Information Structure and Language Change
eBook - PDF

Information Structure and Language Change

New Approaches to Word Order Variation in Germanic

  1. 400 pages
  2. English
  3. PDF
  4. Available on iOS & Android
eBook - PDF

Information Structure and Language Change

New Approaches to Word Order Variation in Germanic

About this book

The volume presents new approaches to explaining word order variation and change in the Germanic languages and thus relates to one of the most prominent and widely discussed topics in the theory of language change and diachronic syntax.

The novelty of our approach consists in three main points. First of all, we aim at describing functional variety in the field of word order and verb placement in the early Germanic languages not as a result of language contact, but rather as a language-internal phenomenon related to stylistic and grammatical conditions in information packaging. Second, given that information structure is not directly accessible in texts from historical corpora that are available only in written form and bear no or little information on prosody and intonation, it presents various methods of retrieving information-structural categories in such texts. Third, it presents empirical studies on the relation between word order and information structure of the four main texts of the Old High German period and embeds these results in the wider picture of word order change in Germanic.

The volume will be of interest to students of German, English, and general linguistics as well as to researchers interested in diachronic syntax, philology of Older German, language change, information structure, discourse semantics, language typology, computational linguistics, and corpus studies.

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.
No, books cannot be downloaded as external files, such as PDFs, for use outside of Perlego. However, you can download books within the Perlego app for offline reading on mobile or tablet. 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 Information Structure and Language Change by Roland Hinterhölzl, Svetlana Petrova, Roland Hinterhölzl,Svetlana Petrova in PDF and/or ePUB format, as well as other popular books in Languages & Linguistics & Grammar & Punctuation. We have over one million books available in our catalogue for you to explore.

Table of contents

  1. Frontmatter
  2. Table of Contents
  3. Introduction
  4. The verb-second property in Old High German: Different ways of filling the prefield
  5. The role of information structure in word order variation and word order change
  6. OV languages: Expressions of cues
  7. Discourse relations and word order change
  8. On the methods of information-structural analysis in historical texts: A case study on Old High German
  9. Paleographic clues to prosody? – Accents, word separation, and other phenomena in Old High German manuscripts
  10. On the “syntax of silence” in Proto-Indo-European
  11. Word order variation and information structure in Old High German: An analysis of subordinate dhazs-clauses in Isidor
  12. Information structure and word order variation in the Old High German Tatian
  13. Verb placement and information structure in the OHG Gospel Harmony by Otfrid von Weissenburg
  14. Translating information structure: A study of Notker’s translation of Boethius’s Latin De Consolatione Philosophiae into Old High German
  15. Aspects of word order and information structure in Old Saxon
  16. Backmatter