1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910784699403321

Autore

Blevins Juliette

Titolo

Evolutionary phonology : the emergence of sound patterns / / Juliette Blevins [[electronic resource]]

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Cambridge : , : Cambridge University Press, , 2004

ISBN

1-107-14390-X

1-283-33086-5

0-511-21393-X

9786613330864

0-511-21572-X

0-511-21035-3

0-511-30924-4

0-511-48635-9

0-511-21212-7

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (xix, 366 pages) : digital, PDF file(s)

Disciplina

414

Soggetti

Grammar, Comparative and general - Phonology

Linguistic change

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

Title from publisher's bibliographic system (viewed on 05 Oct 2015).

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references (p. 315-356) and indexes.

Nota di contenuto

; Preliminaries: -- What is evolutionary phonology? -- Evolution in language and elsewhere -- Explanation in phonology: a brief history of ideas -- ; Sound Patterns: -- Laryngeal features -- Place features -- Other common sound patterns -- The evolution of geminates -- Some uncommon sound patterns -- ; Implications: -- Synchronic phonology -- Diachronic phonology -- Beyond phonology.

Sommario/riassunto

Evolutionary Phonology is a theory of sound patterns which synthesizes results in historical linguistics, phonetics and phonological theory. In this book, Juliette Blevins explores the nature of sounds patterns and sound change in human language over the past 7000-8000 years, the time depth for which the comparative method is reasonably reliable.  This book presents an approach to the problem of how genetically unrelated languages, from families as far apart as Native American,



Australian Aboriginal, Austronesian and Indo-European, can often show similar sound patterns, and also tackles the converse problem of why there are notable exceptions to most of the patterns that are often regarded as universal tendencies or constraints. It argues that in both cases, a formal model of sound change that integrates phonetic variation and patterns of misperception can account for attested sound systems without reference to markedness or naturalness within the synchronic grammar.