This book presents a challenge to the widely-held assumption that human languages are both similar and constant in their degree of complexity. For a hundred years or more the universal equality of languages has been a tenet of faith among most anthropologists and linguists. It has been frequently advanced as a corrective to the idea that some languages are at a later stage of evolution than others. It also appears to be an inevitable outcome of one of the central axioms of generative linguistic theory: that the mental architecture of language is fixed and is thus identical in all languages and that whereas genes evolve languages do not. Language Complexity as an Evolving Variable reopens the debate. Geoffrey Sampson's introductory chapter re-examines and clarifies the notion and theoretical importance of complexity in language, linguistics, cognitive science, and evolution. Eighteen distinguished scholars from all over the world then look at evidence gleaned from their own research in order to reconsider whether languages do or do not exhibit the same degrees and kinds of complexity. They examine data from a wide range of times and places.They consider the links between linguistic structure and social complexity and relate their findings to the causes and processes of language change. Their arguments are frequently controversial and provocative; their conclusions add up to an important challenge to conventional ideas about the nature of language. The authors write readably and accessibly with no recourse to unnecessary jargon. This fascinating book will appeal to all those interested in the interrelations between human nature, culture, and language.

This study of word frequency effects on sound change provides a resolution of the Neogrammarian controversy, which for over a century has pitted phonetically exceptionless change against lexically gradual change. Combining evidence from historical linguistics, sociology and psycholinguistics, Betty S. Phillips discusses the implications for phonology and historical linguistics of certain types of change affecting the most frequent words first and other types of change affecting the least frequent words first.

Blending the spirit of "Eats, Shoots and Leaves" with the science of "The Language Instinct," an original inquiry into the development of that most essential-and mysterious-of human creations: Language Language is mankind's greatest invention-except, of course, that it was never invented." So begins linguist Guy Deutscher's enthralling investigation into the genesis and evolution of language. If we started off with rudimentary utterances on the level of "man throw spear," how did we end up with sophisticated grammars, enormous vocabularies, and intricately nuanced degrees of meaning? Drawing on recent groundbreaking discoveries in modern linguistics, Deutscher exposes the elusive forces of creation at work in human communication, giving us fresh insight into how language emerges, evolves, and decays. He traces the evolution of linguistic complexity from an early "Me Tarzan" stage to such elaborate single-word constructions as the Turkish "sehirlilestiremediklerimizdensiniz" ("you are one of those whom we couldn't turn into a town dweller"). Arguing that destruction and creation in language are intimately entwined, Deutscher shows how these processes are continuously in operation, generating new words, new structures, and new meanings. As entertaining as it is erudite, "The Unfolding of Language" moves nimbly from ancient Babylonian to American idiom, from the central role of metaphor to the staggering triumph of design that is the Semitic verb, to tell the dramatic story and explain the genius behind a uniquely human faculty.

本书系统地提出了一种不同于乔姆斯基观点的语言演变理论，把生物学和语言学的一些不同的立场整合在一起，旨在实践一种综合功能主义的主张。书中不仅大量吸收了社会语言学的理论和方法，而且吸收了功能一类型学派的语言演变理论的思路，并将这些理论较好地整合在以广义选择理论为基础的语句选择理论之中。
本书具有强烈的理论意识与熟练的理论建构套路，与国内汉语历史语言学研究的朴实风格形成了鲜明的对比，可以为汉语的历时研究提供一个可供借鉴的理论模型。