Preface 
Preface to the First Edition 
List of Technical Abbreviations 
Language Matters Boxes 

CHAPTER 1 Language: a preview 
 1 Specialization for Language 
 2 A Creative System 
 3 Grammar and Linguistic Competence 
     3.1 Generality: All Languages Have a Grammar 
     3.2 Parity: All Grammars Are Equal 
     3.3 Universality: Grammars Are Alike in Basic Ways 
     3.4 Mutability: Grammars Change over Time 
     3.5 Inaccessibility: Grammatical Knowledge Is Subconscious 
  Summing Up 
  Key Terms 
  Recommended Reading 
  Exercises 
CHAPTER 2: Phonetics: the sounds of language 
1 Phonetic Transcription 
     1.1 Units of Representation 
     1.2 Segments 
2 The Sound-Producing System 
     2.1 Glottal States 
3 Sound Classes 
     3.1 Vowels, Consonants, and Glides (Syllabic and Nonsyllabic Elements) 
4 Consonant Articulation 
     4.1 The Tongue 
     4.2 Places of Articulation 
5 Manners of Articulation 
     5.1 Oral versus Nasal Phones 
     5.2 Stops
     5.3 Fricatives 
     5.4 Affricates 
     5.5 Voice Lag and Aspiration 
     5.6 Liquids 
     5.7 Syllabic Liquids and Nasals
     5.8 Glides 
6 Vowels 
     6.1 Simple Vowels and Diphthongs 
     6.2 Basic Parameters for Describing Vowels 
     6.3 Tense and Lax Vowels 
7 Phonetic Transcription of American English Consonants and Vowels 
8 Suprasegmentals 
     8.1 Pitch: Tone and Intonation 
     8.2 Length 
     8.3 Stress 
9 Speech Production 
     9.1 Coarticulation 
     9.2 Articulatory Processes 
     9.3 Some Common Articulatory Processes 
10 Other Vowels and Consonants 
 Summing Up 
 Key Terms 
 Recommended Reading 
 Exercises 
CHAPTER 3: Phonology: the function and patterning of sounds 
1 Segments in Contrast 
      1.1 Minimal Pairs 
      1.2 Language-Specific Contrasts 
2 Phonetically Conditioned Variation: Phonemes and Allophones 
      2.1 Complementary Distribution 
      2.2 Phonemes and Allophones 
      2.3 Classes and Generalization in Phonology 
      2.4 English Mid Vowels and Glides 
      2.5 Language-Specific Patterns 
3 Phonetic and Phonemic Transcription 
      3.1 Phonetic and Phonemic Inventories 
4 Above the Segment: Syllables 
      4.1 Defining the Syllable 
      4.2 Onset Constraints and Phonotactics 
      4.3 Accidental and Systematic Gaps 
      4.4 Setting Up Syllables 
      4.5 Syllabic Phonology 
5 Features 
      5.1 Why We Use Features 
      5.2 Feature Representations 
6 Derivations and Rules 
      6.1 Derivations 
      6.2 Rule Application 
      6.3 The Form and Notation of Rules 
      6.4 Processes and Rules: A Last Word 
 Summing Up 
 Key Terms 
 Recommended Reading 
 Appendix: Hints for Solving Phonology Problems 
 Exercises 
CHAPTER 4: Morphology: the analysis of word structure 
1 Words and Word Structure 
      1.1 Morphemes 
      1.2 Analyzing Word Structure 
2 Derivation 
      2.1 Some English Derivational Affixes 
      2.2 Two Classes of Derivational Affixes 
3 Compounding 
      3.1 Properties of Compounds 
      3.2 Endocentric and Exocentric Compounds 
      3.3 Compounds in Other Languages 
4 Inflection 
      4.1 Inflection in English 
      4.2 Inflection versus Derivation 
      4.3 Other Inflectional Phenomena 
5 Other Morphological Phenomena 
      5.1 Processes Primarily Related to Inflection 
      5.2 Other Processes 
6 Morphophonemics 
 Summing Up 
 Key Terms 
 Recommended Reading 
 Appendix: How to Identify Morphemes in Unfamiliar Languages 
 Exercises 
CHAPTER 5  Syntax: the analysis of sentence structure 
1 Categories and Structure 
      1.1 Categories of Words 
      1.2 Phrase Structure 
      1.3 Sentences 
      1.4 Tests for Phrase Structure 
2 Complement Options 
      2.1 Complement Options for Verbs 
      2.2 Complement Options for Other Categories 
      2.3 Complement Clauses 
3 Move 
      3.1 Yes-No Questions 
      3.2 Deep Structure and Surface Structure 
      3.3 Do Insertion 
      3.4 Wh Movement 
4 Universal Grammar and Parametric Variation 
      4.1 Verb Raising
5  Some Additional Structures 
      5.1 Coordination 
      5.2 Modifiers 
      5.3 Passives 
 Summing Up 
 Key Terms 
 Recommended Reading 
 Appendix: How to Build Tree Structures 
 Exercises 
CHAPTER 6 Semantics: the analysis of meaning 
1 The Nature of Meaning 
      1.1 Semantic Relations among Words 
      1.2 Semantic Relations Involving Sentences 
      1.3 What Is Meaning? 
2 The Conceptual System 
      2.1 Fuzzy Concepts 
      2.2 Metaphor 
      2.3 The Lexicalization of Concepts 
      2.4 Grammatical Concepts 
3 Syntax and Sentence Interpretation 
      3.1 Constructional Meaning 
      3.2 Structural Ambiguity 
      3.3 Thematic Roles 
      3.4 The Interpretation of Pronouns 
