Language Universals and Linguistic Typology: Syntax and MorphologySince its first publication, Language Universals and Linguistic Typology has become established as the leading introductory account of one of the most productive areas of linguistics—the analysis, comparison, and classification of the common features and forms of the organization of languages. Adopting an approach to the subject pioneered by Greenberg and others, Bernard Comrie is particularly concerned with syntactico-semantic universals, devoting chapters to word order, case making, relative clauses, and causative constructions. His book is informed throughout by the conviction that an exemplary account of universal properties of human language cannot restrict itself to purely formal aspects, nor focus on analysis of a single language. Rather, it must also consider language use, relate formal properties to testable claims about cognition and cognitive development, and treat data from a wide range of languages. This second edition has been revised and updated to take full account of new research in universals and typology in the past decade, and more generally to consider how the approach advocated here relates to recent advances in generative grammatical theory. |
Other editions - View all
Language Universals and Linguistic Typology: Syntax and Morphology Bernard Comrie Limited preview - 1989 |
Language Universals and Linguistic Typology: Syntax and Morphology Bernard Comrie No preview available - 1989 |
Language Universals and Linguistic Typology: Syntax and Morphology Bernard Comrie No preview available - 1989 |
Common terms and phrases
accusative adjectives adpositions affixes animacy animacy hierarchy animate Balkan Balkan sprachbund basic word order causative constructions causee chapter Chukchi clitic Comrie constraints correlation cross-linguistically dative definition diachronic direct object discussion distinction Dyirbal encoding English English relative clause ergative ergative-absolutive examples explanation formal genetic genitive għandu given grammatical relations Greenberg's Hasan head noun illustrated indirect Indo-European Indo-European languages instance intransitive John language universals lexical linguistic locative main clause morphemes morphological causative morphological typology nominative nominative-accusative noun phrase oblique object particular passive Pawlu plural position possessive construction possible postpositions predicate preposition problem pronoun pronoun-retention Proto-Indo-European range of languages reference relational grammar relative clause formation relativize relevant restricted Russian second person semantic roles sentence singular structure subject properties suffix syntactic syntax third person tion topic transitive verb Turkish universal tendencies universals and typology verb agreement wide range woman word order word order typology Yidiny