Major articulations and interfacing
- 6.3. The dimensions of Soft Syntax
- 6.4. Implementation of Soft Syntax dimensions
- 6.5. General considerations on parsimonious syntax representation
- Chapter 7. Pathways for diachronic shifts
- 7.1. Change in primary components outside of syntax
- 7.2. Syntactic dimensions and change
- 7.3. More on change
- 7.4. Conclusion
- Chapter 8. Conclusions
- 8.1. Reaching a higher level
- 8.2. The essential ingredients
- 8.3. Computational resources
- 8.4. Modeling historical change
- 8.5. Time and society
- 8.6. Soft Syntax
- 8.7. Concentrating on broader forms: Languages
- 8.8. Envoi
- Notes
- References
- Index of names
- Subject index