Linguistic Adaptation at Work? the Change of Word Order and Case System from Latin to the Romance Languages
نویسندگان
چکیده
Understanding language evolution in terms of cultural transmission across generations of language users raises the possibility that some of the processes that have shaped language evolution can also be observed in historical language change. In this paper, we explore how constraints on production may affect the cultural evolution of language by analyzing the emergence of the Romance languages from Latin. Specifically, we focus on the change from Latin’s flexible but OV (Object-Verb) dominant word order with complex case marking to fixed SVO (Subject-Verb-Object) word order with little or no noun inflections in Romance Languages. We suggest that constraints on second language learners’ ability to produce sentences may help explain this historical change. We conclude that historical data on linguistic change can provide a useful source of information relevant to investigating the cognitive constraints that affect the cultural evolution of language.
منابع مشابه
Linguistic Adaptation: the Trade-off between Case Marking and Fixed Word Orders in Germanic and Romance Languages
Understanding language evolution in terms of cultural transmission across generations of language users raises the possibility that some of the processes that have shaped language evolution can also be observed in historical language change. In this paper, we explore how constraints on production may affect the cultural evolution of language by analyzing the emergence of the Germanic and Romanc...
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