LIN 617 - Historical Linguistics - Seminar - Spring 2005



LIN 617 - Historical Linguistics - Seminar - Spring 2005 - 97758

Wed 4:40 - 7:30

 

Elly van Gelderen

Room: LL 226C; e-mail: ellyvangelderen@asu.edu

Office hours: MW 9 – 9:30 am; MW 11:30 – 1 pm; and by appointment (or after class).



Aim:

The aim of Historical Linguistics is to describe change and to (try to) explain it. In this course, we will

(a) examine the ways different schools and frameworks look at change and variation and the methods they typically use, e.g. Neogrammarians and the Comparative Method, Structuralists and Harmony, Generativists and Reanalysis.

(b) look at a variety of (mainly morphosyntactic) changes in different language families, e.g. from synthetic to analytic and back, changes in Case and agreement, embedding, negation, pronoun systems, number systems in Indo-European, Germanic, Romance, Athabascan, Uto-Aztecan, Nostratic, and other families.

 

Method:

For the first several weeks, we will read original articles by people of each of the different directions/approaches (such as Jones, von Schlegel, Grimm, Schleicher, Osthoff & Brugmann for the nineteenth century) as well as textbook chapters (such as Bynon). After that, we will examine a number of issues in different language families.

Students will be expected to read the required reading each week and formulate questions about these. They will also be required to write a review of one of the additional readings. The final paper could focus on either an issue in a particular language or family, or a method for examining change, or a particular school.

 

Evaluation:

30%: 10 times 2 questions/critical comments (to be handed in or e-mailed the Tuesday before class and to be used in class). These need not be elaborate but need to show that you have read the material critically.

60%: Research paper. In week 12, a first draft of the paper is due. This draft will be commented on by Elly and given back. The final version of your paper should incorporate the comments and be 20 pages long. It is due the last week.

10%: 3 page review of one of the additional readings, handed in week 13 (the article or chapter to be reviewed can be from the optional readings but needs to be on a different topic from the paper).

 

Required texts:

There are no required texts. The instructor will make texts available. Some can be downloaded from: ling.hawaii.edu/faculty/stampe/Linguistics/LehmannReader or from: utexas.edu/cola/depts/lrc (IE Doc). There are two optional texts: Aitchison and Bynon.

Preliminary schedule:

 

The additional/optional readings are listed for further reading (e.g. if your paper deals with that topic) and for you to select one from for your review. 

 

Jan 19

Week 1: Introduction, Organization, and Resources. Handouts on Language Origins and Grimm’s Law.

 

DIRECTIONS/APPROACHES (4 weeks):

 

Jan 26

Week 2: The 19th Century: Comparative, Typological, `Romantic' and `scientific' Linguistics. Readings: Jones (1786); von Schlegel (1808); Rask (1818) all reprinted/translated in Lehmann (1967: 10-20; 23-8; 31-7, available from: ling.hawaii.edu/faculty/stampe/Linguistics/LehmannReader), and Waterman (1963 [1983]: 18-60). Optional reading: Bopp (1816); Humboldt (1836); Schleicher (1871); Osthoff & Brugmann (1878), all in Lehmann; Robins (1967: chap 6 and 7); Said (1986); Poliakov (1971); Schwab (1950); Pedersen (1931 [1959]: 248-310); Müller (1864: lecture 7), and Bynon (1977: chap 1).

 

Feb 2

Week 3: Some background on phonetics, OE, Sanskrit, and the early 20th Century: Structuralism, typology, and generative phonology. Readings: on structuralism, Bynon (1977: chap 2, pp.76-107); typology, Sapir (1921, chap 7: ); Generative Phonology, Andersen (1973: 767); Kiparsky (1970); Possibly Bynon (1977: 108-47). Optional reading: Martinet (1955); Jespersen (1922, chap 14-15); Greenberg (1973).

 

Feb 9

Week 4: The early 20th Century continued and review so far. Review reading up to now.

 

Feb 16

Week 5: The late 20th Century: Generative Syntax and Grammaticalization. Readings: Lightfoot (1979: 229-239; 2003); and Kiparsky (1997). Optional reading: an article from Traugott & Heine (1991); parts of Gabelentz (1891); Meillet (1912); Newmeyer (1998: ch 5).

