The nature of syntactic change and what it tells us about language
The nature of syntactic change and what it tells us about language. NWO VIDI project (2006-2010); project leader: Chris Reintges
Project data
| Full title | The nature of syntactic change and what it tells us about language | |
| Duration | 2006-2010 | |
| Nature | NWO VIDI | |
| Project leader | Chris Reintges | |
| Project member | Allison Kirk |
Project description
Language variation and change have long fascinated linguists. The focus of the current research program is on syntactic change. The project comprises both theoretical and empirical research. At the theoretical level, it develops a unifying account of historical changes in grammar, which explains the many facets of syntactic change from what we know about language in general. In this way, the project bridges a gap between historical linguistics and (synchronic) syntactic theory.
The central idea is that syntactic change comes from syntactic variation, the availability of a rich inventory of sentence patterns to express the same content in somewhat different ways. Variation is in principle allowed by the grammar; actual variation can be induced by external factors such as diglossia and language contact, but, we claim, it can also arise spontaneously.
The empirical research is concerned with syntactic variation and change in Ancient Egyptian and Koine Greek, which have been in close contact for almost a thousand years (from the Macedonian conquest of Egypt in 332 BCE to the Arab invasion in 641 CE). With more than four thousand years of uninterrupted language history, Ancient Egyptian provides an ideal field for the study of historical syntax. Coptic, its most recent stage (300-1100 CE), emerged from a bilingual Egyptian-Greek language variety spoken by the hellenized bourgeoisie of Roman Egypt. The project thus discloses a new empirical domain for the study of language history.