Footnote:
Title from publisher's bibliographic system (viewed on 17 Jul 2017)
Description:
The question of complexity, as in what makes one language more 'complex' than another, is a long-established topic of debate amongst linguists. Recently, this issue has been complemented with the view that languages are complex adaptive systems, in which emergence and self-organization play major roles. However, few students of the phenomenon have gone beyond the basic assessment of the number of units and rules in a language (what has been characterized as 'bit complexity') or shown some familiarity with the science of complexity. This book reveals how much can be learned by overcoming these limitations, especially by adopting developmental and evolutionary perspectives. The contributors include specialists of language acquisition, evolution and ecology, grammaticization, phonology, and modeling, all of whom approach languages as dynamical, emergent, and adaptive complex systems.
Complexity in language: a multifaceted phenomenon / Salikoko S. Mufwene, François Pellegrino, & Christophe Coupé -- How to Explain the Origins of Complexity in Language: A Case Study for Agreement Systems / Luc Steels & Katrien Beuls -- Complexity in Speech: Teasing Apart Culture and Cognition -- / Bart de Boer -- a complex-adaptive-systems approach to the evolution of language and the brain / Tom schoenemann -- Evolutionary complexity of social cognition, semasiographic systems, and language / William Croft / To What Extent are Phonological Inventories Complex Systems? / Christophe Coupé, Egidio Marsico, & François Pellegrino -- A Complexity View of Ontogeny as a Window on Phylogeny / Barbara Davis -- Language choice in a multilingual society: a view from complexity science / Lucía Loureiro-Porto & Maxi San Miguel -- Complexity and language contact: a socio-cognitive framework / Albert Bastardas-Boada