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PERSPECTIVES ON HISTORICAL LINGUISTICS 
AMSTERDAM STUDIES IN THE THEORY AND 
HISTORY OF LINGUISTIC SCIENCE 
General Editor 
E.F. KONRAD KOERNER 
(University of Ottawa) 
Series IV - CURRENT ISSUES IN LINGUISTIC THEORY 
Advisory Editorial Board 
Henning Andersen (Copenhagen) ;Raimo Anttila (Los Angeles) 
Tomaz V. Gamkrelidze (Tiflis);Hans-Heinrich Lieb (Berlin) 
J. Peter Maher (Chicago);Ernst Pulgram (Ann Arbor, Mich.) 
E. Wyn Roberts (Vancouver, B.C.);Danny Steinberg (Honolulu) 
Volume 24 
Winfred P. Lehmann & Yakov Malkiel (eds.) 
PERSPECTIVES ON HISTORICAL LINGUISTICS 
PERSPECTIVES 
ON 
HISTORICAL LINGUISTICS 
edited by 
WINFRED P. LEHMANN & YAKOV MALKIEL 
JOHN BENJAMINS PUBLISHING COMPANY 
AMSTERDAM/PHILADELPHIA 
1982 
Dedicated to the memory of 
Emile Benveniste, 1902-1976 
Jerzy Kurylowicz, 1895-1978 
and George Lane, 1904-1981 
© Copyright 1982 - John Benjamins B.V. 
ISSN 0304 0763 / ISBN 90 272 3516 3 
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, by print, photoprint, 
microfilm or any other means, without written permission from the publisher. 
PREFATORY NOTE 
A decade and a half ago the editors of this volume 
arranged a conference to review aims for historical 
linguistics. The papers presented at that conference 
were thereupon published under the title: Directions 
for Historical Linguistics (Austin: University of Texas 
Press, 196 8). They may well have achieved some of their 
goals. In any event the considerable attention sub­
sequently devoted to historical linguistics suggested the 
usefulness of another conference. Unlike its predecessor 
this one required no major support; it was arranged as 
part of a meeting of a learned society. Two sections of 
the Modern Language Association program in San Francisco, 
December 27-29, 1979, were allotted to the Language 
Theory Division for presentation of papers which are now 
published here. 
While the earlier papers and their topics are by no 
means obsolete, the titles of the papers in this volume 
may indicate that historical linguistics has progressed 
in the meantime. Not that the historical study of 
language has completely overcome an unfortunate legacy 
from one of its most influential theorists, by which 
it was sharply separated from descriptive linguistics! 
Yet the separation between the two approaches to the 
study of language no longer maintains the Saussurean 
sharpness of even a decade ago. Linguists are coming to 
understand that if problems are examined in isolation 
from the dimension of time affecting all human activities, 
such isolation, as well as their views of language, may 
be as artificial as the context in which they are treated. 
Linguistics is slowly overcoming another trouble­
some heritage, this too bequeathed by theorists who have 
in part adversely influenced the historical study of 
language: virtually exclusive attention to the sounds and 
forms of language. While like other linguists, the neo-
grammarians -- who set this narrow course — considered 
the sentence the minimal unit of language, in effect they 
limited their attention to its most readily manageable 
Vi PREFATORY NOTE 
segments, phonology and morphology. Such a delimitation 
not only led to neglect of syntax, let alone discourse; 
it also provided limited direction for the approaches to 
the topics on which it concentrated, as essays presented 
below illustrate. 
Linguistics pursued in the neogrammarian tradition, 
which persisted among theoreticians in this country as 
well as much of Europe, also for the most part treated 
language outside its social context. It was one of the 
achievements of the late Uriel Weinreich to assist in 
moving our field back to consideration of language as a 
social phenomenon. The founders of modern linguistics, 
notably Jacob Grimm, undertook their investigations of 
language as only one part of their concern with communica­
tion. Philology, the field in which they and their 
successors carried out their studies, involved the inves­
tigation of communication generally. In some degree then 
we now return to the broad approach of the founders of 
modern linguistics a century and a half ago. To solve 
a particular problem students of language may restrict 
their approaches. But the study of phonology, or mor­
phology, or syntax with no attention to language in its 
social setting may be most useful in refining formalism. 
Investigation of language in its use by social groups 
deepens our understanding of it, at the same time 
disclosing many opportunities for further study. 