4 Other Factors in Sentence Interpretation 
      4.1 The Role of Beliefs and Attitudes 
      4.2 Setting 
      4.3 Discourse 
      4.4 Grice’s Conversational Maxims 
 Summing Up 
 Key Terms 
 Recommended Reading 
 Exercises 
CHAPTER 7 Historical linguistics: the study of language change 
1 The Nature of Language Change 
      1.1 Systematicity of Language Change 
      1.2 Causes of Language Change 
2 Sound Change 
      2.1 Sequential Change 
      2.2 Segmental Change 
      2.3 Auditorily Based Change 
      2.4 Phonetic versus Phonological Change 
      .5 Explaining Phonological Shift 
3 Morphological Change 
      3.1 Addition of Affixes 
      3.2 Loss of Affixes 
      3.3 From Synthetic to Analytic to Synthetic 
      3.4 Analogy 
      3.5 Reanalysis 
4 Syntactic Change 
      4.1 Word Order 
      4.2 Inversion in the History of English 
5 Lexical and Semantic Change 
      5.1 Addition of Lexical Items 
      5.2 Loss of Lexical Items 
      5.3 Semantic Change 
6 The Spread of Change 
      6.1 Diffusion through the Language 
      6.2 Spread through the Population 
7 Language Reconstruction 
      7.1 Comparative Reconstruction 
      7.2 Techniques of Reconstruction 
      7.3 The Discovery of Indo-European 
8 Language Change and Naturalness 
 Summing Up 
 Key Terms 
 Recommended Reading 
 Exercises 
CHAPTER 8 The classification of languages 
1 Some Preliminaries 
      1.1 Dialect and Language 
      1.2 Types of Classification 
2 Typological Classification 
      2.1 Phonology 
      2.2 Morphology 
      2.3 Syntax 
      2.4 Explaining Universals 
3 Genetic Classification 
      3.1 The Indo-European Family 
      3.2 Some Other Families 
      3.3 Language Phyla 
 Summing Up 
 Key Terms 
 Recommended Reading 
 Exercises 
CHAPTER 9 First language acquisition 
1 The Study of Language Acquisition 
      1.1 Methods 
2 Phonological Development 
      2.1 Babbling 
      2.2 Developmental Order 
      2.3 Early Phonetic Processes 
3 Vocabulary Development
      3.1 Strategies for Acquiring Word Meaning 
      3.2 Meaning Errors 
4 Morphological Development 
      4.1 Overgeneralization 
      4.2 A Developmental Sequence 
      4.3 Word Formation Processes 
5 Syntactic Development 
      5.1 The One-Word Stage 
      5.2 The Two-Word Stage 
      5.3 The Telegraphic Stage 
      5.4 Later Development 
      5.5 The Interpretation of Sentence Structure 
6 What Makes Language Acquisition Possible? 
      6.1 The Role of Adult Speech 
      6.2 The Role of Feedback 
      6.3 The Role of Cognitive Development 
      6.4 The Role of Inborn Knowledge 
      6.5 Is There a Critical Period? 
 Summing Up 
 Key Terms 
 Recommended Reading 
 Exercises 
CHAPTER 10 Second language acquisition 
1 The Study of Second Language Acquisition 
      1.1 The Role of the First Language 
      1.2 The Nature of an Interlanguage 
      1.3 The Final State 
      1.4 Variation in Performance 
2 Interlanguage Grammars 
      2.1 L2 Phonology 
      2.2 L2 Syntax 
      2.3 L2 Morphology 
      2.4 Morphology and Syntax 
3 Factors Affecting SLA 
      3.1 Age 
      3.2 Individual Differences 
4 The L2 Classroom 
      4.1 Modified Input 
      4.2 Modified Interaction 
      4.3 Focus on Form 
      4.4 Education in a Bilingual Environment 
 Summing Up 
 Key Terms 
 Recommended Reading 
 Exercises 
CHAPTER 11 Psycholinguistics: the study of language processing 
1 Methods of Psycholinguistic Research 
      1.1 Slips of the Tongue 
      1.2 Experimental Methods: Words in the Mind 
      1.3 Experimental Methods: Sentence Processing 
      1.4 Brain Activity: Event-Related Potentials 
      1.5 Language Corpora and Databases in Psycholinguistic Research 
2 Language Processing and Linguistics 
      2.1 Phonetics and Phonology 
      2.2 Morphological Processing 
      2.3 Syntax 
3 Putting It All Together: Psycholinguistic Modeling 
      3.1 The Use of Metaphors in Psycholinguistic Modeling 
      3.2 Which Model Is Right? 
 Summing Up 
 Key Terms 
 Recommended Reading 
 Exercises 
CHAPTER 12 Brain and language 
1 The Human Brain 
      1.1 The Cerebral Cortex 
      1.2 The Cerebral Hemispheres 
      1.3 The Lobes of the Cortex 
2 Investigating the Brain 
      2.1 Autopsy Studies 
      2.2 Images of the Living Brain 
      2.3 Learning from Hemispheric Connections and Disconnections 
3 Aphasia 
      3.1 Nonfluent Aphasia 
      3.2 Fluent Aphasia 
4 Acquired Dyslexia and Dysgraphia 
      4.1 Reading and Writing Disturbances in Aphasia 
      4.2 Acquired Dyslexia as the Dominant Language Deficit 
5 Linguistic Theory and Aphasia 
      5.1 Features, Rules, and Underlying Forms 
      5.2 Agrammatism 
      5.3 Function Words 
      5.4 The Loss of Syntactic Competence 
