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Trask's Historical Linguistics Trask’s Historical Linguistics Trask’s Historical Linguistics, Third Edition, is an accessible introduction to historical linguistics – the study of language change over time. This engaging book is illustrated with language examples from all six continents, and covers the fundamental concepts of language change, methods for historical linguistics, linguistic reconstruction, sociolinguistic aspects of language change, language contact, the birth and death of languages, language and prehistory and the issue of very remote relations. This third edition of the renowned Trask’s Historical Linguistics is fully revised and updated and covers the most recent developments in historical linguistics, including: ᭹ more detail on morphological change including cutting-edge discussions of iconization ᭹ coverage of recent developments in sociolinguistic explanations of variation and change ᭹ new case studies focusing on Germanic languages and American and New Zealand English, and updated exercises covering each of the topics within the book ᭹ a brand new companion website featuring material for both professors and students, including discussion questions and exercises as well as discussions of the exercises within the book. Trask’s Historical Linguistics is essential reading for all students of language, linguistics and related disciplines. The accompanying website can be found at www.routledge.com/cw/trask Robert McColl Millar is Professor in Linguistics and Scottish Language at the University of Aberdeen. His most recent books include English Historical Sociolinguistics (2012) and (with William Barras and Lisa Marie Bonnici) Lexical Variation and Attrition in the Scottish Fishing Communities (2014). Larry Trask was Professor of Linguistics at the University of Sussex and an authority on Basque language and historical linguistics. ‘Trask’s Historical Linguistics is a jewel among textbooks of Historical Linguistics: it brings to life the intriguing paths on which human languages have wandered in their development, and sparks the enthusiasm of the reader to explore and study them, providing the necessary toolkit and background knowledge.’ Robert Mailhammer, University of Western Sydney, Australia ‘Larry Trask’s Historical Linguistics is an exemplary introduction to the fi eld, and McColl Millar’s third edition is a much needed update: the new case studies and exercises are superb, and the revised reading suggestions extremely helpful.’ Adrian Pablé, University of Hong Kong ‘This new edition of Trask’s Historical Linguistics by Robert McColl Millar provides a thorough introduction to the fi eld in the broadest sense while remaining accessible to stu- dents and specialists alike. Truly a useful book.’ Garry Davis, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, USA ‘This revised and expanded edition of Trask’s seminal work will make welcome reading for scholars and students alike.’ Raymond Hickey, University of Duisburg and Essen, Germany ‘Accessible but not simplifi ed, entertaining but not simplistic, this book provides thorough coverage of the fi eld with a richness of explanation and examples that offers at the same time a synthetic overview and a wealth of data and detail. The new companion website promises to enhance its value as a textbook for the classroom and the independent learner.’ Mark Richard Lauersdorf, University of Kentucky, USA Trask’s Historical Linguistics 3rd Edition Edited by Robert McColl Millar Third edition published 2015 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN and by Routledge 711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2015 Robert McColl Millar and Larry Trask The right of Robert McColl Millar and the late Larry Trask to be identifi ed as authors of this work has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilized in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identifi cation and explanation without intent to infringe. First edition published as Historical Linguistics by Arnold 1996 Second edition published by Hodder Education 2007 British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Trask’s historical linguistics. – Third Edition. / edited by Robert McColl Millar. p. cm. Rev. ed. of: Trask’s Historical linguistics / R.L. Trask. London : Arnold, 2007. Includes bibliographical references and index. 1. Historical linguistics. 