Quantifying language dynamics : : on the cutting edge of areal and phylogenetic linguistics / / edited by Søren Wichmann, Jeff Good.

• TeilnehmendeR: Wichmann, Soren,; Good, Jeff,
• Place / Publishing House: Leiden, The Netherlands ;, Boston, [Massachusetts] : : Brill,, 2014.; ©2014
• Year of Publication: 2014
• Edition: 1st ed.
• Language: English
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (246 p.)
• Notes: Description based upon print version of record.

Quantifying Language Dynamics: On the Cutting Edge of Areal and Phylogenetic Linguistics contains specially-selected papers introducing new, quantitative methodologies for understanding language interaction and evolution. It draws upon data from the phonologies, morphologies, numeral systems, constituent orders, case systems, and lexicons of the world’s languages, bringing large datasets and sophisticated statistical techniques to bear on fundamental questions such as: how to identify and account for areal distributions, when language contact leads to grammatical simplification, whether patterns of morphological borrowing can be predicted, how to deal with contact within phylogenetic models, and what new techniques are most effective for classification of the world’s languages. The book is relevant for students and scholars in general linguistics, typology, and historical and comparative linguistics.

Table of Contents

Front Matter / Søren Wichmann and Jeff Good -- Introduction / Søren Wichmann and Jeff Good -- Exploring Phonological Areality in the Circum-Andean Region Using a Naive Bayes Classifier / Lev Michael , Will Chang and Tammy Stark -- Quantifying Geographical Determinants of Large-Scale Distributions of Linguistic Features / Harald Hammarström and Tom Güldemann -- Languages with More Second Language Learners Tend to Lose Nominal Case / Christian Bentz and Bodo Winter -- Using Phylogenetic Networks to Model Chinese Dialect History / Johann-Mattis List , Nelson-Sathi Shijulal , William Martin and Hans Geisler -- Phylogenetic Inference from Word Lists Using Weighted Alignment with Empirically Determined Weights / Gerhard Jäger -- Does Structural-Typological Similarity Affect Borrowability? / Frank Seifart -- Indexes / Søren Wichmann and Jeff Good.