      5.5 Agrammatism in Other Languages 
      5.6 Language in the Brain: What’s Where? 
 Summing Up 
 Key Terms 
 Recommended Reading 
 Exercises 
CHAPTER 13 Language in social contexts 
1 Language Variation and Social Distinctions 
2 Place 
      2.1 Regional Variation in Lexical Items 
      2.2 Regional Variation in Phonology 
      2.3 Regional Differences in Morphology and Syntax 
3 Time 
4 Isolation 
      4.1 Physical Isolation: The Case of Smith Island 
      4.2 Linguistic Isolation: The Case of Quebec French 
      4.3 Social Isolation: The Case of Urban African American English 
5 Contact 
      5.1 Code-Switching and Borrowing 
      5.2 Contact Languages: Mixed Languages, Lingua Francas, Pidgins, and Creoles 
6 Distinctions within a Community: Class, Ethnicity, and Gender 
      6.1 Class 
      6.2 Ethnicity: The Case of African American English 
      6.3 Gender 
      6.4 Situation-Specific Factors 
7 Social Interaction and Language 
      7.1 Ethnography of Communication 
      7.2 Solidarity and Power 
8 How Societies Deal with Language 
 Summing Up 
 Key Terms 
 Recommended Reading 
 Exercises  
CHAPTER 14 Writing and language 
1 Types of Writing 
      1.1 Logographic Writing 
      1.2 Phonographic Writing 
2 The Early History of Writing 
      2.1 Prewriting 
      2.2 Pictograms 
3 The Development of Writing 
      3.1 Rebuses 
      3.2 Toward Syllabic Writing 
      3.3 Another Middle Eastern Writing System: Hieroglyphs 
      3.4 The Emergence of Alphabets 
4 Some Non-European Writing Systems 
      4.1 Chinese Writing 
      4.2 Japanese Writing 
      4.3 Korean Writing 
      4.4 Cherokee Writing 
5 English Orthography 
      5.1 Irregularities 
      5.2 Obstacles to Reform 
6 Writing and Reading 
 Summing Up 
 Key Terms 
 Recommended Reading 
 Exercises 
CHAPTER 15 Indigenous languages of North America 
1 Origin and Classification 
      1.1 Ultimate Origins 
      1.2 Historical Relationships in North America 
2 Phonetics and Phonology 
      2.1 Velar, Uvular, and Pharyngeal Articulations 
      2.2 Lateral Fricatives 
      2.3 Glottalized Stops and Affricates (Ejectives) 
      2.4 Vowels and Suprasegmental Features 
      2.5 Sounds Not Frequently Found 
3 Morphology and Syntax 
      3.1 The Structure of Words 
      3.2 Grammatical Categories 
      3.3 Pronominal Systems 
      3.4 Noun Classification 
4 The Future of Indigenous North American Languages 
 Summing Up 
 Key Terms
 Recommended Reading
CHAPTER 16 Sign Languages [online only]
1 Phonology 
      1.1 Formational Elements 
      1.2 Combining Formational Elements 
      1.3 Prosody 
2 Morphology 
      2.1 Word Formation 
      2.2 Verb Agreement 
      2.3 Classifier Constructions
3 Syntax 
      3.1 Recursion 
      3.2 Word Order 
      3.3 Sign Language and Universal Grammar 
4 Language as an Art Form: Sign Language Poetry 
5 New Sign Languages 
 Summing Up 
 Key Terms 
 Recommended Reading
CHAPTER 17  Animal communication   [online only]
1 Non-vocal communication
2 Communication structure: the study of signs
      2.1 Signs
      2.2 The types of signs
      2.3 Sign structure
      2.4 A view of animal communication
3 The bees
      3.1 The system
      3.1 Bees and humans
4 The birds
      4.1 Bird vocalization
      4.2 Birds and humans
5 Non-human primates
      5.1 Some functions of non-human primate communication
      5.2 Prosimian communication
      5.3 Monkeys
      5.4 Gibbons, orangutans, chimpanzees
6 Testing non-human primates for linguistic ability
      6.1 Some experiments
      6.2 Non-signing experiments
      6.3 The Clever Hans controversy
      6.4 The great ape debate
      6.5 Implications
7 Comparing communication systems: design features
      7.1 The features
 Summing Up 
 Key Terms 
 Recommended Reading 
 Exercises
CHAPTER 18 Computational linguistics [online only]
1 Computational Phonetics and Phonology 
      1.1 The Talking Machine: Speech Synthesis 
      1.2 Speech Recognition 
2 Computational Morphology 
      2.1 Morphological Processes 
      2.2 Some Problems in Computational Morphology 
3 Computational Syntax 
      3.1 Data and Resources 
      3.2 Natural Language Analysis 
      3.3 Natural Language Generation 
      3.4 The Role of Syntax and Semantics 
4 Computational Lexicography 
5 Computational Semantics 
6 Pragmatics 
      6.1 Reference Resolution 
      6.2 Discourse Markers 
      6.3 Spoken Dialogue 
7 Applications of Computational Linguistics 
      7.1 Indexing and Concordances 
      7.2 Question Answering 
      7.3 Automatic Summarization 
      7.4 Machine Translation 
      7.5 Spoken-Dialogue Systems 
 Summing Up 
 Key Terms 
 Recommended Reading 
 Exercises