Feb 23

Week 6: The present: Grammaticalization in generative and functionalist frameworks Readings: van Gelderen (2004); Hopper & Thompson (1993: 18-62; 167-203); Optional readings: Andersen (2001); Traugott (2001), or Campbell (2002).

Mar 2

Week 7: Cognitive grammar on grammaticalization. Heine et al (1991: 123-168); and Wu (2000). General change: Jespersen 1922.

SPECIFIC CHANGES IN DIFFERENT LANGUAGE FAMILIES:

Mar 9

Week 8: Glottochonology, genealogical linguistics, and areal linguistics. Bynon (pp. 266-272); Haspelmath (2004); Trudgill (2005). We’ll also watch two videos (Journey of Man and In search of the first language).

Mar 16

Week 9: SPRING BREAK

Mar 23

Week 10: Review so far. The Linguistic Cycle: Synthetic > analytic and back. Reading: Hodge 1970, Givon 2000, Schwegler 1990. Optional: Haspelmath 2000 (); Lakoff 1972, Steever 1993.

Mar 30

Week 11: Issues in Indo-European. Grammatical marking: changes in agreement and Case (head and dependent marking) and changes in clause structure. Reading: Kiparsky (1996); Nichols (1992: chap 1); Gamkrelidze & Ivanov (1994: 233-276). Optional readings: Lehmann (1993); parts of Delbrück (1919), or Brugmann (1903 [1933]) or Bopp (1816); Kurylowicz 1964; Ruhlen (1994: chap 5); Klimov (1974).

April 6

Week 12: Research paper draft due. Ergative, have/be, possessive-locative-existential. Mahajan 1996, van Gelderen 2000, Heine Optional: Staal on Zuni, Robertson (1980) on Mayan, Lazard on Persian, McWhorter (1996) on Sranan, Comrie (1978).

April 13

Week 13: Review due. Pronoun systems and number system changes. Reconstructing the languages of the Americas. Parts of Greenberg (1987). Ruhlen (1994: chap 4), Givon (2000, see week 10) and Rankin (2003 and also ). Issues in African Historical Linguistics. Greenberg (19??); Heine et al. (1984).

 

April 20

Week 14: Student papers.

 

April 27

Week 15: Student papers

 

 

 References:

Aitchison, Jean. 1991. Language Change: Progress or Decay. CUP.

Andersen, Henning 1973. ”Abductive and deductive change” Language 49:765-793.

Andersen, Henning 2001. “Actualization and the (Uni)directionality of Change”. In Actualization. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Bopp, Franz 1816. Über das Konjugationssystem der Sanskritsprache ...

Bopp, Franz 1833-1868. Vergleichende Grammatik ...

Brugman, Karl.

Bynon, Theodora. 1977 [1999]. Historical Linguistics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Campbell, Lyle 2002. “Why and How do languages Diversify and Spread?”

hum.utah.edu/linguistics/Faculty/campbell/ Campbell_Kobe.doc

Campbell, Lyle in press. “Areal Linguistics”.

hum.utah.edu/linguistics/Faculty/campbell/ CampbellArealLingEnc.doc

Campbell, Lyle & Marianne Mithun 1979. The Languages of Native America. Austin: University of Texas Press.

Carstairs-McCarthy, Andrew 1999. The Origins of Complex Language. OUP.

Chomsky, Noam. 1966. Cartesian Linguistics. New York: Harper & Row.

Chomsky, Noam 2004. “Three factors in language design”. LSA talk.

Comrie, Bernard 1978. “Ergativity”. Syntactic Typology: 329-394.

Delbrück, B. 1919. Einleitung in das Studium der Indogermanischen Sprachen, 6th edition.

Gabelentz, G von der 1891. Die Sprachwissenschaft. Leipzig.

Gamkrelidze, T. & V. Ivanov 1994-5. Indo-European and the Indo-Europeans I and II Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. (pp. 185-375)

Garrett, Andrew 1990. The Syntax of the Anatolian Pronominal Clitics. Harvard PhD.

