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REVIEW ARTICLE
TYPOLOGICAL, GENETIC, AND AREAL LINGUISTICS
An Assessment of the State of the Art in the 1970s
Thomas A. Sebeok (ed.), Current Trends in Linguistics, Volume 11: Dia-
chronic, Areal, and Typological Linguistics. Associate Editors: Henry M.
Hoenigswald and Robert E .Longacre. Assistants to the Editor: Alexandra
Ramsay Di Luglio and Lucia Hadd Zoercher. Mouton, The Hague & Paris,
1973. XI+604 pp.
This eleventh volume in the ambitiously conceived set designed to summarize
the state of the art from the vantage point of the late 60s and early 70s
treats the principles, methods, and some applications of language classifica-
tion. It is thus among the theoretically most important volumes of the whole
series, in breadth, depth, and generality comparable only to volume three
which dealt with the theoretical foundations of linguistics. However, if in-
deed language classification is meant to be the overall theme ( cf. R. E.
Longacre's different view on p. 287, discussed below), the particular title of
this volume is slightly inaccurate. The term 'diachronic' is obviously used
here as synonymous with 'historical' - in itself a somewhat imprecise usage,
as diachrony, in addition to tracing history, may also endeavor to forecast
future language developments (cf. Birnbaum, 1968). Strictly speaking, 'dia-
chronic' covers both more and less than 'genetic', the term which would
here more appropriately have indicated one of the three chief criteria for
language classification. By not only referring to past linguistic evolution but
conceivably implying prediction as well, 'diachronic' overextends the meth-
odological range of existing language classifications (as only historical com-
parative evidence is involved in genetic classification); by the same token,
'diachronic' is lacking in some connotations of the term 'genetic', the latter,
to be sure, primarily implying an evaluation and interpretation of historical
(including reconstructed prehistorical) data, yet not excluding altogether
recourse also to synchronic comparative evidence found in - historically
established - related languages. 'Typological, Genetic, and Areal Lin-
guistics' (preferably in this hierarchical order; cf. Birnbaum, 1975) would
thus have been a more appropriate subtitle for a volume discussing and
exemplifying various approaches to language classification.
The contents of this volume are arranged in three sections. An introduc-
tory chapter, written by R. H. Robins, traces 'The History of Language
Classification'. The methodological part two, prefaced by some 'Introduc-
Foundations of Language 13 (1975) 267-291. All rights reserved.
268 REVIEW ARTICLE
tory Remarks', by H. M. Hoenigswald, contains eight studies on relevant
principles and techniques; one of them, P. Kiparsky's paper 'On Compar-
ative Linguistics: The Case of Grassmann's Law', would have been more
appropriately included among the case studies appearing in part three of
the volume. In the other seven essays of part two, 'The Comparative Meth-
od', is discussed by Hoenigswald and 'Internal Reconstruction', once more
by J. Kurylowicz (cf. esp. id. 1964); D. Sankoff surveys 'Mathematical
Developments in Lexicostatistic Theory', while 'Areal Linguistics', is the
subject of 'Some General Considerations', offered by W. Winter; J. H.
Greenberg contributes an overview and interpretation of 'The Typological
Method', W. Labov discusses 'The Social Setting of Linguistic Change', and
I. J. Gelb presents some problems pertinent to 'Written Records and De-
cipherment'. Finally, part three illustrates the preceding methodological
discussion with a number of specific case studies even though no precise
one-to-one matching between the individual essays of the two sections could
be achieved, as explained in the Editor's Introduction. This third part of
the volume, opening with a few 'Introductory Remarks' by R. E. Longacre,
is made up of the following essays: 'Otomanguean Isoglosses', by C. R.
Rensch, 'Internal Reconstruction and Finno-Ugric (Finnish)', by R. Ant-
tila, 'The Romance Data of the Pilot Studies for Glottochronology', by J.
A. Rea, 'Japanese Dialects', by S. Hattori, 'Deep-Surface Canonical Dis-
parities in Relation to Analysis and Change: An Australian Example', by
K. Hale, 'Areal Linguistics and Middle America', by T. Kaufman, 'Dia-
chronic Typology of Philippine Vowel Systems', by L. A. Reid, 'Some
Aspects of Decreolization in Creole French', by A. Valdman, 'Linear B',
by J. Chadwick, and 'Altaic Linguistic Reconstruction and Culture', by J.
R. Krueger. As usual, for the reader's convenience, the substantive portion
of the volume is preceded and followed by some technical information and
references: the Editor's Introduction, a Master List of Abbreviations, Bio-
graphical Notes on the contributors, as well as Indexes of Names and of
Languages and Writing Systems. This reviewer will offer some remarks about
the contributions of parts one and two, but will, for obvious reasons, have
to refrain from commenting on several of the specialized case studies whose
data-determined merits and possible shortcomings he is in no position to
judge; as regards those case studies, the problematics of which are at least
generally familiar to me, only a few brief remarks will be made.
In his historical sketch, R. H. Robins also surveys some general theo-
retical aspects of setting up language taxonomies. Thus he points out that
while the "three modes of classification are theoretically distinct, in fact
their resultant classes overlap in membership", just as (barring overseas
migrations or penetration by speakers of a different language) historically
REVIEW ARTICLE 269
related languages will continue to be areally contiguous, while simultaneously
they are likely to exhibit, at least for some time, shared typological features.
In addition, as structural characteristics tend to spread over whole regions
forming so-called Sprachbunde (Trubeckoj's term), areal and typological
classes are themselves likely to overlap independently of inheritance. Citing
Jakobson's terse formulation, "the genetic method operates with kinship,
the areal with affinity, and the typological with isomorphism." However,
as Robins rightly points out, unless it also is typological, a mere areal
grouping of languages would be without linguistic significance. In fact, in
a recent attempt to establish a hierarchy of language classifications, with
particular attention directed at deep-seated ('covert') semantic properties and
categories, I have argued for the primacy of typological classification over
both genetic and areal language grouping, the latter ranking lowest, being
linguistically irrelevant if not coinciding with genetic and/or typological
classification (Birnbaum 1975; cf. also id. 1970, 48, 61-2, 71-91). My own
view of the supremacy of typology over genealogy was based primarily on
the assumption of the fundamental stability or, rather, time-resistant con-
tinuity of the most basic semantic categories underlying a given language
group in contradistinction to the often radical structural reshaping at the
surface levels of grammar and phonology as exemplified by the evolution
from classical Latin to the modern Romance languages (a reshaping largely
implying a change from synthetic to analytic language type). Robins is right,
though, when remarking that this change in typological (surface) structure
would be less, if at all, noticeable if one were to compare the modern
Romance languages not with classical literary Latin but rather with their
more immediate ancestor, colloquial Late ('Vulgar') Latin. He seems con-
vinced, however, that Trubeckoj was on the wrong track when he suggested
"a quasi-typological definition of Indo-European." While in my view such
an identification of a genetic with a typological class is indeed questionable
at the surface levels of linguistic structure (the only ones, it should be noted,
considered by Trubeckoj) - cf., e.g., the typological disparity between two
Indo-European languages such as Sanskrit and modern English- it certainly
makes far better sense at the underlying levels of semantic (and prelinear,
deep-syntactic) structure which is much less susceptible to radical change;
cf. Birnbaum 1970, 40-8; 1975. Robins, quoting relevant scholarship, finds
in the Bantu languages (in the narrow sense) perhaps the best example of
near-coincidence of areal contiguity, typological similarity, and genetic
relationship.