Glossary 
Sources 
Language Index 
Index 

• Streamlined and restructured format: Thirteen core chapters remain in the book to help students and professors focus on the essential course material while five supplemental chapters continue to be featured online in Launchpad Solo for Contemporary Linguistics. Additionally, Chapter 8 (Historical Linguistics) has been streamlined to retain the wealth of information offered within a more accessible and student-friendly context

• Revised Chapter 2 (Phonetics): More in-depth detail on the sound-producing system and glottal states and a new appendix on dialectal variation in the pronunciation of American vowels help students transcribe their own speech more accurately.

• Revised Chapter 3 (Phonology): This entirely revamped chapter more clearly explains key concepts such as phonemes and allophones and complementary distribution; reframes the treatment of syllable structure to introduce concepts of sonority and universal constraints; and provides new and revised problems so that instructions are more explicit and scaffolded.

• Updated content: Select chapters have been updated to include the most recent scholarship including:
• Chapter 10 (Second Language Acquisition) features recent work in motivation, Focus on Form, and education in the bilingual environment.
• Chapter 13 (Language in Social Context) incorporates the latest research on grammatical diversity, language change, and gender problems. The chapter has also been thoroughly revised to include a mix of fieldwork problems and linguistic problems in dialects, creoles, and code-switching.

• Revised Chapter 4 (Morphology): Features a number of new problems that increase the variety of languages and morphological phenomena.

• Revised Chapter 5 (Syntax): Includes new coverage on relative clauses and VP internal subjects as well as abbreviated tree structures without X when there is no specifier or complement. The chapter has also replaced IP with TP. 

• Study Guide: The new edition’s study guide has been revised and updated to reflect changes in the textbook

• LaunchPad Solo for Contemporary Linguistics greatly expands your options for active learning and assessment. *Online exercises, problems, and quizzes for every chapter give students plenty of practice in an interactive environment. An audio chart of IPA vowels and consonants allows students to click the symbol and hear it pronounced. For students who need it, there is a review of core topics and for advanced students there are more challenging materials. Four extra online chapters include “Indigenous Languages of North America,” “Sign Languages,” “Animal Communication,” and“Computational Linguistics.”