Contemporary Linguistic Analysis

Contemporary Linguistic Analysis is written and edited by leading scholars in the field. It provides an up-to-date introduction with coverage of phenomena that are of special interest and relevance to the linguistic situation in Canada.

Although Contemporary Linguistic Analysis has the distinction of being the first linguistics textbook designed primarily for a Canadian readership, it seeks to do much more than simply provide coverage of linguistic phenomena peculiar to Canada. As the title suggests, we have attempted an introduction to linguistic analysis as it is practised at this stage in the development of our discipline. While we do not ignore or reject other fruitful approaches to linguistics, we have taken the generative paradigm as basic for two reasons. First, generative linguistics provides a relatively coherent and integrated approach to basic linguistic phenomena. Phonetics, phonology, morphology, syntax, and semantics are viewed within this framework, as perhaps in no other, as fully integrated and interrelated. Second, the generative approach has been widely influential in its application to a broad range of other linguistic phenomena over the past several decades, including the study of first and second language learning, historical linguistics, typology, psycholinguistics, neurolinguistics.