Tania Kuteva: Difference between revisions
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'''Abstract''' | '''Abstract.''' | ||
It has been one of the dominant doctrines in linguistics lately that there exist no observable processes of language change which suggest that the overall complexity of language structure could vary significantly from period to period of the historical record. Contrary to this wide-spread belief, I will argue that grammaticalization and creolization constitute two common language change processes – identifiable across languages over and over again in historic time – which manifest a tendency towards increase in the overall complexity of language. I will take a closer look at the increasing complexity of grammatical functions as well as the increase in elaborateness of grammatical expression over time. Processes such as grammaticalization and creolization, I will argue, point to overall complexification as part of the long-term evolution of language. | It has been one of the dominant doctrines in linguistics lately that there exist no observable processes of language change which suggest that the overall complexity of language structure could vary significantly from period to period of the historical record. Contrary to this wide-spread belief, I will argue that grammaticalization and creolization constitute two common language change processes – identifiable across languages over and over again in historic time – which manifest a tendency towards increase in the overall complexity of language. I will take a closer look at the increasing complexity of grammatical functions as well as the increase in elaborateness of grammatical expression over time. Processes such as grammaticalization and creolization, I will argue, point to overall complexification as part of the long-term evolution of language. | ||
Revision as of 20:10, 7 December 2007
How do common processes of language change such as creolization and grammaticalization affect the long-term evolution of language?
Abstract.
It has been one of the dominant doctrines in linguistics lately that there exist no observable processes of language change which suggest that the overall complexity of language structure could vary significantly from period to period of the historical record. Contrary to this wide-spread belief, I will argue that grammaticalization and creolization constitute two common language change processes – identifiable across languages over and over again in historic time – which manifest a tendency towards increase in the overall complexity of language. I will take a closer look at the increasing complexity of grammatical functions as well as the increase in elaborateness of grammatical expression over time. Processes such as grammaticalization and creolization, I will argue, point to overall complexification as part of the long-term evolution of language.