Typology in Phonology

Abstract

Editors’ preface

Research into Language Typology poses two intriguing and related challenges to the linguist. One the one hand there is the challenge of isolating empirical data that either at long last seem to fill an inexplicable gap in what is commonly thought natural languages should be like, or that conversely call into question hitherto household assumptions about natural language behaviour. This is where elation often results as easily from a chance discovery, from a brief but gratefully received flash of lucidity, or from painstaking and laborious efforts. On the other hand, there is the task of demonstrating how the new findings fit into a pattern or take up a position that does not weaken our grip on the notion of language itself: any new proposal should both enlarge our insight into the focus area of investigation, but keep in check the range of possibilities that languages will be allowed to exploit.