Surveying the European tradition of language classification, the author
notes the binary language division of the ancient Greeks into Greek (with
a sophisticated dialectal subgrouping) vs. barbarian, with no interest in
270 REVIEW ARTICLE
further classifying the latter. Briefly touching on the Romans' naive belief
that Latin was essentially derived Greek, Robins then moves
on to the Christian tradition which also had to take into account the
typologically quite different sacred language Hebrew - and, later, Arabic.
He dwells on the 'typological' division (into 'guttural', 'palatal', and 'dental',
proposed by Isidore of Seville) of the assumed 72 tongues resulting from
the statically viewed post-Babel dispersion. While the traditional number
of 72 remained relatively stable up to the 19th century, individual languages
unknown to the Bible were included at the expense of others. Only gradually
did the discovery of new, mostly non-European languages and the develop-
ment of a clear historical perspective on linguistic relationship have an
impact on language classification. Already Dante was conscious, we are told,
of the historical relationship between Latin and its vernacular offspring;
and diachrony and linguistic change, caused by internal as well as external
factors, were clearly conceived by the men of the Renaissance who had a
keen interest in etymology. While monogenesis continued to be the prevailing
view of most scholars concerned with the origin of language, Thomas
Jefferson kept an open mind as to the ultimate provenience of the speech
of the many Amerindian tribes. Still, classifications remained basically
genealogical (in the Biblical tradition) and any observations pertinent to
structural kinship between languages were interpreted as a continuing mark
of their common origin. Monogenetic Biblical tradition prescribed that
Hebrew be held the primal language of mankind. It must therefore have
been felt as a shocking novelty when Webb, in the 17th century, argued
that Chinese, being monosyllabic and of the simplest possible structure, be
accorded that status. A few decades later, Leibniz, while not explicitly re-
jecting monogenesis, refused to assign a particular role to Hebrew which
he classified together with other languages in his binary system (of Semito-
Hamitic vs. Japhetic).
An increasing awareness of the great number and diversity of the lan-
guages of the world and of the radical changes undergone by members of
one and the same language family over a period of time (cf. Latin vs.
modern Romance) gave rise, in the 17th-18th centuries, to a genuine interest
in typology which was to coincide with attempts at classification and
systematization of natural phenomena (cf. esp. Linnaeus' botanical tax-
onomy). The fact of considerable overlapping of genetic and typological
classification, at first presumed axiomatic, was superseded by the applica-
tion of other criteria for structural grouping of languages, e.g., into 'an-
alogical' vs. 'transpositive' (by the French encyclopedists), which was modi-
fied in the early 19th century by the distinction of inflecting vs. non-inflecting
languages (F. v. Schlegel) and subsequently by the tripartite system of
REVIEW ARTICLE 271
isolating, agglutinating, and inflecting languages as refined by A. W. v.
Schlegel and, in particular, W. v. Humboldt. Robins further goes on to
demonstrate the development of historical comparative grammar- cultivated
in the second half of the 19th century especially by the neogrammarians
with reference to Indo-European - as a natural outgrowth of the more
wide-ranging, universal interest in linguistic typology as conceived by F. v.
Schlegel, and comments on the first appearance and definitions of the
competing basic notions 'Indo-European', Indogermanisch, and the short-
lived 'Indo-Hittite'. Mentioning the culmination ofiE comparative linguistics
in Meillet's view of genealogical as the only legitimate language classifica-
tion, the author briefly recapitulates the role played by Sanskrit in genetic
linguistics, first fully recognized by Jones (despite his remarkable failure to
identify Hindi as descendant from Sanskrit), but anticipated, it seems,
precisely one hundred years earlier (in 1686) by a now almost forgotten
Swedish scholar, Jager. Darwin's ideas influenced linguistic evolutionary
typology as expounded by Steinthal and, more consistently, Schleicher (the
father of the Stammbaum theory), a trend successfully opposed only at the
beginning of this century by Finck (cf. also Schmidt's Wellentheorie) and
in a more definitive fashion by Sapir who decisively broke with all evaluative
typology.
After a glance at the particular problematics of earlier Amerindian
linguistics, characterized by an increasing realization of the structural di-
versity of the indigenous languages of the Americas and their comparability
with languages of other areas of the world, Robins turns to language
classification as conceived and elaborated in this century, beginning with
the structural approach of de Saussure which also influenced historical
studies (Jakobson, Hoenigswald), and to the distinction of Sprachfamilien
vs. Sprachenkreise (the latter roughly corresponding to wider Kulturkreise)
introduced by Schmidt. Discussing in some detail the wide-ranging concept
of typology set forth by Sapir, the author then assesses recent relevant
developments associated with names such as Trubeckoj, Hjelmslev, Hockett,
Weinreich, and Stankiewicz, on the one hand, and Voegelin, Saporta, and
in particular Greenberg, Bazell, and Ullmann, on the other. After another
exemplification of some of the problems at hand with data from Amerindian
and sub-Saharic African languages (and the methods used by more recent
students of these fields), Robins returns once more to the more precise
assessments of typological classification by Greenberg (esp. his quantifica-
tion procedures), Bazell, and, more recently, Uspenskij (suggesting abstract
standard language models - or 'etalons' - for measuring typological diver-
gence), with some improvements for the latter (introducing typological
deep structure) as proposed by the present writer (however, Robins seems
272 REVIEW ARTICLE
to be familiar only with my first brief hints of 1968, not with my fuller treat-
ment, esp. in Birnbaum 1970, 9-70). The author follows up recent devel-
opments of the Meillet-Vendryes tradition in genetic language classification
where Meillet's notion that "at no time during the years between colloquial
Latin and modern French was there any generation aware of speaking any
but the language of the previous generation" would warrant reexamination
in the light of both Labov's recent thinking on synchronic dynamics (or
ongoing change) and Andersen's and his followers' theorizing on 'abductive
change'. Mentioning the yes/no formula under which such classification
operates - as opposed to the inherently indeterminate and potentially
quantifiable evidence of typological classification, so that, for example,
English would have remained Germanic even in the event of a still more far-
reaching Latinization/Romanization than that which actually occurred -
Robins touches on the problem of reconstructing protolanguages and the
techniques for recovering genealogical relationships of great time-depth
(pointing to monogenesis rather than polygenesis) by means of quantifying
probabilistic evidence such as the, to be sure, highly controversial one
provided by lexicostatistics and glottochronology. In this context, also the
new theories of a possible distant genetic relationship linking together the
'nostratic' language families of the Old World, in recent years discussed
especially by Soviet linguists (Illic-Svityc, Dybo, Dolgopol'skij, and others;
cf. also Birnbaum 1975) would, incidentally, have deserved mention.
Finally, once more taking up Trubeckoj's attempt at a typological charac-
terization of IE (in terms of six obligatory criteria), Robins mentions Ben-
veniste's criticism (quoting as a counterexample Takelma, an Amerindian
language in Oregon which exhibits the same six phonological and gram-
matical features); the author then turns to Trubeckoj's kind of areal (Sprach-
bund) classification and to some of its applications (e.g., by Sandfeld to the
Balkans and Emeneau to the Indian subcontinent) as well as some of its
theoretical ramifications (Jakobson, Weinreich). This approach to areal
linguistics is subsequently confronted with that of the - predominantly
Italian - neolinguists (Bartoli, Bonfante) whose antimechanistic predeces-
sors (Croce, Vossler; Schuchardt) are also identified. Robins' survey ends
with a brief evaluation of Allen's suggestions for lexical (as well as gram-
matical) comparison of languages, subsequently elaborated to a full-fledged
'system-reduction quantification method' (Levenston & Ellis), and with a
note on the recently renewed interest in typology, its potentials and lima-
tions.