By its title, the first essay after the introduction 
links this volume to its predecessor. Stating the prin­
ciples presented in the final essay of that volume and 
reviewing subsequent research, it assesses progress made 
in the meantime towards constructing a general theory of 
change. Like the following papers on phonology and 
morphology, it poses new questions that have arisen in the 
increasingly ambitious research devoted to language. 
Historical attention to discourse, the topic of the 
fifth paper, is virtually new, though it too finds 
predecessors among philologists who devoted themselves 
to texts. Finally, two essays treat etymology, one 
concentrating on the rigorously investigated Romance 
field, the other on Indo-European, especially on new 
insights prompted by attention to Hittite in accordance 
with views developed largely in study of languages totally 
unknown or disregarded by previous Indo-Europeanists. 
Etymology is the historical study of language in 
manageable proportions, including all sub-divisions of 
linguistics: phonology, morphology, syntax, discourse 
as well as meanings of items for individuals and society. 
In recalling the earlier participation of Emile Benveniste 
and Jerzy Kurylowicz, who included its study as well as 
PREFATORY NOTE Vii 
theoretical approaches to language in their scope of 
investigation, we present this collection in the tradition 
of students of language whose broad grasp of it guides 
them to illuminating all of its segments as parts of the 
whole. 
From the foregoing remarks, however, it would be 
wrong to infer that a much-needed partial return to 
certain crucial implications of earlier thinking, be it 
of the twentieth century, be it -- a fortiori — of the 
Romantic era, comes close to exhausting our goals. Quite 
the contrary. The advance of linguistic scholarship and 
science (two branches intertwined) resembles a spiral, 
with each generation, to be sure, trying to reject 
certain gratuitous exaggerations of its predecessors 
by moving, sometimes abruptly, in the opposite direction, 
but with steady progress being nevertheless achieved along 
another, perhaps more important, axis. The latter quali­
fication is a measure of the difference between a linear 
projection of the swings of a pendulum, where one movement 
virtually cancels out another and no visible over-all 
progress is achieved, and a genuine spiral, which 
unmistakably combines general progress along one line 
with the cancellation of extremist positions along 
another. Here is the acid test for this contention: 
Ask yourselves whether any of the papers here included 
would have been conceived or written at a distinctly 
earlier moment. In disagreement with the rigidity and 
schematism of previous schools of thought, we neverthe­
less cheerfully adopt certain minor techniques and 
absorb individual data developed or clarified under 
those regimes. It has been argued that the late Ramon 
Menendez Pidal was, figuratively speaking, a latter 
day re-incarnation of Jacob Grimm. The comparison is 
valid; but only on the understanding that the arsenal 
of tools available to Spain's intellectual giant was 
radically different from the modest kit with which 
Germany's originalgenie
operated. Many changes of taste 
and perspective were necessary before, for example, 
typological analysis as envisaged here, cutting across 
the borders between Indo-European Romance, and Germanic — 
that is, domains of knowledge almost hermetically sealed 
off in the past — could be undertaken in an experimental 
vein. 
In planning this work we selected specialists in 
specific fields of historical linguistics and gave them 
latitude for the direction of their contribution. We 
have tried to maintain their individualism of outlook 
and style, and are grateful to them for their participa­
tion. We would like to express our appreciation to 
Viii PREFATORY NOTE 
Janet Johnson, Lynn Johnk and Margaret Woodruff for 
editorial assistance, especially with the combined 
bibliography. The computer facilities of the Linguistics 
Research Center of the University of Texas at Austin 
permitted assembly of the master bibliography. The 
Cambridge University Press authorized inclusion of the 
maps from Dialect Geography by J. K. Chambers and 
Peter Trudgill. Janet Johnson merits special thanks 
for preparing the camera-ready typescript. We are also 
grateful to the Modern Language Association for our 
initial forum and for a travel grant which enabled the 
participant from abroad to attend the meeting at which 
these papers were first presented. 
Austin, Texas & Berkeley, Calif. 
