External History Of The Romance Languages

Comparative romance grammar/Robert A. Hall.-v.1.

What is the origin of the Romance languages and how did they evolve? When and how did they become different from Latin, and from each other? Volume 2 of The Cambridge History of the Romance Languages offers fresh and original reflections on the principal questions and issues in the comparative external histories of the Romance languages. It is organised around the two key themes of influences and institutions, exploring the fundamental influence, of contact with and borrowing from, other languages (including Latin), and the cultural and institutional forces at work in the establishment of standard languages and norms of correctness. A perfect complement to the first volume, it offers an external history of the Romance languages combining data and theory to produce new and revealing perspectives on the shaping of the Romance languages.

What is the origin of the Romance languages and how did they evolve? When and how did they become different from Latin, and from each other? Volume 2 of The Cambridge History of the Romance Languages offers fresh and original reflections on the principal questions and issues in the comparative external histories of the Romance languages. It is organised around the two key themes of influences and institutions, exploring the fundamental influence, of contact with and borrowing from, other languages (including Latin), and the cultural and institutional forces at work in the establishment of standard languages and norms of correctness. A perfect complement to the first volume, it offers an external history of the Romance languages combining data and theory to produce new and revealing perspectives on the shaping of the Romance languages.

This Cambridge history is the definitive guide to the comparative history of the Romance languages. Volume I is organized around the two key recurrent themes of persistence (structural inheritance and continuity from Latin) and innovation (structural change and loss in Romance).

This book makes available for the first time in paperback the results of an important interdisciplinary conference held at Rutgers University in 1989. Eighteen internationally known specialists in linguistics, history, philology, Latin, and Romance languages tackle the difficult question of how and when Latin evolved into the Romance languages of French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, and Catalan. The result is a stimulating and open exchange that offers the most up-to-date and accessible coverage of the topic. Contributors are Paul M. Lloyd, Tore Janson, J&ózsef Herman, Alberto Varvaro, Thomas D. Cravens, Harm Pinkster, John N. Green, Roger Wright, Marc Van Uytfanghe, Rosamond McKitterick, Katrien Heene, Michel Banniard, Birte Stengaard, Carmen Pensado, Thomas J. Walsh, Robert Blake, Ant&ónio Emiliano, and Marcel Danesi.

Available again, this book discusses nine Romance languages in context of their common Latin origins and then in individual studies. The final chapter is devoted to Romance-based Creole languages; a genuine innovation in a work of this kind.