1 GENERAL LINGUISTICS

By JOHN N. GREEN, University of York

I. MISCELLANIES, PERIODICALS Studies in Descriptive and Historical Linguistics. Festschrift for Wirifred P. Lehmann, ed. P. J. Hopper, Amsterdam, Benjamins, assembles 29 arts in the two sections implied by the title; quality is not lacking, but a more disparate selection can rarely have been seen. Rather more coherent are the three vols of Linguistic Studies Offered to Joseph Greenberg, Saratoga, Anma Libri (val. I is general, 2 phonology, and 3 syntax); the con• tributors represent an impressive gamut of ages and theoretical affiliations, reflecting the seminal importance of G.'s work on universals- now at last accorded equal respect in generativist and more traditional centres. Old periodicals rarely die - and even less have the cour• tesy to announce their demise. The honourable exception is LSci, which ceased production in I977· FoL did cease, and Linguistics and Philosophy has appeared as a partial continuator from its publisher ( rwML, 38: I)' but the former eds have gone as far as they legally may in identifying their new launch Studies in Language, Amsterdam, Benjamins, as the rightful heir. Linguisticae lnvestigationes, ib., ed. J. C. Chevalier, will con• centrate on gen. and French linguistics, while Studium Linguistik, eds D. Wunderlich and J. M. Meisel, Kronberg, Scriptor, I976-, seems to have arrogated gen. and Germanic. Language Problems and Language Planning, ed. R. E. Wood, The Hague, Mouton, succeeds - after a brief respite - its Esperanto fore• runner. J LS has parted company with Mouton and is revived by Gross of Heidelberg in a new format commencing val. 5 (I976). The delight of the year is undoubtedly Maledicta. The International Journal of Verbal Aggression, ed. R. Aman, W ausheka (Wis.), which we are informed 'specializes in totally uncensored research .. .'! A pearl indeed beyond compare. 2 General Linguistics

2. GENERAL APPROACHES To be welcomed is A Bibliography of Contemporary Linguistic Research, N.York, Garland, in which G. Gazdar and colla• borators develop elaborate cross-referencing techniques for some 5,ooo entries with good coverage of informal and in• accessible sources; 'contemporary' is defined as 'post-I 970'. Papers . .. (Chicago), I3, has a bumper crop of 55 arts, tech• nical and speculative; old ideas get an airing, as in S. R. Anderson's sheepish rediscovery of the wheel of morphology, 'On the formal description of inflection', pp. I5-44, and G. Lakoff tries to incorporate the kitchen sink- or at least, sensori-motor activity, thought, perception, emotions and straightforward language- into a holistic theory of 'Lin• guistic Gestalts', pp. 236--87. This year's paravolume is The CLS Book of Squibs with Cumulative Index, Chicago Linguistics Society. Current Issues in Linguistic Theory, ed. R. W. Cole, Bloomington, Indiana U.P., is a set of state-of-the-art papers from the I975 Linguistic Institute, with contributions from inter alios Chomsky, Chafe, Fillmore, Fishman and Ferguson. Criticisms ofTG orthodoxy have to be strident to make them• selves heard. Brickbats fly from R. A. Hall,Jr, 'Some critiques of Chomskyan theory', NMi, 78:86-95, while E. C. Garda contrasts TG - conceived as updated trad. grammar - with her preferred Form-Content model, 'On the practical conse• quences of theoretical principles', Li, 43: I 29-70. Simul• taneously modest and iconoclastic, R. A. Hudson's Arguments for a Non-Transformational Grammar, Chicago U.P., I976, claims 'daughter-dependency grammar' (an outgrowth of Halliday's systemic grammar) does much better the kinds of things TG linguists want to do - though significantly H. does not argue this is what linguistics ought to be doing. Now available is the second, very readable, vol. of M. Berry's Introduction to Systemic Linguistics, London, Batsford (TWML, 37:3). Other approaches are represented by R. M. Brend and K. L. Pike eds, Tagmemics, The Hague, Mouton, I976 (vol. I = AspectsoftheField, vol. 2 = Theoretical Discussion) and Fonctionnalisme et syntaxe du franfais ( = LaF, 35), ed. D. Franc;ois, with a somewhat negative assess• ment of'Le fonctionalisme panni quelques theories syntaxiques' by D. Faita, pp. 26--40. Among the turmoil, C. F. Hockett,