May 19 82 The Editors 
TABLE OF CONTENTS 
Prefatory note ν 
Table of contents ix 
Charts, figures and tables χ 
Abbreviations xi-xii 
1. WINFRED P. LEHMANN 
Introduction: Diachronic linguistics 1 
2. WILLIAM LABOV 
Building on Empirical Foundations 17 
3. WOLFGANG U, DRESSLER 
A Semiotic Model of Diachronic Process Phonology 93 
4. YAKOV MALKIEL 
Semantically-Marked Root Morphemes in Diachronic Morphology.. 133 
5. ELIZABETH CLOSS TRAUGOTT 
From Propositional to Textual and Expressive Meanings; Some 
Semantic-Pragmatic Aspects of Grammaticalization 245 
6. STEVEN N. DWORKIN 
Romance Etymology 273 
7. CAROL F. JUSTUS 
Indo-European Etymology with Special Reference to Grammatical 
Category 291 
Bibliography 329 
Subject Index 373 
Author Index 377 
CHARTS, FIGURES AND TABLES 
Figure 1(a). (sj) in Brunlanes: speakers aged 70+ 43 
Figure 1(b). (sj) in Brunlanes: speakers aged 25-69 44 
Figure 1(c). (sj) in Brunlanes: speakers aged -24 63 
Figure 2 Retrograde movement of checked (eyC) in 
Philadelphia 64 
Table I. Studies of linguistic change and variation 
in urban speech communities 91-92 
Chart 1. Gradual change of rules and their outputs 118 
Chart 2. Diachronic deiconization of phonological 
processes 123 
Flowchart of changes of grammatical markers 257 
Table 1. Antecedent-consequent markers in the OE Boethius 260 
Table 2. Antecedent-consequent markers in the ME Boethius 261 
Table 3 Antecedent-consequent markers in the I.T's 
Boethius 262 
Chart I. Active, Middle, Perfect 303 
Chart II. Thematic Active and Middle 304 
Chart III. Hittite -bi conjugation 305 
Chart IV. Genus verbi 310 
Chart V. Greek transitivizing Active 311 
Chart VI. Comparative IE transitivizing Active 313 
Chart VII. Transitivizing Middle, Perfect, and Active forms 315 
Chart VIII. IE 'move' with transitive Active renewal 
*-(n)-ew 317 
Chart IX. Denominative, eventive and other renewing 
suffixes 318 
Chart X. Revised Hypothesis * s e k - : s o k - : s k - 325 
ABBREVIATIONS 
(A) Genera l 
ad j . adjective 0 object 
adv. adverb obi. oblique 
arch. archaic obs (ol.) obsolete 
BEV See Abbreviations (B) OED Old English Dictionary 
Centr. Central orig. originally 
Class. Classical OV object verb 
coll. colloquial Orth. orthographic(ally) 
con j . conjunction pers. personally 
dial. dialectal pi. plural 
dim. diminutive poet. poetically 
f. feminine p.ptc. past participle 
F2 formant 2 PR phonological rule 
fig. figurative pres. present 
gram. grammatical prop. property 
gen. genitive refl. reflexive 
intrs. intransitive s. subject 
IPA International Phonetic sg. singular 
Alphabet sub j . subjunctive 
JCS Journal of Cuneiform subst. substantive 
Studies stand. standard 
lit. literally SVO subject-verb-object 
LCV Project LCV, see p. 51 SOV subject-object-verb 
LPC linear predictive coding trans. transitive 
LYS Labov, Yaeger & Steiner v. verb 
m. masculine var(s). variants 
M.E.D. "Modern English Dictionary VO verb object 
med. medieval West. Western 
mod. modifier WLH Weinreich, Labov and 
MR morphological rule Herzog 
n. noun 
nom. nominative 
NP noun phrase 
xii ABBREVIATIONS 
(Β) Names of Languages 
Am. American English ON Old Norse 
Andal. Andalusian OProv. Old Provencal 
Ar. Arabic OPtg. Old Portuguese 
Ast. Asturian OSp. Old Spanish 
Arag. Aragonese Pers. Persian 
BEV Black English Vernacular PIE Proto-Indo-European 
Brit. British English Ptg. Portuguese 
Cast. Castilian R. Russian 
Cat. Catalan Rom. Romance 
Du. Dutch Rum. Rumanian 
E. English Sc. Scottish 
EME Early Middle English S. It. South Italian 
ENE Early New English Skt. Sanskrit 
Fr. French Sp. Spanish 
Friul. Friulan(o) Sw. Swiss 
G. German Tusc. Tuscan 
Gal. Galician Vegl. Vegliote, i.e. North 
Gmc. Germanic Dalmatian 
Goth. Gothic V. Lat. Vulgar Latin 
Gr. Greek 
Gr.-Lat. Graeco-Latin 
Hebr. Hebrew 
IE Indo-European 
It. Italian 
Lang. Langobardian 
L(at.) Latin 
L Lat. Late Latin 
LG Low German 
Lith. Lithuanian 
LME Late Middle English 
ME Middle English 
Med. Lat. Medieval Latin 
MHG Middle High German 
NE New/Modern English 
NH New Hittite 
NHG New High German 
Neap. Neapolitan 
Norw. Norwegian 
OAst. Old Asturian 
OCSl Old Church Slavonic 
OE Old English 
OFr. Old French 
OFris. Old Frisian 
OH Old Hittite 
OHG Old High German 
INTRODUCTION: DIACHRONIC LINGUISTICS 
WINFRED P. LEHMANN 
University of Texas at Austin 
When historical linguistics began to develop in the 
19th century, individual scholars made major contributions 
in distinct areas. These set directions for subsequent 
study. Franz Bopp produced a seminal work in morphology 
(1816); Jacob Grimm produced a similarly influential 
study in phonology (1822). Following Grimm, Rudolph 
von Raumer, Hermann Grassmann, Carl Verner and Ferdinand 
de Saussure amplified understanding of phonological 
change. Following Bopp, August Schleicher and Karl 
Brugmann made refinements in morphology; see Lehmann 
(1967) for pertinent examples of important contributions 
in phonology and morphology (see also Koerner 19 78, esp. 
