The Rise and Fall of Languages

Datos Bibliográficos

ID23398223
AutoresR M W Dixon (0000-0001-8294-5806, La Trobe University, autor de correspondencia)
Año1997
Fecha de publicación1997-12-11
Open AccessSí
TipoBOOK
RevistaRise and Fall of Languages (SOURCE_BOOK)
EditorialCambridge University Press (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1017/cbo9780511612060
OpenAlexW2079164242
Open LibraryOL34475719M
ISBN9780511612060
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas209
Referencias citadas2

This book puts forward a different approach to language change, the punctuated equilibrium model. This is based on the premise that during most of the 100,000 or more years that humans have had language, states of equilibrium have existed during which linguistic features diffused across the languages in a given area so that they gradually converged on a common prototype. From time to time, the state of equilibrium would be punctuated, with expansion and split of peoples and of languages, most recently, as a result of European colonisation and the globalisation of communication which are likely to result in the extinction, within the next hundred years, of 90% of the languages currently spoken. Professor Dixon suggests that every linguist should assume a responsibility for documenting some of these languages before they disappear.

Colonisation · Economics · Globalization · Linguistics · Market economy · Premise · Punctuated equilibrium · State (computer science) · Computer Science · History · Linguistic Variation and Morphology · Linguistics, Language Diversity, and Identity · Philosophy