Linguistic Ecology and Language Contact

This book revisits and updates the concept of linguistic ecology, outlining applications to a variety of contact situations worldwide.

Ralph Ludwig (Edited by), Steve Pagel (Edited by), Peter Mühlhäusler (Edited by)

9781107041356, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 20 December 2018

400 pages, 46 b/w illus. 19 tables
23.5 x 15.7 x 2.3 cm, 0.78 kg

'Following an extraordinarily thorough editorial overview, the topics covered here range from conversation and code-mixing to language contact writ large. This is a valuable treatment of an important area.' John Edwards, Editor, Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development

Contributions from an international team of experts revisit and update the concept of linguistic ecology in order to critically examine current theoretical approaches to language contact. Language is understood as a part of complex socio-historical-cultural systems, and interaction between the different dimensions and levels of these systems is considered to be essential for specific language forms. This book presents a uniform, abstract model of linguistic ecology based on, among other things, two concepts of Edmund Husserl's philosophy (parts and wholes, and foundation). It considers the individual speaker in the specific communication situation to be the essential heuristic basis of linguistic analysis. The chapters present and employ a new, transparent and accessible contact linguistic vocabulary to aid reader comprehension, and explore a wide range of language contact situations in Europe, Africa, the Middle East, Latin America, Asia and the Pacific. This book will be fascinating reading for students and researchers across contact linguistics and cultural studies.

Part I. Introduction and Theoretical Frame: 1. Linguistic ecology and language contact: conceptual evolution, interrelatedness, and parameters Ralph Ludwig, Peter Mühlhäusler and Steve Pagel
2. On the notion of natural in ecological linguistics Françoise Gadet and Steve Pagel
Part II. On the Ecology of Speaker and Space from Situational to Intermediate Ecology: 3. An interactionist perspective on the ecology of linguistic practices: the situated and embodied production of talk Lorenza Mondada
4. Approaching language in urban interactions ecologically: the case of Spanish in Lima Juan Carlos Godenzzi
Part III. On the Ecology of Space and Time, Traditions in the Formation of Macro-Ecologies: 5. The historical formation of a macro-ecology: the case of the Levant Cyril Aslanov
6. Spanish anthroponomy from an ecological linguistic view: the Antillean society in the early sixteenth century Silke Jansen
Part IV. On the Ecology of Language and Speaker, the Hybridization of Language and Discourse: 7. Reflections on discourse ecology and language contact: the crucial role of some scalar terms Sibylle Kriegel, Ralph Ludwig and Tabea Salzmann
8. Language mixing and ecology in Africa: focus on Camfranglais and Sheng Anne Schröder and Philip W. Rudd
9. Hybrid speech of Francophone groups in Cairo: from macro-level ecology to discourse Cynthia Dermarkar, Françoise Gadet, Ralph Ludwig and Stefan Pfänder
10. The opposite of an anti-Creole? Why modern Chamorro is not a new language Steve Pagel
Part V. The Multiplicity of Ecological Parameters, Echoing the Theoretical Frame and Going Beyond: 11. Contact between typologically different languages Peter Mühlhäusler
12. Theoretical and practical aspects of ecological language planning Peter Mühlhäusler.

Subject Areas: Historical & comparative linguistics [CFF], Philosophy of language [CFA]