189-209). By the end of the century the theoretical 
bases of historical phonology and morphology had reached 
a high level, as handbooks like Eduard Sievers's 
Grundzuge der Phonetik (5th ed 1901), Hermann Paul's 
Prinzipien der Sprachgeschichte (1st ed 1880, 5th ed 
1920) and the theoretical statements on morphology in 
Brugmann's Grundriss, Vol. II (1906-1916) illustrate. 
The course of development in each area followed 
parallel lines. First, data were assembled and 
generalizations were stated. Grimm's presentation of 
the data for his rules on the Germanic consonant shift 
was remarkably complete as are the paradigms in Bopp's 
short work. The generalizations were then refined, as 
in solutions of the residues — those among the Germanic 
consonants labeled exceptions to Grimm's law. Finally, 
universal principles were proposed, as in August Leskien's 
neogrammarian principle and in the many works on morpho­
logical change which are often brought together under 
the term analogy (Kurylowicz 1964; Anttila 1977). 
(1) 
2 WINFRED P. LEHMANN 
In further areas of language, involving semantics 
— syntax and the lexicon — the diversity of data 
delayed a similar advance to universal principles. The 
syntactic treatments of German, Latin and Greek in the 
first half of the 19th century did not proceed beyond 
assembly of data. Grimm's
highly praised volume on the 
syntax of the simple sentence in the Germanic languages 
provides a clear example (1898) . It brought together 
massive sets of examples, but the conclusions do not 
proceed beyond summaries for the data assembled. Some­
what later Berthold Delbrück proposed generalizations 
based on his study of Greek and Sanskrit syntax, tending 
towards principles clarifying historical syntax. But 
only in this century were universal principles advanced, 
as in Brugmann's psychological principles (1918), in 
Behaghel's laws (Vennemann 19 74) and in P. Wilhelm 
Schmidt's conclusions on the history of the genitive and 
adjective contructions in the Romance languages (19 26). 
Later works have attempted to sharpen syntactic princi 
ples, and to move historical syntactic study to a 
similar place with the study of phonology and morphology 
(Lehmann 1974; Lightfoot 1979). 
Historical study of the lexicon proved even less 
amenable to such advances. It attracted an indefatigible 
scholar, August Pott. Through volume after volume he 
comments on huge and amorphous compilations of data 
(1859-1876). Some of his observations are illuminating, 
in virtually poetic form, as when he compares the role of 
particles in sentences to that of spices, a pinch of 
which suffices to change the flavor of a dish. Yet 
rather than general principles governing semantic change, 
the major effort was devoted to determining and defining 
units which are carriers of meaning: roots and affixes, 
and thereupon to describe their relationships. The 
dictionaries in use today for historical purposes, such 
as the comprehensive work by Alois Walde and Julius 
Pokorny for the Indo-European languages, are compilations 
of this sort (1927-1932). The etymological dictionaries 
for individual languages build on these, concentrating 
their attention on individual words. There were attempts 
to provide some generalizations, as by Michel Breal 
(1897) and Gustav Stern (1931). But these had severely 
limited application, scarcely more than for the examples 
cited. Breal's "law of specialization" and his "law of 
differentiation" illustrate by their very designations 
that such "laws" apply only to limited lists of words; 
one may use them for clarifying those lists but not the 
lexicon in general, let alone for predicting the course 
of semantic change. In short, historical approaches to 
DIACHRONIC LINGUISTICS 3 
semantics did not advance beyond the initial stages of 
study which William Dwight Whitney labeled "assembling" 
and "arranging," with virtually no success in "explaining" 
semantic change (Whitney 1896:6). 