Gelderen, Elly van 1993. The Rise of Functional Categories. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Gelderen, Elly van 1997. Verbal Agreement and the Grammar behind its `Breakdown'. Tübingen: Niemeyer.

Gelderen, Elly van 2000. A History of English Reflexive Pronouns. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Gelderen, Elly van 2004. Grammaticalization as Economy. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. [see also: ).

Gildea, Spike 2000. Reconstructing Grammar. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Givon, Talmy 2000. “Internal reconstruction, as method, as theory”. In Gildea

Greenberg, Joseph 1973. "The Typological Method", ed. by T. Sebeok Current Trends in Linguistics 11: 149-93. Den Haag: Mouton.

Greenberg, Joseph 1987. Language in the Americas. Stanford.

Greenberg, Joseph 2000. Indo-European and its clostest relatives. Stanford.

Haider, Hubert & Martin Prinzhorn, eds. 1986. Verb Second Phenomena in Germanic Languages. Dordrecht: Foris.

Haspelmath, Martin 1989. LB?

Haspelmath, Martin 1998. “The semantic development of old presents”. Diachronica 15: 29-62.

Haspelmath, Martin 1999.

Haspelmath, Martin 2000.

Haugen, Jason 2004. Issues in Comparative Uto-Aztecan Morphosyntax. University of Arizona Diss.

Heine, Bernd 1993?? Possession…

Heine, Bernd et al 1991. Grammaticalization. Chicago: Chicago UP.

Heine, Bernd et al 1984. Grammaticalization and reanalysis in African Languages. Hamburg: Helmut Buske.

Hirt, H. 1927-37. Indogermanische Grammatik, 7 volumes.

Hodge, Carleton 1970. “The Linguistic Cycle”. Language Sciences 13: 1-7.

Hopper, Mike & Elizabeth Traugott 1993/2003. Grammaticalization. Cambridge.

Howe, Stephen 1996. The Personal Pronouns in the Germanic Languages. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter.

Jespersen, Otto 1922. Language.

Joseph, Brian & Richard Janda (eds) 2003. The Handbook of Historical Linguistics. Blackwell.

King, Robert 1969. Historical Linguistics and Generative Grammar.

Kiparsky, Paul 1970 [1982]. "Historical Linguistics". Explanation in Phonology. Dordrecht: Foris.

Kiparsky, Paul 1996. "Indo-European Origins of Germanic Syntax", in Battye, A. & I. Roberts (eds.) Clause Structure and Language Change. Oxford UP.

Kiparsky, Paul 1997. "The Rise of Positional Licensing", in van Kemenade, A. & N. Vincent (eds), Parameters of Morphosyntactic Change. Cambridge: CUP.

Klimov, G.A. 1974. ** Linguistics 131: 11-25.

Koerner, Konrad 2004. Essays in the History of Linguistics. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Kurylowicz, J. 1964. The Inflectional Categories of Indo-European. Heidelberg: Carl Winter Verlag. (P621.K8)

Lakoff, Robin 1971. “Another look at drift”. Linguistic Change and Generative Theory, 172-198. Bloomington: Indiana UP.

Lehmann, W. 1967. A Reader in Nineteenth Century Historical Indo-European Linguistics. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Can be downloaded from: ling.hawaii.edu/faculty/stampe/Linguistics/LehmannReader

Lehmann, W.P. 1993. Theoretical Bases of Indo-European Linguistics. London: Routledge.

Lightfoot, David 1979. Principles of Diachronic Syntax. Cambridge: CUP.

Lightfoot, David 1983. “On Reconstructing a Proto-Syntax”. Rauch & Carr (eds). Language Change. Indiana UP.

Lightfoot, David 1995. "Why UG needs a Learning Theory: Triggering Verb Movement", in Battye, A. & Ian Roberts (eds) Clause Structure and Language Change. Oxford: OUP.

Lightfoot, David 2003a. “Cuing a new grammar”. Ms.

Lightfoot, David 2003b. “Grammatical Approaches to Linguistic Change” in Joseph & Janda.

Lockwood, W.B. 1969. Indo-European Philology. London: Hutchinson.

