Book contents
- The Cambridge Handbook of Language Contact
- Cambridge Handbooks in Language and Linguistics
- The Cambridge Handbook of Language Contact
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Maps Volume I
- Figures Volume I
- Tables Volume I
- Contributors
- Preface
- Introduction
- Part One Language Contact and Genetic Linguistics
- 2 Language Contact and Historical Linguistics
- 3 The Chinese Expansion and Language Coexistence in Modern China
- 4 Tracing Language Contact in Africa’s Past
- 5 Populations in Contact: Linguistic, Archaeological, and Genomic Evidence for Indo-European Diffusion
- 6 The Impact of Autochthonous Languages on Bantu Language Variation: A Comparative View on Southern and Central Africa
- Part Two Linguistic Areas
- Part Three Language Spread
- Part Four Emergence and Spread of Some European Languages
- Part Five Language Diasporas
- Author Index
- Language Index
- Subject Index
- References
2 - Language Contact and Historical Linguistics
from Part One - Language Contact and Genetic Linguistics
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 June 2022
- The Cambridge Handbook of Language Contact
- Cambridge Handbooks in Language and Linguistics
- The Cambridge Handbook of Language Contact
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Maps Volume I
- Figures Volume I
- Tables Volume I
- Contributors
- Preface
- Introduction
- Part One Language Contact and Genetic Linguistics
- 2 Language Contact and Historical Linguistics
- 3 The Chinese Expansion and Language Coexistence in Modern China
- 4 Tracing Language Contact in Africa’s Past
- 5 Populations in Contact: Linguistic, Archaeological, and Genomic Evidence for Indo-European Diffusion
- 6 The Impact of Autochthonous Languages on Bantu Language Variation: A Comparative View on Southern and Central Africa
- Part Two Linguistic Areas
- Part Three Language Spread
- Part Four Emergence and Spread of Some European Languages
- Part Five Language Diasporas
- Author Index
- Language Index
- Subject Index
- References
Summary
Language contact studies and historical linguistics, i.e. the study of language change, are subfields of linguistics that have long been recognized as being mutually relevant. This chapter explores this relationship along two dimensions: first, with regard to the fields of study themselves, and second, and perhaps more importantly, with regard to those aspects of language contact and of influence external to a given linguistic system that are particularly relevant to understanding the basic subject matter of historical linguistics, i.e. what happens to languages as they pass through time. In terms of the fields of study, an overview of the historiography of the distinction between internally motivated and externally motivated change is offered. This survey is followed by a discussion of several case studies, in which language contact serves as an actuator of change as well as some in which it is an inhibitor of change. Finally, the interaction of language contact with another key issue in historical linguistics, namely language genealogy, is discussed, along with a consideration of the naturalness and pervasiveness of language contact.
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- Information
- The Cambridge Handbook of Language ContactVolume 1: Population Movement and Language Change, pp. 43 - 63Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2022
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