Language Change

This is a lucid and up-to-date overview of language change. It discusses where our evidence about language change comes from, how and why changes happen, and how languages begin and end. It considers both changes which occurred long ago, and those currently in progress. It does this within the framework of one central question - is language change a symptom of progress or decay? It concludes that language is neither progressing nor decaying, but that an understanding of the factors surrounding change is essential for anyone concerned about language alteration. For this substantially revised third edition, Jean Aitchison has included two new chapters on change of meaning and grammaticalization. Sections on new methods of reconstruction and ongoing chain shifts in Britain and America have also been added as well as over 150 new references. The work remains non-technical in style and accessible to readers with no previous knowledge of linguistics.

• Lucid and up-to-date overview of language change • Third edition of this bestselling textbook is substantially revised and includes two new chapters • Non-technical in style and accessible to the reader with no previous knowledge of linguistics

Part I. Preliminaries: 1. The ever-whirling wheel: the inevitability of change; 2. Collecting up clues: piecing together the evidence; 3. Charting the changes: studying changes in progress; Part II. Transition: 4. Spreading the word: from person to person; 5. Conflicting loyalties: opposing social pressures; 6. Catching on and taking off: how sound changes spread through a language; 7. Caught in the web: how syntactic changes work through a language; 8. The wheels of language: grammaticalization; 9. Slip slidin’ away: change of meaning; Part III: 10. The reason why: sociolinguistic causes of change; 11. Doing what comes naturally: inherent causes of language change; 12. Repairing the patterns: therapeutic changes; 13. The Mad Hatter’s tea-party: chain reaction changes; Part IV: 14. Development and breakdown: child language and language disorders; 15. Language birth: how languages begin; 16. Language death: how languages end; 17. Progress or decay?: Assessing the situation.

‘The book is a very good and readable introduction to the discipline of historical linguistics and covers a very large number of questions.’ The Linguist