Generally speaking, this comprehensive historical essay is a most knowl-
edgeable and enlightening survey of an extremely complex field; it is well
structured, some unavoidable detours and returns to one and the same
REVIEW ARTICLE 273
problem notwithstanding. That it ultimately raises more questions than it
possibly can answer is understandable in view of the very nature of the vast
subject matter discussed.
The eassays of part two, each addressing itself to one particular method
or set of techniques, are on the average considerably shorther than the
introductory historical survey of the whole field of language classification;
only Greenberg's and Labov's important papers exceed the length of the
opening chapter.
To this reviewer, both of H. Hoenigswald's contributions were somewhat
disappointing reading. While his 'Introductory Remarks' do nothing but
set the stage for the following essays, and do so in a rather chatty and un-
systematic manner, his own brief discussion of 'The Comparative Method'
offers little by way of new insight or genuine assessment of that method as
it has been refined and redefined over the last 150 years or so. Certainly in
terms of theorizing about linguistic change and the specifics of the processes
involved as well as evaluating the units and classes correlated for the pur-
pose of establishing and interpreting genetic relationship and reconstructing
ancestral protolanguages, Hoenigswald's remarks do not essentially go
beyond his own more impressive book-length treatment of 1960 and the
supplementary papers of 1965 and 1966 referred to by the author. Un-
doubtedly, even a textbook assessment of the potentials and constraints of
the comparative method as presented, for example, in Anttila 1972: esp.
229-56, is more enlightening and original. At most, Hoenigswald's contri-
bution to this volume can be characterized as a set of generally well-chosen
exemplifications of the usefulness of the comparative method when applied
to a variety of language families and subgroups, mostly but not exclusively
IE; his brief concluding remarks on the relationship of the comparative
method to the tentative findings of glottochronology (and the possible
mutual benefits the two methods could derive from each other) are too
vague and noncommittal to allow any significant conclusions.
J. Kurylowicz's paper on 'Internal Reconstruction', a topic with which
he has been concerned, in theory and application, over the five decades of
his active groundbreaking scholarship and which, incidentally, also was the
subject of his principal report delivered at the first plenary session of the
9th International Congress of Linguists (Cambridge, Mass., 1962; cf.
Kurylowicz 1964), in my view, does not quite come up to expected theoreti-
cal standards, particularly if one remembers that it was precisely the Polish
linguist who early- in publications of 1927 and 1935- achieved one of the !
greatest and lasting feats of internal reconstruction: the positing of a set of i\
'laryngeals' (of some phonetic quality or other, denoted by him as:)) in the
PIE phonological system on the basis of the (essentially) synchronic data of
\
274 REVIEW ARTICLE
one single ancient IE language, (cuneiform) Hittite, thus confirming and
amplifying on a purely hypothetical assumption first advanced by de Saus-
sure (viz., his positing, for PIE, the existence of two 'coefficients sonantiques').
This is not to say, however, that Kurylowicz's more recent paper does not
contain a wealth of interesting data, observations, and insightful explana-
tions which not only go beyond his 1962 congress paper, but in some in-
stances are more than a mere extract and condensation of his vast research
reported elsewhere in several fundamental monographs. In the paper in-
cluded in this volume, Kurylowicz illustrates his notion of internal re-
construction with both phonological and morphological- inflectional as well
as derivational - data, and while on a few points his conclusions do not,
perhaps, necessarily seem absolutely cogent (or, at any rate, allow for some
alternative interpretation), it is not with his illustrative material and its
overall assessment that this reviewer would wish to take issue. What rather
bothers me, as incidentally was already the case with Kurylowicz's earlier
paper on the same subject ( cf. my contribution to the discussion after his
1962 congress paper, op. cit. 31-2; see also Birnbaum 1970, 92-9, discussing
both Kurylowicz's vague definition and T. Milewsk,i's broader application
as well as some other interpretations of the method of internal reconstruction),
is the all too vague and imprecise definition of internal reconstruction as
such (i.e., as a particular method or set of techniques) in contrast to linguistic
reconstruction achieved by the comparative method or some other procedures,
e.g., glottochronology. In his 1962 congress paper Kurylowicz had at least
emphasized that internal reconstruction is based on synchronic analysis,
but he failed to point out that, as a rule, such synchronic data is drawn from
one language only (where such a language can either be currently spoken,
represent some earlier evolutionary phase of a recorded language, or even
itself have been recovered only on the basis of comparative evidence); cf.,
however, his answer to Hamp in the ensuing discussion, op. cit. 36. In his
more recent contribution, his definition of the term 'internal reconstruction'
is even more vague and general. According to him, it simply "refers to new
methods and aspects of reconstruction applied to the material of traditional
comparative [emphasis added, H. B.] grammar." We are then told that it is
in particular the methods of functional (or classical) structuralism that have
contributed most to this rapid development of general linguistics, and it
becomes subsequently clear that it is primarily typological considerations
and the search for (and ascertainment of) language universals that add this
powerful new dimension to internal reconstruction as well. In other words,
this is not really a definition of internal (as opposed to comparative) re-
construction, but rather a - well-founded, to be sure - assessment of some
new fundamental theoretical insight and their fruitful effect on linguistic

REVIEW ARTICLE 275
reconstruction in general. But nowhere in Kurylowicz's treatment can one I
find a clear formulation of the very prerequisites of this particular metho-
dology: the projection of the synchronically available data of one language .
into some prehistoric past, yielding relative rather than absolute chronol- \
ogies. On this essential point of definition, a discussion like that by )
Anttila (1972, esp. 213-28, 264-73), though limited to the application of this
method to morphophonemics only, is much more compelling and clari-

D. Sankoff's highly technical paper on 'Mathematical Developments in
Lexicostatistic Theory', suffers, in this reviewer's opinion, from its being
based on a fundamental misconception: the belief of M. Swadesh and his
followers and modifiers in the essentially uniform rate of linguistic change,
particularly at the morphemic and word-semantic levels, using the - quite
mistaken, I would contend - analogy of vocabulary turnover to radioactive
decay (gauged by means of carbon-14, a scientific method, it should be noted,
which has turned out to be much less precise and reliable than originally
assumed); for some further criticism of lexicostatistics cf. also, e.g., Fodor
1965. All sociolinguistic observation seems to refute the underlying
assumption of this approach and to suggest instead that the rate of replace-
ment, especially of morphemic-semantic units, is by no means constant,
not even approximately or in such instances where large time intervals are
concerned, and that it fluctuates considerably owing to the ever-present
extra-linguistic factors of language change. The lack or scantiness of relevant
sociological and ethnological data for prehistoric periods do not render
substantial variations in the rate of vocabulary replacement at such times
less probable, only less (or not at all) ascertainable. The merits of the purely
mathematical reasoning in Sankoff's essay, though beyond the grasp of this
reviewer, seems impressive and sophisticated.
