Motives for Language Change (review)

The fifteen essays collected in this volume are meant to celebrate the 60th birthday of Roger Lass, who is known for his interest in the philosophical issues relating to methods of internal and comparative reconstruction. The first two papers deal with theoretical issues. Peter Matthews (7–17) raises questions about the Chomskyan position that language change is an epiphenomenon rather than a matter of the I(nternal)-language. Frederick J. Newmeyer (18–36) stresses the importance of distinguishing formal explanations of language change (i.e. those appealing to mental grammar) from functional explanations (i.e. those appealing to the use and users of language).

Four of the contributions are concerned with linguistic models of language change. Jean Aitchison (39–53) shows that theoretical models are in fact formulated as metaphors, such as conduit, tree, waves, game, chain, plants, building, and dominator, without engaging the reality of language change itself. On the basis of the history of English, David Denison (54–70) questions the validity of S-curves for describing change. Richard Hogg (71–81) suggests that, contrary to popular belief, suppletion may arise in preference to regularization and can even develop into regular morphology. April McMahon (82–96) points out several limitations of optimality theory in explaining the English Great Vowel Shift, and derives from this its inadequacies for explaining phonological change generally.

Three studies deal with issues concerning grammaticalization. David Lightfoot (99–123) argues that grammaticalization reveals more about the effect of language change than its cause. Elizabeth Closs Traugott (124–39) shows how the speaker-hearer situation can contribute to the development from subjectivization to intersubjectivization. For example, let’s is a subjective hortatory particle, but when used by a nurse in the utterance Let’s take our pills, Roger, it acquires an intersubjective meaning. Along the same lines, James Milroy (143–57) highlights the role that speakers play in language change.

Four papers are concerned with contact-based explanations. Markku Filppula (161–73) traces the internal and external factors of the development of Irish English. Malcolm Ross (174–98) speculates on the role of language contact in the prehistory of Papuan languages. Gregory K. Iverson and Joseph C. Salmons (199–212) deal with the spread of Germanic umlaut through contact. Raymond Hickey (213–39) looks at the stages of the formation of New Zealand English in which varieties originating from its diverse inputs were selected out in preference of similarities.

The last two contributions discuss typological changes. Bernard Comrie (243–57) stresses the validity of the uniformitarian hypothesis, namely that the earlier stages of a language show fewer complexities than the present-day stage. Raymond Hickey (258–78) shows how learners’ reanalysis can induce typological change (e.g. marking off Irish from other Celtic languages). Divergent as they are, these papers reflect serious efforts to gain deeper insights into language change.