Luraghi, Silvia 2001. “Some remarks on Instrument, Comitative, and Agrent in Indo-European”. STUF 54.4: 385-401.

Martinet, A. 1955. Economie des Changements Phonétiques. Bern: Francke.

Matras, Yaron & Peter Bakker 2003. The Mixed Language debate. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.

McWhorter, John 1997. Towards a new model of creole genesis. New York: Peter Lang.

Meillet, A. 1912. "L'evolution des formes grammaticales", reprinted in Meillet 1958 Linguistique Historique et Linguistique Generale.

Meillet, A. 1937 [1903]. Introduction a l'étude comparative des langues indo-européennes, 8th ed. reprinted 1964.

Müller, M. 1864. Lectures on the Science of Language. London: Longman.

Newmeyer, Frederick 1998. Language Form and Language Function. MIT.

Nichols, Johanna. 1992. Linguistic Diversity in space and time. University of Chicago Press.

Ohala, John 2003. “Phonetics and Historical Phonology”, in Joseph & Janda.

Pearce, Elizabeth 1990. Parameters in Old French Syntax. Dordrecht: Kluwer.

Pedersen, H. 1931[1962] The Discovery of Language: Linguistic Science in the 19th Century. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.

Poliakov, L. 1971. The Aryan Myth. B&N reprint 1996.

Prokosch, E. 1939. A Comparative Germanic Grammar. Philadelphia.

Roberts, Ian & Anna Roussou 2003. Syntactic Change. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. One chapter in:

Robertson, John 1980. The Structure of Pronoun Incorporation in the Mayan Verbal complex. New York: Garland

Robins, R.H. 1967. A Short History of Linguistics. London: Longman.

Prokosch, E. 1938. A Comparative Germanic Grammar. Baltimore: LSA.

Rankin, Robert 2003. “The Comparative Method”, in Joseph & Janda.

Renfrew, Colin et al 2000. Time Depth in Historical Linguistics. McDonald Institute for Archeological Research.

Ruhlen, M. 1994. The Origin of Language. New York: Wiley.

Said, E. 1984. Orientalism.

Sapir, Edward 1921. Language. Downloadable at: .

Schwab, R. 1950. La Renaissance Orientale. Paris: Payot. [translated by Gene Patterson-Black, The Oriental Renaissance. NY: Columbia UP]

Schwegler, A. 1990. Analyticity and Syntheticity. Berlin: Mouton (PC 201 S38 1990)

Staal, Frits. 1967. Word order in Sanskrit and universal grammar. Dordrecht: Reidel.

Steele, Susan 1976. “Clisis and diachrony”. In Charles Li Mechanisms of Syntactic Change, 539-579.

Steever, Sanford 1993. Analysis to synthesis: the development of complex verb morphology in the Dravidian languages. OUP.

Tauli, Valter 1958. The Structural Tendencies of Languages. Helsinki.

Traugott, Elizabeth 1997a. “From Subjectification to Intersubjectification”.

Traugott, Elizabeth 1997b.

Traugott, Elizabeth 2001. “Legitimate Counterexamples to Grammaticalization”.

Traugott, Elizabeth & Richard Dasher 2002. CUP.

Traugott, Elizabeth & Berndt Heine, eds. 1991. Approaches to Grammaticalization I and II. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Trudgill, Peter 1990. The Dialects of England. Oxford: Blackwell.

Waterman, J. 1963 [1970]. Perspectives in Linguistics. Chicago: Chicago UP.

Whitman, John 2000. “Relabelling”. In Susan Pintzuk, George Tsoulas, and Anthony Warner Diachronic Syntax, 220-238. OUP.

Wood, Johanna 2003. Definiteness and Number. Arizona State University Diss.

Wu, Xiu-Zhi Zoe 2000. Grammaticalization and the Development of Functional Categories. University of Southern California Diss.



 

Some examples of paper topics

An issue in a particular language or family:

1. Grammaticalization in Chinese. What does it tell us about the linguistic cycle? See Wu, and Wu and Simpson at the Chinese Linguistics Archive: .