As was mentioned above, P. Kiparsky's remarks 'On Comparative Lin-
guistics', reassessing Grassmann's Law ( =GL, eliminating the first of two
aspirations in consecutive syllables in Sanskrit and Greek) in terms of a
somewhat modified generative phonology is, above all, a case study employ-
ing this method. However, the 'Introduction' provides a lucid statement of the
main tenets of the method when applied to historical and especially prehistoric
data, dismissing among other things, the frequent misconception that con-
structing a generative grammar is in itself tantamount to internal reconstruc-
tion. Although the ultimate goal of comparative linguistics, and recon-
struction in particular, is conceived here holistically and, following the
fundamental view held by generativists, language change is considered
equivalent to grammar change, the basic difference between internal and
comparative reconstruction is clearly spelled out even though it is not con-
--------------------------------- ---
276 REVIEW ARTICLE
ceived as a distinction in method but rather as one in availability of data
(from one vs. several languages) on which to operate. In separate sections
giving a synchronic description of GLand analyzing its prehistory in Sans-
krit and Greek, Kiparsky then considers various possibilities of rule re-
ordering (involving, in addition to GL, the 'cluster rule' which eliminates
aspiration immediately before obstruents) and, for Greek at least, comes
up with the interesting observation "that the etymological distinction be-
tween the root type gedh and ghedh is lost ... exactly where it had no morpho-
phonemic support from the cluster rule." The not all-too-surprising sug-
gestion that GL was a rule shared by the Greek-Indo-Iranian dialect (ofiE)
before it split up seems but a consequence of this observation.
W. Winter's well-written paper on 'Areal Linguistics' offers the reader
precisely that which its subtitle suggests, 'Some General Considerations' in
the form of a tentative essay rather than a systematic summary, let alone
any coherent theory applicable to the field. Surveying primarily the basic
prerequisites and the various mechanisms for linguistic transfer along the
dimensions of time and space as well as some abstract (or metaphoric)
models for the operation of such transfer (the family-tree and wave theory
models, among others), Winter discusses in an informed and generally
persuasive manner a wide range of relevant phenomena and processes, in-
cluding such controversial a problem as the shifting degree of permeability
to outside influence by various components of linguistic structure. While,
rightly I would think, he considers 'paradigmatic morphology' the most
resistant portion of language, and the lexicon, together with stylistics, the
most susceptible one, the author finds that "syntax should be particularly
amenable to change where a variety of synonymous expressions is found in
a language anyhow (i.e., in major constructions), but on the other hand be
relatively stable where certain configurations have no intralanguage com-
petitors." This is true, it would seem to me, only where surface syntax is con-
cerned, but deep-seated (that is to say, semantically-based) syntactic prop-
erties are, by and large, remarkably constant, as I have tried to show else-
where (cf. e.g., Birnbaum 1970, 42 ff., 60 f.). Much of Winter's compelling
reasoning and well-chosen exemplification falls squarely within the sphere
of linguistic (or, more narrowly, dialect) geography. This is true, for in-
stance, when he discusses the significance of isogloss bundles (citing the IE
centrumfsatam line, being an isolated one, as of little overall consequence)
or substratum phenomena (with a reference to Georgiev's attempt to as-
certain a non-Greek IE component of the Greek lexicon). And while,
according to him, "the notion of areal grouping, of Sprachbund, is not a
superior substitute for that of a 'genetically related' language 'family',"
nowhere does he propose that language grouping based merely on areal
REVIEW ARTICLE 277
contiguity (but not also characterized by a substantial set of shared typologi-
cal and/or genetically motivated features) would constitute a sufficient
criterion for an independent - third - classificatory principle.
J. Greenberg's essay on 'The Typological Method' consists essentially of
two major parts, one discussing 'The Logic of Typology' and the other one
surveying, in several sections, the evolution of typological research up to the
present (ca. 1970; 'The History of Typology', 'Typology and Linguistic
Theory', 'Typology and Diachrony'). An introductory note, opening with
Marouzeau's well-known definition that "that typological study oflanguages
is that which defines their characteristics in abstraction from history,"
outlines the organization of the presentation to follow.
Discussing the definitional framework of typology, the author begins by
pointing out that 'typology' (with its derivatives) is a relatively recent coinage
compared to the term 'type' itself. Thus, for example, Peirce in his well-
known type-token distinction found no need for a separate term 'typology'.
The latter, introduced toward the end of the last century, was first used in
linguistics only in the 1920s, while earlier forms of language typologies were
usually referred to merely as classification, with morphological classification
being the predominant one. Greenberg then goes on to discuss the potential
objects of linguistic typology, that is, in addition to languages as wholes,
individual linguistic phenomena or properties and components (e.g., syntactic
constructions, treated by Bloomfield, among others), quantitative aspects
of the word (counting phonemes, syllables, frequency, etc., studied, e.g., by
Menzerath and Meyer-Eppler), or processes of change (e.g., regular vs.
sporadic, conditioned vs. nonconditioned sound change). Greenberg further
discusses the fundamental difference between classification (yielding discrete,
exclusive classes) and typology (defining 'scaled' or mixed, often multi-
dimensional types, representing a clustering of characteristics rather than an
absolute and pure set of non-overlapping features). Sapir's arrangement of
languages on a comparative and relational scale, Greenberg's own provision
of a metric in the quantification of morphological typology, and Menzerath's
quantitative typology are mentioned as examples of this relative or ap-
proximative assignment of languages and linguistic phenomena and/or
processes in typological linguistics. Tracing back this fundamental difference
between (absolute) classification and (relative) typology to the dichotomy
between natural and cultural sciences as it emerged, in particular, in Ger-
many toward the end of the last and at the beginning of this century (cf.,
e.g., Dilthey's concept of Geisteswissenschaften or Weber's then new sociol-
ogy), Greenberg asserts that in the light oflogical typological research of the
kind conducted by Hempel and Oppenheim the very phrase 'typological
classification', as used in linguistics, would seem to imply a contradiction
278 REVIEW ARTICLE
in terms. In part, these at first sight contradictory specifics of linguistic
typology are explained by the fact that language is made up of- or, at any
rate, perceived as being made up of- discrete rather than continuous units;
cf. the invention of the alphabet bearing witness to the 'naturalness' of this
approach. And, according to Greenberg, the 'dialectical' opposition be-
tween genetic and typological linguistics, both involving classificational aims,
but one being by nature historical, the other ahistorical, also distinguishes
typology in linguistics from that in other fields. The author then goes on to
conceive of linguistic typology in a set-theoretical functional framework,
with the matching of ordered pairs as the primary technique, exemplifying
his reasoning with concrete examples of specific language types (such as
isolating, agglutinative, inflective). He further points out that from a logical
point of view 'type' ordinarily connotes a plurality of characteristics, while
type defined by a one-dimensional typology were better labeled 'quasi-types'.
Discussing explicitness and validity in typology, Greenberg distinguishes
between three recurrent methodologies in this field of linguistic inquiry:
(1) intuitive (2) empirical, and (3) analytical (or heuristic). Operationally the
intuitive approach- represented by much of 19th century morphological
typologizing - is essentially negative, i.e., a group of languages is described
not for the purpose of deriving any new hypotheses or testing old ones. So-
called factor analysis, such as the semantic differential developed by Osgood
and his associates, can serve as an example of the empirical approach,
amounting to a multidimensional quantitative typology. Also Trubeckoj'
inductive typology of vowel systems classifying such sound correlations as
linear, triangular, and quadrangular can serve as an example of the empirical
approach. The third, analytical (or heuristic) method operates by setting
up an a priori scheme exhausting all logical possibilities before being applied
to the empirical data. As Greenberg notes, there exist in fact no pure appli-
cations of the analytic approach as there is always a background of some
prior observations, but much of the current typological work of TG gram-
marians seems to fall into this category. It should be added that also
Uspenskij's typological framework, operating with an abstract 'etalon' or
standard language, shares important features with this approach.
