Subject: typology

we would like to bring to your attention recent publications from john benjamins publishing in the field of typology . the typology and dialectology of romani edited by : yaron matras , peter bakker and hristo kyuchukov university of manchester / aarhus universitet / university of shumen , bulgaria 1997 xxxii , 224 pp . current issues in linguistic theory , 156 us / canada : cloth : 1 55619 872 8 price : us $ 65 . 00 rest of the world : cloth : 90 272 3661 5 price : nlg 130 john benjamins publishing web site : http : / / www . benjamins . com for further information via e-mail : service @ benjamins . com contributions to this collection focus on the unity and diversity of the language of the roma ( gypsies ) , the only indic language spoken exclusively in europe . properties discussed include the distinct inflectional and derivational patterns applied to asian and european lexical layers , the distribution of inflectional , agglutinative , and analytic formation among syntactic categories , regularities in the ongoing shift from inflectional to analytic case formation , suppletion , aspects of syntactic convergence , and patterns of morphological transitivization and de-transitivization ( causatives and passives ) . these phenomena are considered in the light of contemporary discussions on language universals , with reference to a variety of different approaches including prague school typology , functional sentence perspective , functional grammar , functional-pragmatic typology , and general grammaticalization theory . chapters partly adopt a comparative approach covering all major dialects of the language , and are partly devoted to single-dialect corpuses . special attention is given to the czech / slovak and hungarian varieties , to previously undescribed dialects from bulgaria and turkey , to codified varieties in macedonia , and to the variety of dialects discussed in the popular works of the victorian author george borrow . an extensive introduction outlines the principal morphosyntactic features of the language and provides a classification of romani dialects , including an overview of those mentioned in the volume . contributions by : peter bakker ; norbert boretzky ; vit bubenik ; petra cech ; viktor elsik ; victor a . friedman ; ian f . hancock ; mozes f . heinschink ; milena hubschmannova ; birgit igla ; yaron matras . coding the hypothetical a comparative typology of russian and macedonian conditionals . jane f . hacking the university of kansas 1997 , vi , 156 pp . studies in language companion series , 38 us / canada : cloth : 1 55619 849 3 price : us $ 63 . 00 rest of the world : cloth : 90 272 3041 2 price : nlg 125 john benjamins publishing web site : http : / / www . benjamins . com for further information via e-mail : service @ benjamins . com conditionals encode speculation . they convey how events could have been different in the past or present , or might be different in the future if particular conditions had been or will be met . while all languages afford the means to speculate or hypothesize about possible events , the ways in which they do so vary . this work explores some of this variation through an analysis of the structure and semantics of complex conditional sentences in russian and macedonian . it addresses typological questions about the general properties of natural language conditionals and examines the role of the grammatical categories tense , aspect , mood and status in the coding of conditional meaning . the book also discusses the relationship between the use of these categories and the shape of a language 's conditional system . for example , the use of tense in counterfactual contexts in macedonian correlates with the grammaticalization of more shades of conditional meaning than are grammaticalized in russian , which does not employ tense forms in this way . the book addresses issues of concern to slavists and raises questions for those interested in conditionals and the coding of hypothetical meaning . case , typology and grammar . in honor of barry j . blake edited by anna siewierska and jae jung song lancaster university / university of otago 1998 395 pp . typological studies in language , 38 us / canada : cloth : 1 55619 651 2 price : us $ 85 . 00 rest of the world : cloth : 90 272 2937 6 price : nlg 170 john benjamins publishing web site : http : / / www . benjamins . com for further information via e-mail : service @ benjamins . com this collection of fifteen original articles includes descriptive , typological and / or theoretical studies of a number of morphosyntactic phenomena , such as case , transitivity , grammaticalization , valency alternations , etc . , in a variety of languages or language groups , and discussions concerning theoretical issues in specific grammatical frameworks . the collection , written in honor of the australian linguist , barry j . blake on his 60th birthday , thematically reflects the field that professor blake has worked in over the past three decades . the volume will be of special interest to researchers in morphosyntax and linguistic typology . - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - bernadette martinez - keck tel : ( 215 ) 836-1200 publicity / marketing fax : ( 215 ) 836-1204 john benjamins north america e-mail : bernie @ benjamins . com po box 27519 philadelphia pa 19118-0519 check out the john benjamins web site : http : / / www . benjamins . com
