D Eric Holt

Optimality Theory and Language Change - Studies in Natural Language and Linguistic Theory D Eric Holt Softcover reprint of the original 1st ed. 2003 edition

Marc Notes: Papers presented at the 2000 conference of the International Linguistics Association; Includes bibliographical references (p. 419-441) and indexes. Table of Contents: List of contributors Acknowledgements Part I Optimality Theory and Language Change: Overview and Theoretical Issues: D. Eric Holt / Remarks on Optimatility Theory and language change.- Paul Boersma / The odds of eternal optimization in Optimality Theory.- Randall Gess / On re-ranking and explanatory adequacy in a constraint-based theory of phonological change.- Ricardo Bermudez-Otero & Richard M. Hogg / The actuation problem in Optimality Theory: Phonologization, rule inversion and rule loss.- April McMahon / When history doesn't repeat itself: Optimality Theory and implausible sound changes.- Charles Reiss / Language change without constraint reranking.- Part II Case Studies of Phonological Change: Donka Minkova & Robert Stockwell / English vowel shifts and 'optimal' diphthongs: Is there a logical link?.- Viola Miglio & Bruce Moren / Merger avoidance and lexical reconstruction: An OT model of the Great Vowel Shift.- Haike Jacobs / The emergence of quantitiy-sensitivity in Latin: Secondary stress, lambic Shortening and theorectical implications for 'mixed' stress systems.- Conxita Lleo / Some interactions between word, foot and syllable structure in the history of the Spanish language.- D. Eric Holt / The emergence of palatal sonorants and alternating diphthongs in Old Spanish.- Jaye Padgett / The emergence of contrastive palatalization in Russian.- Part III Case Studies of Syntactic Change: Benjamin Slade / How to rank constraints: Constraint conflict, grammatical competition and the rise of periphrastic do.- Larry LaFond / Historical changes in verb-second and null subjects from Old to Modern French.- Bibliography on Optimality Theory and language change / Randall Gess.- References.- Indices: Names, Languages, Constraints, Terms."Publisher Marketing: This text: discusses many optimization and linguistic issues in great detail; treats the history of a variety of languages, including English, French, Germanic, Galician/Portuguese, Latin, Russian and Spanish; shows that the application of optimality theory (OT) allows for innovative and improved analyses; allows researchers that appeal to OT to see the connections of their (usually synchronic) work with diachronic studies; and contains a complete bibliography on OT and language change. or syntax that treat these topics from generative approaches or that give a general survey of various frameworks of research into these areas. Likewise, the volume may serve as a text for courses in phonology, syntax and optimality theory that have a component dedicated to extensions of linguistic theory to historical change. It is of interest for historical linguists, researchers into optimality theory and linguistic theory and for phonologists and syntacticians with an interest in historical change.