From the premises and methodologies of typological research Greenberg
then turns to its goals and purposes. Here the author considers three main
directions, viz., toward (a) generalization (b) classification, and (s) indi-
vidualization. Greenberg finds an early example of the third, individualizing
approach in Mathesius' 'characterology' of individual languages. Also the
Humboldtian tradition and its echoes in Sapir's and Wharf's approach,
seeking to capture the overall 'genius' of a language (as but one expression of a
still deeper unity manifested in the culture or national character of the speak-
REVIEW ARTICLE 279
ers of that language), belong essentially to this individualizing facet of
language typology. The opposite approach of generalization is closely
associated with the renewed search for language universals, especially those
implicational in form. Contrary to the individualizing approach, it deals
with the limitations of language per se (i.e., vis-a-vis other semiotic-com-
municative systems) rather than with the specifics of individual languages
and language groups. Whenever Indo-European linguistics - on rare oc-
casions, to be sure - displayed an interest in problems of typology (as, e.g.,
expressed by Finck), its approach was individualizing, attempting to ascer-
tain the- psychological-national- characteristics of, say, Germanic (within
Indo-European) or German (within Germanic). Referring to observations
made by de Ia Grasserie and Sapir that, to use the latter's wording, "languages
falling into the same class have a way of paralleling each other in many
details or structural features not envisaged by the scheme of classification,"
Greenberg then goes on to further qualify the generalizing vs. the individ-
ualizing approach in typology, the former in tune with the natural sciences,
the latter with history and cultural scholarship (cf. the Naturwissenschaft/
Geisteswissenschaft dichotomy alluded to above; see now further also I tkonen
1974 with its emphasis on hermeneutics). In between these two extreme ap-
proaches Greenberg sees the typologically classificational approach, rep-
resented, for example, by Trubeckoj, as it prevailed in 20th century research
up to the recent explicit linkage between typology and the study of universals.
The latter was clearly prefigured, by the way, also in Hjelmslev's work,
especially in his posthumous book on 'Language', something Greenberg,
surprisingly, it would seem, fails to even take note of. Another name in-
creasingly deserving mention in this context is that of the typologist-uni-
versalist H. Seiler, nowhere mentioned by Greenberg. The remainder of
the first part of Greenberg's contribution then discusses the largely still
unresolved problem of choice of criteria for typological classifications,
emphasizes once again the distinction between (discrete) 'class' and (mixed,
transitional, and only rarely pure or ideal) 'type' and its repercussions for the
use of the term 'typical', pointing out, among other things, that even Clas-
sical Chinese can be considered merely the closest discernable approxima-
tion of an 'ideal' language-type (truly 'ideal types' always being abstract
constructs only, such as Uspenskij's 'etalon languages' not mentioned by
Greenberg). In closing, he points once more to the 'mixed', 'transitional',
and 'non-pure' types as used in sociology, psychology, and in the kind of
linguistics advocated by Skalicka (who operates with mixed morphological
types).
In the following sections on the history of typology, Greenberg first dis-
cusses the various attempts at morphological typology characteristic of the
280 REVIEW ARTICLE
19th century and the first quarter of this century. Among the few early
suggestions made for a phonological typology, the one by de Ia Grasserie
(1890) deserves mention. Otherwise, the classical form of morphological
typology was the threefold division into isolating, agglutinative, and in-
flective languages, firmly introduced by A. W. v. Schlegel and replacing the
earlier twofold division into languages with affixes and those with inflection,
devised by his brother F. v. Schlegel. Focusing on the structure of the word,
this typology was individualizing in its aim and intuitive in its methodology.
In a sense, the concern with word structure was in line with Humboldt's
emphasis on 'inner' and 'outer' form, as still echoed, for example, by the
neo-Humboldtian Lewy. Yet, the notion of the Volksgeist could also lead
to some more general schemes of language classification such as that of
Wundt. A. W. v. Schlegel's classificatory trichotomy was further refined by
such distinctions as that between organic vs. mechanic organization of
language and within the inflectional type between synthetic and analytic.
Humboldt, well acquainted with some of the particular types of the Amer-
indian languages, added a fourth, the incorporating, type to the previous
triad, a type subsequently eliminated by the Indo-Europeanist Schleicher.
Instead, the latter, relatively free of any value judgments so characteristic of
previous relevant research, now stressed the positivist ('Darwinist') aspect of
language evolution, claiming, for example, that Finno-Ugric, though less
well attested, is in no way 'inferior' to Indo-European. The ensuing era of
the Neogrammarian School (centered in Leipzig and preoccupied almost
exclusively with Indo-European) had little interest for any overall language
typology, which therefore fell into disrepute, ultimately culminating in the
claim to the exclusive legitimacy of genetic linguistic classification made by
Meillet and, in a similar vein, Pedersen. A contributing factor (outside the
IE domain) was that von der Gabelentz was able to present evidence that
even Chinese, representing the most primitive, isolating type, was historically
secondary, showing traces of both agglutination and inflection. Even the
antipositivist opponents of the neogrammarians around the turn of the
century (Schuchardt eta/.) showed little interest in language typology which
instead was cultivated by a few Humboldtians (such as Steinthal and Finck)
and gained momentum only with the advent of a strong neo-Humboldtian
wave, personified by scholars such as Lewy, Hartmann, Weisgerber, and,
in America, Sapir and Wharf; cf. the famed Sapir-Whorf hypothesis.
It was only with structuralism of the Geneva and, in particular, Prague
Schools that language typology once again became fashionable. This revival
went hand in hand with the upswing ofneo-Humboldtianism in the German-
speaking world and with the tradition of anthropological linguistics in
America. Fundamental here was the conception of language as a synchronic
REVIEW ARTICLE 281
structure. But while the neo-Humboldtians and the American anthropologi-
cal linguists favored an individualizing approach (emphasizing language
diversity), the members of the Prague School, with the possible exception
of Mathesius' 'characterological' (i.e., essentially individualizing) approach,
were more inclined toward a generalizing conception of language typology,
linking it with the study of universals. Among forerunners adhering to this
approach, Greenberg once more mentions de la Grasserie, but Brenda! (of
the Copenhagen School) and Frei (of the Geneva School) also belong to this
general trend. In this connection, in particular, it is hard to understand how
Greenberg could avoid mentioning Hjelmslev's deep concern with typology
and its immediate repercussions for the study of language universals. Within
the most important branch of European structuralism, the Prague School,
Greenberg quotes relevant statements by Trnka, Mathesius, Jakobson,
Skalicka, and others. Thus, already in 1929 Trnka pointed out that "the
synchronic method ... can compare with each other any systems of expres-
sion (and) go not only from form to meaning but also from meaning (func-
tion) to form ... " Mathesius' 'characterology' allowed for both individuali-
zation and generalization, language types now being conceived as hier-
archical wholes. However Skalicka later explicitly pointed out the connec-
tion between types and implicational universals (previously emphasized
also by Jakobson) and defined 'type' as a "collection of grammatical charac-
teristics." Further, Tubeckoj's vowel systems are once more cited as an
example of setting up relational properties ultimately leading to the establish-
ment of universal frameworks for comparison such as the one employed by
Jakobson for defining his universal distinctive features. But the Prague
School kind of typology and universals would also resort to frequency data
and statistics, and Greenberg cites work by Mathesius and Knimsky along
these lines. He then returns once more to the American scene of 'anthro-
pological structuralism' with its emphasis on an individualizing approach and
the introduction of the notion of 'pattern' (by Sapir) and what could be
labeled cultural relativism, especially in the work ofWhorf ( cf. his typological
contrast of Hopi and S[tandard] A[verage] E[uropean], represented by
English). In passing, the author mentions Voegelin's part-language typology,
especially in phonology (say, within the subset of stops). Greenberg's own
pioneering quantification of morphological typology is dealt with only
briefly, mentioning its generalizing approach and disregard for semantic
data (i.e., for Sapir's overall question as to how certain concepts were ex-
pressed). As an example of the persisting interest in the individualizing
approach to typology in American anthropological linguistics, Greenberg
quotes the work of Hymes. While noting that the general trend in typological
linguistics currently is mostly oriented toward the generalizing approach
282 REVIEW ARTICLE
(linking typology with universals), Greenberg's brief mention of recent
relevant achievements in the Soviet Union, and especially as regards the
work of Uspenskij (influenced by Hjelmslev!), is at least in the opinion
of this reviewer, clearly inadequate; cf. more recently also Kacnel'son
1972.