2. Comparative linguistics. I. Millar, Robert McColl, 1966- II. Trask, R. L. (Robert Lawrence), 1944–2004. Historical linguistics. III. Title. P140.T74 2015 417’.7–dc23 2014031176 ISBN: 978-0-415-70657-5 (hbk) ISBN: 978-0-415-70658-2 (pbk) ISBN: 978-1-315-72805-6 (ebk) Typeset in Times New Roman by Graphicraft Limited, Hong Kong Additional materials are available on the companion website at www.routledge.com/cw/trask Contents List of illustrations ix To the reader xii To the teacher xiv Acknowledgements xvi Abbreviations xviii 1 The fact of language change 1 1.1 Chilled 1 1.2 English then and now 2 1.3 Attitudes to language change 6 1.4 The inevitability of change 10 Case study: bonk! 11 Further reading 13 Exercises 14 2 Lexical and semantic change 16 2.1 Borrowing 16 2.2 Phonological treatment of loans 21 2.3 Morphological treatment of loans 24 2.4 Formation of new words 26 2.5 Change in word-meaning 32 Case study: nice 41 Further reading 44 Exercises 44 3 Phonological change I: change in pronunciation 48 3.1 The phonetic basis of phonological change 48 3.2 Assimilation and dissimilation 49 3.3 Lenition and fortition 51 3.4 Addition and removal of phonetic features 55 vi Contents 3.5 Vowels and syllable structure 57 3.6 Whole-segment processes 60 3.7 The regularity issue: a fi rst look 62 Case study: Germanic */xw/ in the present-day dialects 63 3.8 Summary 66 Further reading 66 Exercises 67 4 Phonological change II: change in phonological systems 71 4.1 Conditioning and rephonologization 71 4.2 Phonological space 75 4.3 Chain shifts 78 4.4 Phonological change as rule change 83 Case study: the Germanic consonant system: ‘Grimm’s Law’ and ‘Verner’s Law’ 87 4.5 Summary 90 Further reading 91 Exercises 91 5 Morphological change 96 5.1 Reanalysis 96 5.2 Analogy and levelling 99 5.3 Universal principles of analogy 104 5.4 Morphologization 107 5.5 Morphologization of phonological rules 109 5.6 Change in morphological type 115 Case study: the development of the defi nite article from the demonstrative paradigm in English 118 Further reading 122 Exercises 122 6 Syntactic change 126 6.1 Reanalysis of surface structure 126 6.2 Shift of markedness 131 6.3 Grammaticalization 134 6.4 Typological harmony 137 6.5 Syntactic change as restructuring of grammars 140 Case study: the rise of ergativity 143 Further reading 148 Exercises 149 Contents vii 7 Relatedness between languages 154 7.1 The origin of dialects 154 7.2 Dialect geography 158 7.3 Genetic relationships 164 7.4 Tree model and wave model 169 7.5 The language families of the world 174 Case study: a Martian’s eye view on the Germanic language family 180 Further reading 184 Exercises 185 8 The comparative method 191 8.1 Systematic correspondences 191 8.2 Comparative reconstruction 195 8.3 Pitfalls and limitations 203 8.4 The Neogrammarian Hypothesis 209 8.5 Semantic reconstruction 210 8.6 The use of typology and universals 213 8.7 Reconstructing grammar 217 8.8 The reality of proto-languages 219 Case study: a reconstruction too far? 220 Further reading 227 Exercises 228 9 Internal reconstruction 234 9.1 A fi rst look at the internal method 234 9.2 Alternations and internal reconstruction 238 9.3 Internal reconstruction of grammar and lexicon 240 Case study: the laryngeal theory of PIE 243 Further reading 246 Exercises 247 10 The origin and propagation of change 250 10.1 The Saussurean paradox 250 10.2 Variation and social stratifi cation 251 10.3 Variation as the vehicle of change 257 10.4 Lexical diffusion 271 10.5 Near-mergers 275 Case study: historical sociolinguistics 278 10.6 A closing note 282 Further reading 284 Exercises 285 viii Contents 11 Social and historical pressures upon language 291 11.1 Linguistic contact 291 11.2 Linguistic areas 303 11.3 Language birth: pidgins and creoles 304 11.4 Language planning 311 11.5 Language death 319 Case study: the genesis and development of American and New Zealand English 326 Further reading 335 Exercises 336 12 Language and prehistory 343 12.1 Introduction 343 12.2 Linguistic palaeontology 343 12.3 Links with archaeology 345 12.4 Statistical methods 350 Case study: Greenberg’s mass comparison 359 Further reading 365 Exercises 365 Appendix: the Swadesh 200-word list 370 Bibliography 372 Index 386 Illustrations Figures 4.1 Primary split 73 4.2 The phoneme system of Modern Greek 76 4.3 The English Great Vowel Shift 79 4.4 The history of the Greek vowel system 81 6.1 A Mojave copular sentence 129 7.1 The past tense of dive in the eastern USA (Atwood 1953: Figure 6) 160 7.2 The past tense of see in England (Upton et al. 1987: map 139) 161 7.3 An isogloss bundle in France (Chambers and Trudgill 1980: map 7.6) 162 7.4 The major dialect areas of England (Trudgill 1999: map 9) 163 7.5 The dialect areas of the eastern USA (Kurath and McDavid 1961: map 2) 164 7.6 The Germanic family tree 170 7.7 The Indo-European family tree 171 7.8 A wave diagram of the Germanic family (developed from Robinson 1992) 173 7.9 A Martian Germanic family tree 183 7.10 The local words for ‘young dog’ in England (Upton et al.
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