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  • The first Glot International state-of-the-article book: The latest in linguistics ed. by Lisa Cheng, Rint Sybesma
  • Eric Mathieu
The first Glot International state-of-the-article book: The latest in linguistics. Ed. by Lisa Cheng and Rint Sybesma. (Studies in generative grammar 48.) Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, 2000. Pp. 409. ISBN: 3110169541. $108.90.

These fifteen articles have appeared previously in Glot International (Vols. 1 and 2, 1995–1997). Designed to give an overview of a particular linguistic topic (very much in the spirit of SynCom), these ‘state-of-the-articles’ all end with a full bibliography on the subject. The papers have been revised for this edition, taking into account the most recent updates in their respective domains of enquiry. Although not clearly marked, the book contains two main parts. The first part contains seven articles ranging from syntax, semantics, discourse, and L2 acquisition to typology, all written from a generative grammar perspective. The second part concentrates on phonology with one exception, the last paper, which is on lexical change.

The book is dedicated to the memory of Teun Hoekstra whose contribution, ‘The function of functional categories’, opens the series of articles. The goal of the paper is to review the concept of functional category in generative grammar for the past twenty-five years. Norbert Hornstein’s ‘Control in GB and minimalism’ surveys the shift from the GB empty category view of control to more recent accounts couched in terms of NP trace or raising of aspectual features. In ‘Ergativity: A perspective on recent work’, Alana Johns enumerates the properties of ergative/absolutive languages. The notion of split systems is introduced, and it is emphasized that no language seems to be wholly ergative. Kyle Johnson’s paper, ‘When verb phrases go missing’, discusses VP ellipsis and compares the pro-form (the gap is a pronoun) view with the derivational account (the gap is a trace or a copy of a full version of the antecedent). ‘Topic and focus’ by Henriëtte de Swart and Helen de Hoop is an excellent review of the domain of discourse. Given that topic and focus mean different things to different people, the synthesis and the clarifications they provide is a breath of fresh air. In ‘Recent research on the acquisition of L2 competence: Morphosyntax and argument structure’, Lynn Eubank and Alan Juffs comment upon the progress of L2 research from the early days of GB to the present day. In ‘Model theoretic syntax’, Tom Cornell and James Rogers argue that the connections between the principles and parameters framework and grammar formalisms in the Montagovian tradition run deeper than previously suspected. Luigi Burzio’s ‘The rise of optimality theory’ is a brilliant introduction to the topic and charts the progress that has been made in phonology for the past twenty years. Paula Fikkert’s ‘Acquisition of phonology’ shows that research into the acquisition of phonology is ideally not only based on formal theories but also on analyses of longitudinal data from child language. ‘Tone: An overview’ is the title of San Duanmu’s paper. It goes through the development and achievement in research on tone in the past thirty years. ‘The phonology-morphology interface’ by Geert Booij introduces lexical phonology and provides a map of the historical development of the field. The next installment is about word-level stress. The article, entitled ‘Metrical phonology’, is by Harry van der Hulst. Next, Curt Rice discusses ‘Generative metrics’ in an article of the same name. It contains a very comprehensive section on OT. Wendy Sandler’s ‘One phonology or two? Sign language and phonological theory’ focuses on the contribution of phonological theories to our understanding of sign language. The book closes with ‘Semantic change’ by Elizabeth Closs Traugott. The article discusses lexical variation with a special emphasis on metaphor, metonymy, and discourse markers.

The book is superbly edited and provides many hours of fun reading. Each article is a perfect introduction [End Page 648...

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