The next section purporting to discuss 'Typology and Linguistic Theory'
is in fact a brief account of the role played by typological studies in TG gram-
mar as well as some contemporary competing linguistic schools (the latter,
however, in fact no more than mentioned). Whereas the neogrammarian
approach to language was basically anti-typological and classic structuralism
(in its several variants) took a positive view of typology, TG grammar has
so far, to a large extent, been indifferent to typology on the assumption that
all deep structure is universal (or, put differently, that universals are found
only in deep structure). In this conception, typology is therefore always
possible but essentially pointless. My own suggestions for conceiving of
deep structure as multilayered, with a number of typological strata (to be
further specified in terms of their particular properties) placed between
language-specific 'shallow' deep structure (or 'infrastructure') and truly
universal deep (or 'profound') structure have obviously gone unnoticed by
Greenberg or were not considered worth mentioning (cf. esp. Birnbaum,
1970, 9-70, 'Deep Structure and Typological Linguistics'; see further also
my paper presented at the 1972 11th International Congress of Linguists in
Bologna, 'How Deep is Deep Structure?,' and its revised version 'Toward a
Stratified View of Deep Structure' to appear in the volume Linguistics at the
Crossroads). Yet Greenberg mentions certain preliminary approaches to
typology also in TG grammar (which, by the way, he treats with remarkable
sympathy and respect considering his own generally realistic stance): Bach's
attempt at typologizing various kinds of transformations, Fillmore's sug-
gestions regarding a typology of constraints applicable to the universal
base, or certain proposed word order typologies (Greenberg, McCawley,
Ross). Greenberg's own programmatic argument (given on p. 179) to the
effect that "the construct of the 'type' is, as it were, interposed between the
individual language in all its uniqueness and the unconditional or invariant
features to be found in all languages" with all its consequences is, of course,
closely paralleled by my own reasoning referred to above. In general, the
use of rules and deep structures (rather than directly observable properties),
the degree of explicitness and definitional precision, the sets of constraints,
the hierarchies of marked and unmarked members, and statistic frequency
measurements - all these factors, cited by Greenberg, would seem to suggest
the possibility for future fruitful typological studies also in the framework
of standard or modified TG grammar.
REVIEW ARTICLE 283
In the final section of his lengthy essay, Greenberg turns to the problem of
the relationship between typology and diachrony and that between typologi-
cal and genetic linguistics (and the corresponding classifications). My own
view is that while, of course, like Greenberg, I cannot subscribe to the neo-
grammarian (including Meillet's and Pedersen's) opinion that only a genetic
classification of languages can be considered valid and legitimate, neither do
I share the belief (adhered to by many structuralists and, it seems, with some
qualifications also by Greenberg) that typological and genetic language
classifications represent two altogether separate, incompatible taxonomic
principles. As I have tried to show elsewhere (Birnbaum, 1975), genetic
classification, though based on its own specific - genealogical-historical -
criteria, ultimately can be conceived of as one particular kind of typological
classification since language families, too, can be classified in terms of syn-
chronic structural characteristics which provide for their coherence. The
problem here is primarily the diachronic dimension: obviously, to take an
example, modern English may typologically be closer to some other non-IE
contemporary language than to Proto-IE (or even to some ancient IE
language such as Sanskrit or Classical Greek). But this fact alone does not
invalidate the assumption that modern English still displays certain charac-
teristics found only in some other IE languages, and, moreover, the deep-
seated semantic categories and configurations of contemporary English
will turn out not even to have changed as radically as their surface manifesta-
tions (implying, in this case, an almost complete switch from synthetic to
analytic language structure) would seem to suggest; for some reasoning
along similar lines, see also Lakoff, 1968, using Latin, English, and Spanish
data. Since no serious attempt has yet been made to establish a finite number
of discrete linguistic types (given all the complexities, approximations, and
multidimensional aspects so eloquently discussed by Greenberg) and since
it is therefore only realistic to assume the existence of a great number of
more or less overlapping and even coinciding coexistent language types,
even Benveniste's objection against Trubeckoj's tentative establishment of
an IE linguistic type (namely that, except for their totally different respective
lexicons, it would fully coincide with the wholly unrelated language Takelma)
cannot really be considered a cogent argument.
After briefly discussing the important notion of parallel processes of
change (called 'drift' by Sapir) and referring to Jakobson's appeal (of 1958)
to utilize the insights of typology for genetic linguistics, Greenberg then
proceeds to sketch a typological approach also to processes of language
change, distinguishing between four methods: (1) dynamicization of typolo-
gies (2) dynamicization of subtypologies, as well as (3) the intragenetic,
and (4) intergenetic methods. To illustrate the first method, Greenberg refers
284 REVIEW ARTICLE
to the well-known fact (previously discussed by Jakobson, Ferguson, myself,
and others) that the existence of nasal vowels in a language always presup-
poses the existence of oral vowels, but not vice versa (thus proving the
diachronic priority of languages with oral vowels only). At least to this
reviewer it is not quite clear in what respect the second method differs in
principle from the first one, especially since no unambiguous examples are
adduced. The third, intragenetic method, is exemplified by the fact - taken
from Slavic, or rather Russian - that of the three endings of the genitive
plural, zerof-ovf-ej, the latter two, being phonetically marked, tend to spread
in this semantically marked case form, while the phonetically unmarked
ending zero is retained in the unmarked category of the nominative singular
(and partly the accusative singular), an observation of a semiotically moti-
vated distribution earlier analyzed in more subtle terms by Jakobson. Finally,
the last, intergenetic typological contrasting is illustrated with comparable
(but genetically unrelated) processes such as the loss of a laryngeal with
concomitant lengthening of a preceding vowel in Indo-European and Coptic,
a method used in recent years with much success and insight, for example,
by Kurylowicz (in his comparative-contrastive study of ablaut and related
phenomena in IE and Semitic). In closing this survey of Greenberg's thorough
typological study, it should be stated that while his treatment of the 'logic
of typology' and the 'history of typology' from its beginnings up to and in-
cluding its potential applications to TG grammar is most intriguing and
enlightening (a few omissions and arguable points notwithstanding), his
discussion of 'typology and diachrony' has left at least this reviewer with a
somewhat less favorable impression.
Considering the overall theme of the volume under review, language
classification (and some of its ramifications), it is not immediately clear why
the next essay, W. Labov's 'The Social Setting of Linguistic Change', was
included here. This is not to say, however, that Labov's paper does not make
for fascinating reading. Quite to the contrary, this is a succinct exposition
of his - relatively new - brand of dynamic linguistics (originally conceived
in collaboration with the late U. Weinreich) which so far has been applied
primarily to the gradual change of phonological systems. Though designed
to contribute to a better understanding of historical - or, rather, diachronic -
processes, Labov's study of sound change as determined, in large measure,
by its social setting focusses, to begin with, on the synchronic dynamics or
ongoing change in a given speech community, thus rejecting the validity of
studying sound change as manifested in one particular idiolect or in the
framework of some abstract model based on the assumption of some ideal of
competence (as opposed to actual performance, in the Chomskyan sense).
