Hannah Gibson - Böcker

This volume explores the rich and complex pattern of morphosyntactic variation in the Bantu languages, providing a comprehensive overview of the wealth of empirical and conceptual work in the field. The chapters discuss data from some 80 Bantu languages as well as drawing on a wider comparative set of more than 200 languages from across Central, Eastern and Southern Africa: some studies focus on one specific language in a comparative context; some investigate fine-grained variation among a close-knit group of languages; and others present large-scale comparative studies spanning the whole of the Bantu-speaking area. The contributors address a range of topics from a micro-variation perspective, primarily in the areas of nominal and verbal morphology and syntax and information structure. The volume highlights key aspects of contemporary research in Bantu morphosyntax and outlines distinct and novel approaches to prominent questions; it combines the most recent thinking on morphosyntactic variation in Bantu with different theoretical and methodological approaches and novel empirical data from a wide range of languages.

Building Meaning in Context: A Dynamic Approach to Bantu Clause Structure uses the tools of the Dynamic Syntax framework to explore morphosyntactic phenomena in a number of Bantu languages. Examines word order alternations, inversion constructions and negation in Bantu, showing the incremental nature of the build-up of meaning in contextHighlights cross-linguistic parallels, drawing on data from Japanese, Korean, Romance languages and varieties of GreekOffers a radical new perspective on the nature of human language, showing the centrality of the concepts of underspecification and update which lie at the heart of the DS structure building processAn innovative analysis with a broad empirical coverage