Schedule
How this page works: New things go on top. Links to handouts, readings, etc. will usually give you a pdf file. If you have trouble reading anything (messed up fonts, missing files, etc.), please let me know!
[Week 15, Tu] Last Class! 2011-12-06
Review for the final exam (comparative and internal reconstruction).
Wrap-up. Lecture notes.
Reminder: Final papers due by Fri, Dec. 9th, at 4PM. Email me a PDF.
[Week 14, Th] Presentations 2011-12-01
Ryan on Syntactic Reconstruction.
Kathryn on How to Speak a Lost Language: Ancient Egyptian and the decipherment of the hieroglyphs.
Neima on 'The social motivation of a sound change'.
Reminder: Assignment 8 due next Tuesday, the 6th.
[Week 14, Tu] Presentations 2011-11-29
Dan on Linguistic Paleontology.
Andy on Tonogenesis, loss of tone, and pitch accent in Ancient Greek.
[Week 13, Tu] Presentations 2011-11-22
Will on Language Contact, Pidgins and Creoles.
Sam on Language Planning, Language Death: Hebrew.
Assignment 8: Due Tuesday, December 6th.
Reading for next Thursday (distributed in class):
(i) Phonetic Clues Hint Language is Africa Born;
(ii) Atkinson (2011).
[Week 12, Th] Presentations 2011-11-17
Rebecca on Nostratic.
Lindsey on Mass Comparison: Statistical Methods of Comparing Languages and Language Families.
Gwen on Deciphering Linear B.
[Week 12, Tu] Observing language change 2011-11-15
Change in action: Variation as a vehicle for change.
Social motivation for language change.
[Week 11, Th] Presentations scheduling 2011-11-10
Presentations scheduling/no class today.
Background reading for next week's presentations:
Ch. 11, Social and historical pressures upon language: contact, planning and the birth and death of languages.
Ch. 12, Language and prehistory.
[Week 11, Tu] Laryngeal theory 2011-11-08
Laryngeal theory slideshow (and sample presentation.)
Solutions to IR problems: Karok, Central Papuan.
Reading for next time:
Ch. 10, The origin and propagation of change.
[Week 10, Th] Internal Reconstruction 2011-11-03
More practice with internal reconstruction: Finnish, Japanese, Lardil.
[Week 10, Tu] Internal Reconstruction 2011-11-01
Internal Reconstruction.
Lecture notes.
Assignment 7: Karok and Central Papuan.
[Week 9, Th] Comparative Method 2011-10-27
More practice with comparative reconstruction. Glottalic Theory.
Lecture notes.
Reading for next time: Ch. 9, Internal reconstruction.
[Week 9, Tu] Comparative Method 2011-10-25
Practice with comparative reconstruction.
Lecture notes.
[Week 8, Th] Comparative Method 2011-10-20
Exam review. Comparative Method.
Lecture notes. Proto-Polynesian problem.
Assignment 6: Trukese.
Reading for next time: Ch. 8, The comparative method.
[Week 8, Tu] Fall Break 2011-10-18
No class.
[Week 7, Th] Midterm 2011-10-13
Exam 1!
Reading over break: Ch. 7, Relatedness between languages.
[Week 7, Tu] Review 2011-10-11
Review for the midterm. Lecture notes.
See last Thursday's lecture notes for a list of what to know for the exam.
[Week 6, Th] Syntactic change 2011-10-06
Change in word order.
Lecture notes.
[Week 6, Tu] Syntactic change 2011-10-04
Syntactic change. Borrowing, grammaticalization, reanalysis.
Lecture notes.
[Week 5, Th] Morphological change 2011-09-29
Change in morphological type.
Lexical semantic change.
Lecture notes.
Reading for next time: Ch. 6, Syntactic change.
[Week 5, Tu] Morphological change 2011-09-27
Solutions to Balto-Finnic. Hungarian.
Analogical change.
Lecture notes.
[Week 4, Th] Sound change 2011-09-22
Balto-Finnic. Hungarian.
Major sound changes from PIE to its daughter languages.
Lecture notes.
Assignment 4: Hungarian.
Reading for next time: Ch. 5, Morphological change.
[Week 4, Tu] Sound change 2011-09-20
Phonemic vs non-phonemic change. Chain shifts.
Symmetry and maximization of phonological space.
Lecture notes.
[Week 3, Th] Sound change 2011-09-15
Sound change as addition/loss/reordering/generalization of phonological rules. Lecture notes.
Reading (for Tues.): (i) Chapter 4 from the text; (ii) "Phonological typology and naturalness", from Odden (2005), Introducing Phonology, Cambridge University Press.
Assignment 3: Balto-Finnic.
[Week 3, Tu] Sound change 2011-09-13
Types of sound change.
Lecture notes.
Reading for next time: Ch. 4, Change in phonological systems.
[Week 2, Th] Borrowing 2011-09-08
More on borrowing. Start on sound change (Exercises 371-377).
Lecture notes.
Assignment 2: See today's lecture notes.
Reading for next time:
(i) Chapter 3, Change in pronunciation; (ii) Bloomfield on borrowing.
[Week 2, Tu] Borrowing 2011-09-06
Borrowing. Lecture notes.
[Week 1, Th] Phonetics review 2011-09-01
Phonetics review: IPA, English phonemes, natural classes.
Lecture notes.
Reading for next time:
(i) Chapter 2, up to p. 35; (ii) Hock & Joseph (2009).
[Week 1, Th] Phonetics review 2011-09-01
Phonetics review: IPA, English phonemes, natural classes.
Lecture notes.
Assignment 1: See today's lecture notes.
[Week 1, Tu] Introduction and Course Overview 2011-08-30
What is historical linguistics?
Lecture notes.
Reading for next time:
(i) Ch. 1 of Historical Linguistics, pp 1-6, Campbell (2006).
(ii) Ch. 1 of the course textbook, Trask's Historical Linguistics.