2. How ‘mixed languages’ arise and what they look like, e.g. Matras & Bakker 2003; Thomason & Kaufman 1988.

 

3. Grammaticalization of e.g. determiners (Lyons 1999; Diessel), or modals, or instrumentals (e.g. Luraghi 2001), or the future (Joseph 1982, Robert & Roussou 2003).

 

4. Reasons behind suppletion, e.g. be/is/am; go/went; good/better; I/me; we/us (Gamkrelidze & Ivanov).

 

5. The change from ergative to non-ergative (Modern Persian), or the development of ergativity (e.g. Garrett 1990).

6. The typology of languages that use animate/inanimate, i.e. active languages. Lehman (1993): evidence from Indo-European.

7. Changes in mood, e.g. the replacement of the indicative by the subjunctive (Haspelmath 1998).

8. Changes in inflection (Chapman and Trudgill), or the history of pronouns in a language (Howe 1996).

A method for examining change:

9. Genetic Classification and use of the CM. For instance, review and evaluate the evidence for grouping the Pueblo languages (Zuni, Acoma, et, see Davis 1979 in Campbell & Mithun 1979), or what might Basque be related to.

10. Use of corpora, see e.g.

11. The Computational Phylogenetics Project (cs.rice.edu/~nakhleh/CPHL/

12. Glottochronology.

13. Connections among writing systems: .

A particular school or idea:

14. Historical pragmatics, Brinton, Jucker, Biber, Traugott 1997ab

15. Influence of Darwinism on 19th century linguistics.

16. Functionalist Historical Linguistics, e.g. Hapelmath 1999

17. Structuralism.

18. Sound Symbolism (Prokosch 1939: 120-23).

19. Racism in (Historical) Linguistics (Bernal, Koerner 2004, Said 1984)

20. Analogy. De Saussure and Hock.

LIN 617 INTRODUCTION AND RESOURCES

EvG – 19 Jan 2005

Why study HisLing?

Some terminology/concepts

See glossary at:

CM

cognate

corpus/corpora

diachronic - synchronic

external - internal

generative

grammaticalization

IR

opacity

proto-language

reanalysis

reconstruction

UG

E-resources

Indo-European homepage:

OED ()

Electronic Texts (see my links: )

Monoconc and TACT

BNC and other corpora (see ).

Utexas: utexas.edu/cola/depts/lrc.

Regular Conferences (with proceedings)

ICHL (Benjamins), see

ICEHL (Benjamins), see ; Bergamo in 2006

DIGS (OUP), see

NRG (Benjamins), see

One-time conferences

Genes, Peoples, and Languages:

Journals

Diachronica, see

Language Variation and Change ().

Studia Linguistica Historica

Journal of Historical Pragmatics ().

History of Linguistics – Jan 26, 2005 - EvG

1. Relevance for Historical Linguistics.

2. Understand modern developments.

3. Understand how ‘change’ is seen (decay or progress) and used socially.

The 19th Century (and a little before and after)

`Romantic’ linguistics: language, thought, and nation are related.

William Jones (1746-94)

Rasmus Rask (1787-1832)

Franz Bopp (1791-1867)

Jacob Grimm (1785-1863)

August Wilhelm Von Schlegel (1767-1845)

Friedrich von Schlegel (1772-1829)

Wilhelm von Humboldt (1767 – 1835)

Typological and Darwinian, also interest in phonetics

Also Wilhelm von Humboldt

Schleicher (1821 – 1868)

Henry Sweet (1845 – 1912)

Edward Sievers (1850-?)

Otto Jespersen (1860-?)

William Dwight Whitney (1827-1894)

Neogrammarian: sound laws without exception and analogy

August Leskien (1840-1916)

Hermann Osthoff (1847-1909)

Karl Brugman (1849-1919)

Ferdinand de Saussure (1857-1913)

Hermann Paul (1846-1921)

Some quotes:

“Liegt nicht ein gewisser mut und stolz darin, media in tenuis, tenuis in aspirata zu verstärken?” (Grimm 1853: 306).

“Die flectirenden Sprachen stehen somit am höchsten auf der Scala der Sprachen” (Schleicher 1859: 9).

The gerund “makes possible a finer shading of thought and feeling” (Curme 1912 361).

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