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- Volume 29, Issue, 2012
Diachronica - Volume 29, Issue 4, 2012
Volume 29, Issue 4, 2012
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Phonologically-constrained change: The role of the foot in monosyllabization and rhythmic shifts in Mainland Southeast Asia
Author(s): Marc Brunelle and Pittayawat Pittayapornpp.: 411–433 (23)More LessChanges in word shapes in Mainland Southeast Asia are usually attributed to contact-induced typological convergence. However, little attention has been paid to the role of structural constraints in defining paths of change. In this paper, we describe two distributional gaps in paths of word shape shifts: (1) there are no attested cases of direct shift between trochaic and iambic rhythm and (2) monosyllabization does not occur in trochaic languages. We argue that universal phonetic tendencies and structural constraints on their phonologization that derive from the Iambic-Trochaic Law are sufficient to explain these gaps and seem to account for at least part of the typological convergence usually attributed to contact.
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The emergence of obstruents after high vowels
Author(s): David R. Mortensenpp.: 434–470 (37)More LessWhile a few cases of the emergence of obstruents after high vowels are found in the literature (Burling 1966, 1967, Blust 1994), no attempt has been made to comprehensively collect instances of this sound change or give them a unified explanation. This paper attempts to resolve this gap in the literature by introducing a post-vocalic obstruent emergence (POE) as a recurring sound change with a phonetic (aerodynamic) basis. Possible cases are identified in Tibeto-Burman, Austronesian, and Grassfields Bantu. Special attention is given to a novel case in the Tibeto-Burman language Huishu.
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The principle of morphosyntactic subsystem integrity in language contact: Evidence from morphological borrowing in Resígaro (Arawakan)
Author(s): Frank Seifartpp.: 471–504 (34)More LessThis paper describes a case of non-lexical borrowing in the Northwest Amazonian language Resígaro (Arawakan), which has borrowed from the unrelated Bora language entire paradigms of noun class, gender, and number markers, as well as associated bound grammatical roots, while all other morphosyntactic subsystems of Resígaro are virtually unaffected. To account for this case of massive morphological borrowing (and others that have previously been described), this paper proposes the Principle of Morphosyntactic Subsystem Integrity (PMSI), which predicts that in situations where various grammatical morphemes are borrowed, these tend to be morphosyntactically interrelated, rather than being random collections of forms or sets of forms that are best described by well-known borrowability hierarchies, e.g. lexical before grammatical morphemes or derivational before inflectional markers.
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New methodologies for historical linguistics?: Calibrating a lexicon-based methodology for diffusion vs. subgrouping
Author(s): Mark Donohue, Tim Denham and Stephen Oppenheimerpp.: 505–522 (18)More LessRecent research claims that analysis of lexical cognate classes for a basic wordlist can reproduce linguistic subgroups within the Austronesian family (Gray et al. 2009). The analysis is open to question in two respects. Primarily, the lexically-based classification, primed with pre-established cognate classes of the family it seeks to emulate, fails to differentiate shared retentions from shared innovations. Secondly, languages and language families typically disperse through contiguous regions (especially in the Pacific) which means that geography or social distance should be expected crudely to match phylogeny in most cases. The reproduction fails because of local borrowing between branches not closely related to each other. For instance, when we examine disjunct distributions, cases in which the phylogeny does not match a straightforward geographic spread, we can determine which of these (phylogeny or geography) the lexical cognate approach preferentially detects. Where we find a mismatch between geography and phylogeny, Gray et al.’s approach clusters languages based on human geography (that is, social distance), not linguistic subgroup. In all cases of divergence between Gray et al.’s tree and accepted Austronesian trees, the discrepancy is a product of the former representing social distance rather than historical phylogenetic relationships. In summary, the examination of lexical cognate classes is not a valid proxy for the comparative method, though it is a useful heuristic for detecting pairs of languages that are either lexically conservative, or which show the effects of later lexical diffusion (without discriminating between these two outcomes).
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Basic vocabulary and Bayesian phylolinguistics: Issues of understanding and representation
Author(s): Simon J. Greenhill and Russell D. Graypp.: 523–537 (15)More LessDonohue et al.’s critique of our work on the origins and spread of the Austronesian language family is marred by misunderstandings. We respond to these by noting that our Bayesian phylogenetic approach: (1) distinguishes between retentions and innovations probabilistically, (2) focuses on basic vocabulary not ‘the lexicon’, (3) eliminates known loanwords, (4) produces results that are congruent with the results of the comparative method and conflict with the scenarios requiring unprecedented amounts of language shift postulated by Donohue et al.
Volumes & issues
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Volume 41 (2024)
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Volume 40 (2023)
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Volume 39 (2022)
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Volume 38 (2021)
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Volume 37 (2020)
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Volume 36 (2019)
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Volume 35 (2018)
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Volume 34 (2017)
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Volume 33 (2016)
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Volume 32 (2015)
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Volume 31 (2014)
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Volume 30 (2013)
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Volume 29 (2012)
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Volume 28 (2011)
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Volume 27 (2010)
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Volume 26 (2009)
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Volume 25 (2008)
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Volume 24 (2007)
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Volume 23 (2006)
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Volume 22 (2005)
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Volume 21 (2004)
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Volume 20 (2003)
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Volume 19 (2002)
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Volume 18 (2001)
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Volume 17 (2000)
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Volume 16 (1999)
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Volume 15 (1998)
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Volume 14 (1997)
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Volume 13 (1996)
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Volume 12 (1995)
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Volume 11 (1994)
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Volume 10 (1993)
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Volume 9 (1992)
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Volume 8 (1991)
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Volume 7 (1990)
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Volume 6 (1989)
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Volume 5 (1988)
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Volume 4 (1987)
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Volume 3 (1986)
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Volume 2 (1985)
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Volume 1 (1984)
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What happened to English?
Author(s): John McWhorter
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