Principles and Methods for Historical Linguistics

by Robert J. Jeffers

Intended for use in advanced undergraduate and beginning graduate courses, this text presents a wide survey of methodological procedures and theoretical positions.

Genres: Linguistics, Reference, Language

209 pages, Paperback

First published August 1, 1979

Reviews

[Bernard · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mixed bag. Obviously a product of its' time (historical syntax and phonology have made huge leaps since the publication of this book, both due to advances in synchronic theories and due to the availability of tools for modelling change and historical relations), containing a lot of information on the various pillars of historical inquiry; phonemic; phonological, American-structuralist;Prague school;early Generativist. Arguably the first half of the book is the most interesting, but a lot of the passages on syntactic change are shockingly weak (and even contradictory). Would recommend it as a survey of the philosophical approaches to historical investigation, but it's likely that there are far better texts out there than this. Personally enjoyed it as a way to gain a sense of the historical approach, but I'd hesitate to call it sufficiently holistic or principled in that manner. Probably more useful to undergraduates.

[Christopher · Rating 3 out of 5]

PRINCIPLES AND METHODS FOR HISTORICAL LINGUISTICS by Robert J. Jeffers and Ilse Lehiste is a textbook which the authors developed over several years in teaching introductory courses at the Ohio State University. It was ultimately published by the MIT Press in 1979.

Excluding back matter, the textbook is a mere 170 pages. Nonetheless, Jeffers and Lehiste manage to cover all the aspects of the field that undergraduates should know. There are ten chapters: 1) phonetic change, 2) comparative reconstruction, 3) internal reconstruction, 5) morphological systems and linguistic change, 5) phonological change, 6) explanation in linguistic change: the case of sound change, 7) syntatic change, 8) lexical change, 9) language contact and linguistic change, and 10) the evidence. In my view the strongest chapter is that on phonological change. Lehiste was one of the great 20th century phonologists, and here she provides a helpful comparison of the views of the American structuralists and the Prague School on sound change.

Examples are mainly drawn from the Indo-European languages, both ancient and modern and both European and from the Indian subcontinent. There are also a few nice examples from the Baltic Finnic languages. The book assumes some prior training in the basics of linguistics, and is written at a fairly rigorous level which assumes that the student is prepared to get only the basics here and seek out papers and monographs to learn more. In this way it may be seen to differ from the textbooks of Trask and Campbell, who try to walk the student through the field in a careful and approachable way. As to the value of Jeffers and Lehiste's textbook today, I find it enlightening but superseded. One case in which the book shows its age is in that, though it makes brief reference to the glottalic theory of Indo-European linguistics, it doesn't cover the application of typological insights to reconstruction. Certainly readers today would do best to make use of Hans Heinrich Hock's massive PRINCIPLES OF HISTORICAL LINGUISTICS, written at the same level but much more detailed in all its parts.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of the few textbooks I actually read. Historical linguistics was one of my favorite subjects.