historical linguistics

Also found in: Thesaurus, Medical, Encyclopedia, Wikipedia.

Related to historical linguistics: descriptive linguistics, structural linguistics

historical linguistics

n. (used with a sing. verb)

The study of linguistic change over time in language or in a particular language or language family, sometimes including the reconstruction of unattested forms of earlier stages of a language. Also called philology.

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

historical linguistics

(Linguistics) (functioning as singular) the study of language as it changes in the course of time, with a view either to discovering general principles of linguistic change or to establishing the correct genealogical classification of particular languages. Also called: diachronic linguistics Compare descriptive linguistics

Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged, 12th Edition 2014 © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1994, 1998, 2000, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2011, 2014

historical linguistics

The study of the changes in a language over a period of time.

ThesaurusAntonymsRelated WordsSynonymsLegend:

Switch to new thesaurus

Noun

historical linguistics - the study of linguistic change; "the synchrony and diachrony of language"

diachronic linguistics, diachrony

linguistics - the scientific study of language

sound law - a law describing sound changes in the history of a language

deriving, etymologizing, derivation - (historical linguistics) an explanation of the historical origins of a word or phrase

Translations

Historische Sprachwissenschaft

References in periodicals archive ?

"Not every [...] recent development [...] in the field of biology can find an insightful application in the work of historical linguistics".

A handbook of historical linguistics

However, until very recently, the developments just outlined have hardly influenced research in Historical Linguistics.

Javier E. Diaz Vera, ed. 2002: A Changing World of Words

This is a revised and extended version of a paper read at the 12th International Conference on English Historical Linguistics held at Glasgow University, Scotland in August, 2002.

Revisiting the revisited: could we survive without the great vowel shift?

The comparative method of Indo-European linguists, which has become a widely accepted paradigma for historical linguistics in general, is based upon the principle that related languages diverge with passage of time.

Convergent or divergent linguistic development?

Perinbam's argument would have benefited from a more rigorous use of historical linguistics in order to provide a firmer chronology of changes in identity during the more distant past.

Family Identity and the State in the Bamako Kafu, c. 1800-c. 1900

English historical linguistics; an international handbook; v.1

A Neglected Phonetic Law: The Reduction of the Indo-European Laryngeals in Internal Syllables Before Yod." In Papers from the 5th International Conference on Historical Linguistics, ed.

Historical Phonology of Old Indo-Aryan Consonants

The Handbook of Historical Linguistics is one of the Blackwell Handbooks in Linguistics and contains 26 chapters on various topics in historical linguistics.

Brian D. Joseph and Richard D. Janda, editors: The Handbook of Historical Linguistics

Even though it has already been three years since the latest typically student-oriented contribution by Smith (1999), the dramatically low number of textbooks on English historical linguistics has not increased much.

An introduction to Middle English

This is not, and is not intended to be, a straight-forward standard textbook on historical linguistics on the lines of, say, Theodora Bynon's Historical Linguistics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1977).

Historical Linguistics and Language Change

Among the topics are Ma:tu'in: the bridge between kinship and "clan" in the Tewa Pueblos of New Mexico, Taos social history: a rhizomatic account, the historical linguistics of kin-term skewing in Puebloan languages, archaeological expressions of ancestral Hopi social organization, an archaeological perspective on Zuni social history, and from mission to mesa: reconstructing Pueblo social networks during the Pueblo Revolt period.