Historical Linguistics

One of the characteristic properties of languages is that they all undergo change over time. In this seminar, we will examine different aspects of this phenomenon of linguistic change. Drawing on evidence from a typologically diverse range of languages, we will discuss the nature of the changes that can be observed at different levels of linguistic structure: sound change, morphological change, semantic change, syntactic change, and lexical change. We will also take a closer look at the most prominent aspects of traditional historical linguistics, that is, the reconstruction of earlier stages of languages based on the comparative method and internal reconstruction, and the classification of languages into language families. Finally, some further aspects of historical linguistics will be explored, such as explanations of language change, language contact, the methods for extracting historical linguistic information from written sources, the use of historical linguistic findings for cultural and historical inferences, and quantitative approaches to historical linguistics.