This volume focuses on the relation between theory and description by examining aspects of transitivity in different languages. Transitivity or case grammar, to use the popular term has always occupied a centre-stage position in linguistics, not least because of its supposedly p…
Language change and functional explanations
Why is a raven like a writing-desk? The concept of similarity lies at the heart of this new book on contrastive analysis. Similarity judgements depend partly on properties of the objects being compared, and partly on what the person judging considers to be relevant to the assess…
Although the contributors to this book do not belong to one particular 'school' of linguistic theory, they all share an interest in the external functions of language in society and in the relationship between these functions and internal linguistic phenomena. In this sense they…
Although the contributors to this book do not belong to one particular 'school' of linguistic theory, they all share an interest in the external functions of language in society and in the relationship between these functions and internal linguistic phenomena. In this sense they…
The two basic approaches to linguistics are the formalist and the functionalist approaches. In this work, Frederick J. Newmeyer, a formalist, argues that both approaches are valid. However, because formal and functional linguists have avoided direct confrontation, they remain un…