The Linker in the Khoisan Languages

Chris Collins is Professor of Linguistics at New York University. He is a syntactician with an interest in African languages and has done fieldwork in Botswana, Namibia, South Africa, and Togo.

Khoisan languages are primarily known in the linguistic literature for their elaborate use of click consonants but they also have a typologically rare particle--the linker. Using data obtained through rigorous fieldwork on endangered languages, Chris Collins has provided a definitive analysis of an aspect of Universal Grammar that had largely gone unnoticed. The linker promises to provide unique insight into patterns of linguistic contact and relatedness in the Kalahari Basin and beyond.

• Chapter 1 Introduction Chapter 2 The Linker in the Khoisan LanguagesChapter 3 The Internal Structure of vP in Ju|'Hoansi and [lHoan*Chapter 4 Linkers and the Internal Structure of vP, co-authored with Mark C. Baker Chapter 5 The Absence of the Linker in Double Object Constructions in N|uuChapter 6 Click Pronouns in N|uu