Current attention to directions which historical 
linguists are exploring or to perspectives which they 
envision must therefore take the semantic segment as the 
primary focus of concern. Two earlier publications 
indicate preliminary steps in dealing with semantics in 
historical studies: a volume published as a Festschrift 
for Wilhelm Streitberg which was labeled 'state and 
tasks of linguistics' (no editor, 1924) and the prede­
cessor to this volume (Lehmann and Malkiel 1968). In 
addition, many linguists have indicated their views on 
historical linguistic theory in longer works, often 
in prefaces, as did Brugmann (1904, 1906) and Meillet 
(1937), or in separate articles. Some of these have 
been assembled, as in the widely read collections of 
Meillet (1921, 1934) and Benveniste (1966). Any histori­
cal investigation must take their views into considera­
tion; a survey of them here would extend this introduction 
unduly. 
The survey of 19 24 concentrated on Indo-European 
linguistics, after a review of "Indo-European and 
general linguistics" (Junker 1-64). Yet even the essays 
directed at Indo-European invite general studies, such 
as Junker's initial dictum, based on Schuchardt, that 
linguists must have general concerns, rather than limiting 
themselves to Romance or Indo-European studies: "Der 
Indogermanist ist Sprachforscher, oder er ist wissen-
schaftlich nichts" (Junker 1924:1). It is idle to dwell 
on the 19 24 survey, in view of its lack of impact on 
general linguistics or even on Indo-European studies. 
Linguists were about to concentrate once again on 
phonology and morphology, influenced on the one hand by 
the axioms of Bloomfield, on the other by Prague School 
functionalism. In this concentrated attention there was 
no follow-up to the invitation to syntactic or semantic 
study. General linguistics embarked on its extended 
concern with structural phonology and thereupon generative 
syntax, while historical linguistic study remained in a 
holding pattern. 
In a move out of this pattern the 196 8 publication 
reexamined fundamentals: the artificial gulf created 
by Saussure between descriptive and historical study 
of language (3-20); impact of the morphological level on 
the phonological in change (21-64); further attention to 
the interrelationship between phonology and morphology 
in a clarification of the "notion of morphophoneme" 
4 WINFRED P. LEHMANN 
which characterized the late work of Kurylowicz (65-81); 
reemphasis on a sociolinguistic approach in the study of 
language change, in the often cited essay of Weinreich, 
Labov and Herzog (95-198). These topics illustrate steps 
which diachronic linguistics needed to take for regaining 
its bearings. The status reached for Indo-European 
studies was open for reevaluation. Directions for 
historical linguistics were to come from attention to all 
languages, not merely the Indo-European. And that 
attention was to be directed at all segments of language, 
including "the area of semantic change" (1968:18). 
The last decade and a half has seen a flowering of 
historical linguistics, with historical attention to 
languages wherever data are available, and to all areas 
of language. Some contributions were prompted by the 
international conferences on historical linguistics, 
beginning with that at Edinburgh in 1973, others by 
special sessions of recurring meetings, such as that of 
the Chicago Linguistic Society (1976) , still others by 
special symposia, such as those held at Santa Barbara 
(Li 1976, 1978). Advances resulting from these have 
been incorporated in subsequent studies, including 
those here. Such advances also led to restatements, as 
of Indo-European syntax (Lehmann 19 74) and of diachronic 
principles (e.g. Lightfoot 1979, Ramat 1981). 
The advances are far too broad for more than brief 
comment here. Among the chief are statements of 
principles in accordance with generalizations drawn from 
typological study. These principles have guided 
restatements of long-studied phenomena. In phonology, 
for example, a restatement of major consequence for 
Indo-European studies has resulted from the application 
of such generalizations to the early obstruent system. 
When findings of the laryngeal theory eliminated 
the proposed voiceless aspirated stops from the Proto-
Indo-European system of obstruents, maintenance of 
voiced aspirated stops constituted a highly suspect 
system, as Roman Jakobson brought to the attention of a 
wide group of linguists in the Oslo Congress (Jakobson 
1962:531; see also Kurylowicz 1935 and Lehmann 1952: 
80-81). 
