Typology and universals

A linguistic theory must strive to be applicable to all human languages and thus must recognize at some level what all languages have in common. Generative theory, for instance, has sought commonalities in the form of universals of grammar at the level of phrase structure rules and conditions and constraints on movement rules. While there are certainly many tendencies and repeated patterns cross-linguistically, stating universals at this level has largely been unsuccessful in accounting for the empirical data (see Newmeyer 2005). In this chapter we will consider tracing the tendencies and patterns observable across languages to the interaction of the cognitive processes that have been discussed in the previous chapters of this book. This approach allows us to integrate synchronic patterns with patterns of language change and provides the framework for forming a more comprehensive theory that explains the range of structures found in the languages of the world. But in addition to accounting for similarities among languages, it is also important to account for major typological differences. Towards this goal it is suggested here, following other research (Perkins 1992, Wray and Grace 2007) that cultural factors may come into play. Indeed social and cultural factors have remained in the background in the previous discussion, but clearly such factors cannot be ignored in a full account of the emergence of language.