Language Universals and Linguistic Typology: Syntax and Morphology

By Bernard Comrie

Book Overview

Since its first publication, Language Universals and Linguistic Typology has become established as the leading introductory account of one of the most productive areas of linguistics-the analysis,... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0226114368
• ISBN13: 9780226114361
• Release Date: October 1981
• Publisher: University of Chicago Press
• Length: 252 Pages
• Weight: 0.94 lbs.

Customer Reviews

A magnificent introduction and reference.

Along with Paynes "Describing Morphosyntax" (ISBN: 0521588057), this book will help any student -- or entertain any enthusiast --of languages or linguistics. It treats various types of syntactic theory in a manner that (rarely among such useful works) is clear, engaging and (in places) enthralling. While drawing on the familiar "old standards" for grammatic comparison (Russian, Dyirbal, Yakut, Hikxaryana, Japanese, etc), the way comparisons are drawn between systems reveals isomorphisms and patterns that are certainly elegant and perhaps beautiful. Comrie has, as ever, produced a thing of wonder.