Number by Greville G. Corbett (review)

Abstract

MLRy 98.1, 2003 263 selective even within each chapter, highlighting the most important, rather than overburdening the reader with chronological lists of works and achievements. The lucidity of his style makes the book attractive?indeed, students will love it (as Arnost Lustig forecasts on the dust jacket), but the general reader too is bound to find it clear, competent , and useful. And the scholars? They are likely to go back to the texts, inspired by the variety of Porter's interpretations and desiring to discuss them with him. Cambridge Bohuslava Bradbrook Number. By Greville G. Corbett. (Cambridge Textbooks in Linguistics) Cam? bridge: Cambridge University Press. 2000. xx + 358pp. ?42.50 (pbk ?15.95). ISBN 0-521-64016-4 (pbk 0-521-64970-6). In a seminal 1978 article, Bernard Comrie reminded linguists that 'Linguistics is about languages', and warned against hasty generalizations based on a single language, usually English ('Linguistics is about Languages', in Linguistics in the Seventies: Directions and Prospects, ed. by Braj B. Kachru (Urbana: Department of Linguistics, University of Illinois, 1978), pp. 221-36). Comrie also, however, saw the danger for typologists of sacrificing depth for breadth. A second problem is that of comparing like with like cross-linguistically, and a third that of drawing satisfying generalizations from a wide range of data. Here, as in his similarly magisterial work on Gender (Cam? bridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), Corbett overcomes all three problems by treating a single grammatical category in formidably impressive detail, drawing on over 250 languages. There are also examples of marked and dialectal constructions from more familiar European languages. The dangers of 'seeing English as ifit were Language' are well illustrated in Chap? ter 2, which surveys number systems. Languages with dual, trial, and paucal number are described, and the familiar singular/plural system ofEnglish is found to occupy but 'one corner of typological space'. Generalizations are presented in the form of implicational hierarchies, most notably the Animacy Hierarchy, seen in Chapters 3 and 4 to constrain the kinds of nominal which can be marked for number, with higher-ranked items (e.g. pronouns) most likely to carry marking. Chapter 5 explores ways in which languages express number, while Chapter 6 focuses on one of these, syntax. Corbett considers conflictsbetween 'syntactic' and 'semantic' agreement (e.g. 'Thecommittee has vs. have decided'), and again proposes a hierarchy, in which pronouns at the bottom are more likely to favour semantic agreement ('the committee . . . theydecided') than higher-ranked items such as attributives (*'these committee'). After a review of uses of number in Chapter 7, Chapter 8 introduces the fascinating but complex topic of verbal number. Corbett is careful to distinguish this from nominal agreement and aspect, but recognizes that such distinctions are not always clear-cut in practice, and offersa number of helpful diagnostic tests. Here, and in the finalchapter which covers the diachrony of number systems, interaction between number and other categories, and the psycholinguistics of number, lie fruitfulavenues for further research. A challenge for typologists is to make their work accessible and interesting to the reader unversed in Mordvin, Aari, or Nivkh, forwhom the sheer range of unfamiliar languages may seem simply bewildering. Fortunately, the author is as scrupulous about clarity as he is about defining terms and comparing like with like. Each chapter has a clear introduction, examples have both translations and morphological glosses, and key points are summarized helpfully at the end. Diagrams are used sensibly to illustrate hierarchies, and the use of 'artificial English' to elucidate differentnumber systems in Chapter 2 is ingenious. As Corbett points out, time may be short for typologists, with only 250 of the 264 Reviews world's estimated 6,000 languages presumed 'safe' for the next 100 years. For that reason alone, this impressive work is especially welcome. University of Kent at Canterbury David Hornsby Issues in Modern Foreign Languages Teaching. Ed. by Kit Field. (Issues in Subject Teaching) London and New York: Routledge/Falmer. 2000. xix + 287 pp. ?60 (pbk ?16.99). ISBN 0-415-23717-3 (pbk 0-415-23064-0). The series editor confirms the intention 'to provide teachers with a stimulus for democratic involvement in the development of subject teaching' (p. xvi...