REVIEW ARTICLE 285
Clearly, this new trend of studying sound change must be seen primarily as a
reaction to the abstract approach to sound change (and diachrony in general)
advocated by some historically oriented generativists (such asP. Kiparsky or
King). Labov and his associates suggest that they approach their data with-
out any preconceived notions, purely on an empirical basis. The social
variables, in TG grammar almost entirely neglected (or abstracted from,
'for the sake of the argument', as it were, or for the purpose of defining and
describing competence rather than performance, to be exact), are con-
sidered of primary significance here. In this respect, in particular, Labov of
course continues not only the tradition of his immediate teacher and col-
league, U. Weinreich, but also that of earlier schools emphasizing the social
factor, both in American anthropologically oriented (socio)linguistics and,
for example, the French brand of linguistics (Meillet, Vendryes eta/.). In the
first section of his essay, Labov gives full credit to these and many other
predecessors in 'the linguistic view oflanguage as a social fact'. The following
sections, discussing 'three substantive questions on linguistic change' ('Does
the social and stylistic variation of language play an important role in lin-
guistic change?' 'Can high-level, abstract rules of phonology and grammar
be affected by social factors?' 'Is there any adaptive function to linguistic
diversification?') and further elaborating on them under separate headings
('The Study of Sound Change in Progress: the Uniformitarian Principle',
'The Embedding of Linguistic Change in its Social Context', with several
further special problems discussed and amply illustrated in this section,
'The Evaluation Problem: Subjective Reactions to Linguistic Change', 'The
Actuation Problem', 'The Question of Social Variation in the Life History
of a Linguistic Change', 'Doubts on the Degree of Abstraction', and, finally,
'Is There an Adaptive Function to Linguistic Diversity?') all address im-
portant and, in fact, crucial problems concerning the mechanisms and the
determining factors in linguistic - primarily phonological - change, generally
taking an unorthodox, realistic view of what actually goes on when linguistic
habits gradually change in a particular speech community (the author
remaining well aware that even the concept of a 'speech community', is, of
course, but a relative notion). Labov clearly argues for always starting out
from the observable data, which itself shapes any theoretical and generalizing
conclusions, rather than setting out from a particular abstract theoretical
framework lor model) into which the facts oflinguistic reality must sometimes
forcefully be fitted to support any aprioristic theory. It should be noted,
though, that rather than subsuming the final findings of an altogether new
and fully worked out approach to linguistic change, Labov's paper has, to a
large extent, the character of a progress report on relevant ongoing research.
286 REVIEW ARTICLE
For a somewhat more detailed account, further elaborating on many points
only briefly touched upon in this essay as well as adding new facts and obser-
vations, see Labov eta/. 1972.
While the inclusion of Labov's condensed progress report, interesting and
important as it is, may seem somewhat questionable in view of the general
thematics of this volume, it is readily clear why the editors would want to
include a paper on various writing systems and their- only partly achieved-
decipherment among the contributions to a volume on language classification.
I. J. Gelb's essay, 'Written Records and Decipherment', certainly makes for
enlightening reading, especially for those less familiar with this particular
field. To be sure, Gelb essentially limits himself to dealing with 'the written
remains from ancient times which have been discovered in the long stretch
of land extending from Gibraltar to the Yellow Sea', and even his discussion
and exemplification of the four ancient civilizations concerned, the Near
East, India, China, and the Mediterranean area of classic, Greco-Roman
antiquity, is rather heavily focused on Southwest Asia and Northeast
Africa, the field of his own specialization. Only very occasionally and rather
inconsistently are later periods and other areas (e.g., the old Maya records,
the 'Easter Island writing', or the Proto-Indic linguistic remains from the
Indus Valley) brought into the discussion by way of illustrating parallel, or
at any rate comparable, problems of decipherment.
Granted the complexity of definitions, problems, and procedures to be
covered within the limits of a short paper, Gelb's insistence on a highly struc-
tured taxonomy of terms and concepts sometimes rather hampers the reader's
ability to orient himself, especially as the dividing line between contrasting
and/or competing notions is often very thin indeed. Thus, Gelb himself at the
outset rightly dispenses with any futile (in this context) attempt to distinguish
between 'written records' and 'literature', by excluding the usage of the latter
altogether from his discussion. But when it comes to the discussion of the
terms used for the study of written records -epigraphy and paleography-
some objections could legitimately be raised against his way of accounting
for a somewhat imprecise terminology. And while he discusses the merits of
terminologically distinguishing between the 'decipherment' of writing systems
as opposed to the 'recovery' (or 'interpretation') of formerly unknown or as
yet unidentified languages, he himself uses these (and some similar) terms
almost indiscriminately. Finally, while the author is, of course, quite aware
of the difference between the broader term 'graph' and the narrower 'graph-
eme' also in their strictly linguistic sense (cf., e.g., 275), he nonetheless does
not hesitate to state that "the study of full writing is called 'graphemics'"
(see 260 where, however, other suggested terms also are cited). And, still
from the point of view of linguistics, it is hard to see how he can relegate the
REVIEW ARTICLE 287
study of various 'graphs' (or, to be precise, allographs) such as the two signs
for Greek (lower case) sigma to the domain labeled by him 'para-writing'
or 'paragraphy' (260, but cf. also 275). Though striving for a concise and
exact style, Gelb's wording occasionally is less than fortunate; cf., for
example, when he speaks (260) about "our alphabetic writing, which is sup-
posed to consist of graphemes for single phonemes of the language" only to
immediately have to give some examples to contradict this 'supposition'.
But why, to begin with, assume that there necessarily 'is supposed' to be an
ideal one-to-one relationship between the phonemes of a language and the
graphemes of which its writing system consists?
In the chart of ancient writings and languages (266-7), Hittite hieroglyphic
should perhaps have been marked by a plus in parentheses as only the
hieroglyphic Hittite texts from the first millennium B. C. can be considered
fully deciphered, while those from the second millennium in part still remain
unreadable (cf. Dunaevskaja 1968, 8). In the discussion of various types of
writing systems (259-60), it is maybe somewhat confusing to find the term
'ideography', without any further comment, as one of the synonyms for
'sub-writing' or 'semasiography', i.e., the use of visual marks without the
intermediary of linguistic elements, since the conventionalized 'ideogram'
for which Gelb uses 'logogram' is the term otherwise frequently denoting one
of the chief components of one of the types of 'full writing', namely the logo-
syllabic systems. The author's self-imposed limitations in time and space
have also prompted him to suggest some generalizations that he might have
otherwise avoided. Thus, had he also taken into account recent finds from
medieval Eastern Europe, he could have listed birch bark (on which numerous
inscriptions have been found during excavations in Novgorod) as one of the
conceivable writing materials (255), and the statement that "all organic
matter is perishable in wet climates" (256), while generally true of course,
might perhaps have been somehow qualified in view of the fact that the
Novgorod birch bark letters were preserved as a result of the particular
degree of humidity of the earth layers in which they were found. Of data
that Gelb could not yet treat in his survey, but on which it would have been
particularly interesting to learn his opinion, are the supposedly inscribed - in
large part artistically shaped- objects, mostly from Central and East Balkan
sites, that M. Gimbutas and her team have excavated, and for which she
assumes, on not too solid grounds, it would seem to me, a pre-IE 'Linear
Old European script' (see Gimbutas 1974, 85-8). Somewhat surprisingly
one finds Linear A tentatively listed in the section on 'Decipherment of
unknown writings used for known languages' (269, cf. also 257). While it is
true, of course, that Minoan Linear A still remains undeciphered, it is
nonetheless evident that this writing system is closely related to that of
288 REVIEW ARTICLE
Linear B (cf., e.g., Packard 1974, 21). On the other hand, hypotheses still
vary widely as to the identity of the language hiding behind this script
(Akkadian or Ugaritic-type Semitic, Anatolian, esp. Luvian and/or Hittite,
or Greek-type IE, and others; cf. Packard 1974, 26-8). The application of
statistics to decipherment by making lists of the first and last signs of a given
sign group (word) is, by the same token, also one of the most important
'graphotactic' devices discussed but as such not made patently clear by
Gelb (275-6). A somewhat fuller discussion of the particular unresolved
problems relevant to one of the most puzzling languages still resisting correct
interpretation, Etruscan, would have been welcome.
