Joseph Brian D. Joseph – författare

This volume centers on three important theoretical concepts for the study of language change and the ways in which language structure emerges and turns into new structure: reanalysis, actualization, and indexicality. Reanalysis is a part of ongoing everyday language use, a process through which language is reproduced and changed. Actualization refers to the processes through which a reanalyzed structure spreads throughout single communities and society. Indexicality covers the way in which parts of a linguistic system can point to other parts of the system, both syntagmatically and paradigmatically. The inclusion of indexicality leads to fine-grained analysis in morphology, word order, and constructional syntax.

The “Nostratic” hypothesis — positing a common linguistic ancestor for a wide range of language families including Indo-European, Uralic, and Afro-Asiatic — has produced one of the most enduring and often intense controversies in linguistics. Overwhelmingly, though, both supporters of the hypothesis and those who reject it have not dealt directly with one another’s arguments. This volume brings together selected representatives of both sides, as well as a number of agnostic historical linguists, with the aim of examining the evidence for this particular hypothesis in the context of distant genetic relationships generally.The volume contains discussion of variants of the Nostratic hypothesis (A. Bomhard; J. Greenberg; A. Manaster-Ramer, K. Baertsch, K. Adams, & P. Michalove), the mathematics of chance in determining the relationships posited for Nostratic (R. Oswalt; D. Ringe), and the evidence from particular branches posited in Nostratic (L. Campbell; C. Hodge; A. Vovin), with responses and additional discussion by E. Hamp, B. Vine, W. Baxter and B. Comrie.

This bibliography provides an alphabetical listing of over 1500 articles, books, and dissertations that treat in some way the topic of clitics and related matters, e.g. affixes, words, word order, movement, sandhi, etc. The beginning point for the bibliographic entries is 1892, taking Jacob Wackernagel''s classic work as the point of departure, and the entries cover the subsequent 100-year period. Each entury is accompanied by a series of descriptors which give an indication of the content of the item. Nearly one-third of the book is a detailed analytic index, based on the descriptors, which can aid in topical searches for relevant material. Prefatory matter includes an essay “What is a Clitic?” by Arnold M. Zwicky, a brief consideration of Wackernagel''s scholarly career by Brian D. Joseph, and information on the format and use of the book itself.