Vowel-Shifting in the English Language - An Evolutionary Account

English has long been suspected to be a vowel-shifting language. This hypothesis, often only adumbrated in previous work, is closely investigated in this book. Framed within a novel framework combining evolutionary linguistics and Optimality Theory, the account proposed here argues that the replacement of duration by quality as the primary cue to signaling vowel oppositions has resulted in the 'shiftiness' of many post-medieval English varieties.

About the author

Kamil Kämierski, Adam Mickiewicz University, Poznä, Poland.

Product details

• Authors: Kamil Ka¿mierski, Kamil Kazmierski
• Publisher: De Gruyter
• Languages: English, German
• Product format: Hardback
• Released: 01.01.2015
• EAN: 9783110369502
• ISBN: 978-3-11-036950-2
• No. of pages: 222
• Dimensions: 162 mm x 17 mm x 235 mm
• Weight: 460 g
• Series: Topics in English Linguistics; Topics in English Linguistics [TiEL]; Topics in English Linguistics [TiEL]; Topics in English Linguistics; ISSN; Topics in English Linguistics [TiEL], 88
• Subject: Humanities, art, music > Linguistics and literary studies > General and comparative linguistics