The above, partly critical comments on some details of this most instruc-
tive essay - informative when it comes to explaining the basic methods and
techniques used in decipherment - are not meant to detract from the overall
merits and the generally very lucid and cogent reasoning of this succinct and
well-organized presentation.
In his 'Introductory Remarks', to part three of this volume, the unifying
theme of which he, incidentally, considers 'diachronic linguistics or cross-
language study' rather than language classification, R. E. Longacre briefly
surveys what seems to him the erratic swinging of the pendulum in American
and British linguistics between the two extremes of a one-sided preoccupation
with either language universals or distinctive particulars. Thus, he quotes and
comments on linguists such Nida, Bloomfield, Firth, and Allen, all more or
less outspoken 'antiuniversalists', and contrasts them with TG grammarians
(represented by a quotation from Postal) whose interest, as is well known,
has been particularly focused on the universal aspects of language. In the
ongoing 'dissolution' of supposedly largely universal deep structure into
general semantic structure, the author sees a signal of a possible return to a
kind of linguistics again primarily concerned with the study of particulars,
but pleads, for his part, for striking a reasonable balance between the two
extremes in future research. He then goes on to briefly list some specific
(if more or less self-evident) advantages of applied case studies over merely
theoretical essays on methodology and sees some parallelism between the
relationship of inquiry into universals vs. particulars, on the one hand, and
methodological theory vs. concrete application, on the other. Bloomfield's
classic Algonquian sketch is cited as an example of the theoretical and
methodological usefulness of a case study of a non-IE language also for such
an established field as that of Indo-European studies. Longacre concludes
his opening remarks by summarily stating the particular significance of
each of the following case studies.
Considerations of space, in addition to lack of expertise in several of the
fields covered in the case studies that follow, alluded to earlier, preclude a
REVIEW ARTICLE 289
detailed discussion of the remainder of this volume. Therefore, we will have
to limit ourselves to a few particular comments concerning just a few of the
specific case studies, all of which - and this should be stressed - make for
interesting reading.
R. Anttila's highly selective (in terms of illustrative data) study on 'Internal
Reconstruction and Finno-Ugric (Finnish)', while written in the author's
usual casual, personal style, is full of new and intriguing observations, sug-
gestions, and insights. In addition, it is another demonstration of his tremen-
dous erudition. Considering the thrust of internal reconstruction primarily
inductive, this paper also suggests a vindication and partial reinterpretation
of the role and significance of analogy as a methodological tool in historical
linguistics and takes issue with much of the kind of diachronic research
practiced in recent years by the 'historical' branch of TG grammarians.
Still, for a fuller account of Anttila's relevant views, the reader is well advised
to consult his recent textbook on historical and comparative linguistics
(Anttila 1972) as well as his forthcoming study on analogy (for a preliminary
version, see Anttila 1974).
Somewhat surprisingly, perhaps, J. A. Rea's essay 'The Romance Data of
the Pilot Studies for Glottochronology' is, if anything, a succinct critique of
the method and results of glottochronology (lexicostatistics) leading to the-
in my view- fully justified question: "If ... the mathematics are inadequate;
if ... the results of the method do not correspond to known facts; if, now,
the Romance wordlists and scorings that formed the basis of the method are
in fact full of indeterminacies, inconsistencies and errors, what then remains?"
J. Chadwick's paper 'Linear B', telling, once more, the story of one of the
most exciting feats of decipherment of all time, the successful identification
of the Linear B script as Early ('Mycenaean') Greek by the late M. Ventris,
prematurely killed in a car accident, does not really contribute anything
substantially new, at least when compared to earlier, more detailed accounts
primarily by Ventris' collaborator himself (cf. esp. Chadwick 1959). Might
it be that this paper was (written for and) included in this volume to counter-
balance, rather than, as a case study, match, Gelb's methodological essay
where Ventris' achievement is, if anything, somewhat played down (cf. 275)?
J. R. Krueger's concluding paper on 'Altaic Linguistic Reconstruction
and Culture', is at least as much a brief histoire de Ia question as a contribu-
tion of any new, original ideas to the intricate and, to a large extent, un-
resolved problems of comparative Altaic linguistics. Unclear are not only
the possible, in some instances at best distant relationships with such language
groups as Uralic and Indo-European, on the one hand, and Korean-Japanese,
on the other, but very much open remains even the fundamental question
as to whether the three main components of what traditionally is referred
290 REVIEW ARTICLE
to as Altaic, viz., Turkic, Mongolian, and Manchu-Tungus, are actually
genetically related or only have strongly influenced each other as a result of
symbiosis and mutual exchanges (reflected in various sub-, ad-, and super-
stratum phenomena), thus developing a set of shared typological chara-
teristics, especially in syntax, macromorphology (i.e., order of and mecha-
nisms for combining morphemes), and lexicology. All this, and the relevant
opposing viewpoints -where the author holds a 'right-of-the-center' view,
that is to say, is cautiously inclined to accept a common origin for all Altaic
languages, granted many conformities and similarities are secondary and
due to borrowing rather than to inheritance - are duly sketched by Krueger
who, in closing, even attempts to at least outline the (to be sure, very limited)
possibilities of reconstructing Altaic culture through linguistic evidence,
again primarily reporting on work by others (D. Sinor, in particular). Of
references to theoretical work relevant to the techniques of establishing
(or refuting) distant relationship, one misses, among others, Fokos-Fuchs
1962 (utilizing primarily criteria of syntax, so relevant here, for Ural-Altaic)
and several studies by Collinder (esp. 1964 and 1965).
It goes without saying that a volume as content-packed and diversified
(in approach as well as subject matter) as the one reviewed here cannot but
raise a number of questions and prompt some critical remarks, a few of which
were voiced above. In closing, it should therefore be stressed, once more,
that the overall impact of the many contributions assembled in this six-
hundred-plus pages volume is definitely a positive one. Whether the con-
tents are in the field or fields of his own specialization or outside it, and
whether he is convinced or unconvinced by some of the arguments advanced
by the various authors, who represent a broad spectrum of schools of
thought and interests, the open-minded reader can only profit from famil-
iarizing himself with the wide range of intriguing facts and views presented
in this book.
UCLA HENRIK BIRNBAUM
BIBLIOGRAPHY
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Birnbaum, H.: 1968, 'On Reconstruction and Prediction: two Correlates of Diachrony
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Birnbaum, H.: 1970, Problems of Typological and Genetic Linguistics Viewed in a Gen-
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Birnbaum, H.: 1975, 'Typology, Genealogy, and Linguistic Universals', Linguistics (to
REVIEW ARTICLE 291
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