R. A. Lodge, A sociolinguistic history of Parisian French. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004. Pp. xi, 290. Hb $70.

Detailed longitudinal studies of urban sociolinguistic change are few and far between. They are intrinsically difficult and of vast scope and pose severe theoretical and methodological problems concerning the availability and reliability of data. Lodge's survey of how the speech of Paris “has evolved hand in hand with demographic and socio-economic change” (p. 250), over some 800 years, is a largely convincing attempt to overcome these problems.