A. Set of dentals in PIE system B. Set criticized 
proposed before laryngeal by Jakobson: 
theory: 
t th t 
d dh d dh 
DIACHRONIC LINGUISTICS 5 
There are of course various solutions. One is to 
allow for Proto-Indo-European an aberrant system, on the 
grounds that such a system might well be temporary and 
on the way to restructuring, as it indeed was in all the 
Indo-European dialects. Another is to assume that the 
phonemes represented by the traditional bh dh gh were 
not aspirated stops but rather fricatives, as many 
linguists had proposed (Prokosch 19 39); others indicated 
their hesitation
by simply proposing phonemes (Benveniste 
1935) or by their transcription (Lehmann 1952:112 — dh). 
Another proposed solution is directed by the finding 
that when obstruent systems have a gap in their set of 
labial stops, the order in which such a gap occurs is 
likely to be voiceless and glottalized. Applied to the 
Indo-European system, with its minimal evidence for [b], 
this situation has been taken as grounds for recasting 
the Indo-European obstruent system to that represented 
below, proposed independently by Hopper (19 73) and by 
Gamkrelidze-Ivanov (1973). 
B'. (ambiguous value for d ) C. 
t t 
d dh t' d 
As may be noted from Hopperfs current designation: 
glottalic theory, the modified system represents a major 
departure in Indo-European phonology, comparable to the 
positing of palatals, velars and labio-velars after 
Schleicher, or to the laryngeal theory. These earlier 
departures were proposed on the basis of closer scrutiny 
of data or as a result of new data, as that furnished 
by Hittite on laryngeals. The glottalic theory on, the 
other hand is based solely on reasoning from typological 
observations. Whatever the eventual impact of the 
glottalic theory on the phonological system posited for 
Proto-Indo-European, generalizations achieved by 
typological scrutiny will be increasingly important as 
further proto-systems are posited. 
Such generalizations have also been applied to the 
syntax of Proto-Indo-European, permitting for the first 
time a tentative history of Indo-European syntax. It 
must not be forgotten that historical linguists of the 
past decided against providing a history of proto-
languages. Brugmann states his view unambiguously, as in 
the preface to his second edition (1897:ix): 
that [a historical presentation] is the proper 
6 WINFRED P. LEHMANN 
method of presentation, corresponding to the essence 
of the matter, that the facts of language history 
should always be presented in the context and chrono­
logical order, in which they actually occurred, has 
been indicated by us in Vol. II., p. 800f. Unfortu­
nately there is still a great problem in the determi­
nation of chronology for prehistoric periods, even 
of relative chronology. And I fear the time is 
still far distant when a presentation of Indo-European 
history involving the various languages will replace 
the usual presentation of the data -- such a presen­
tation will of course concentrate on the prehistoric 
period -- and successfully make use of the form of 
presentation which we consider ideal . (Translation mine: 
W. P. L.) 
Brugmann's belief as expressed here led to the presenta­
tion of facts synchronically rather than diachronically, 
even in apparently historical grammars. 
His view on the proper presentation directed works 
on proto-languages as well as the comprehensive grammars 
of early languages (Brockelmann 1911-1913; Schwyzer 1939-
1953; Szantyr 1965). While Schwyzer and Szantyr, for 
example, cite data on Homeric Greek and early Latin, 
they do not present the changing systems of these lan­
guages. By contrast, a departure from the non-historical 
approach to a historical sketch of the Proto-Indo-
European phonological system was published in 1952 
(Lehmann 1952:109-114; sketches of the declensional 
system and subsequently the syntactic system of Proto-
Indo-European were proposed subsequently (Lehmann 1958; 
see also Fairbanks 1977; Lehmann 1974; Neu 19 76; 
Schmalstieg 1981). All of these rely on generalizations 
based on the comparative study of languages in typology 
(see Hopper 1981). 
Reactions to such steps towards historical treatment 
of proto-languages vary. Some scholars are opposed to it, 
holding that one must restrict one's conclusions to those 
based on attested data (Watkins 1976). Such restriction 
implies concern only for surface structures, a posture 
sharply limiting all linguistic study and maintained by 
virtually no one outside historical linguistics and by 
few historical linguists. Objections are also raised to 
the use of a framework (Watkins, op. cit.) Such objec­
tions must apply only to the specific framework employed, 
for all linguistic study is based on assumptions of frame­
works, whether simple structures like the vowel triangle 
or subject-predicate clause, or more elaborate models 
achieved through broader knowledge of language. All 
DIACHRONIC LINGUISTICS 7 
conclusions on language are guided by theory, which as in 
all sciences, especially the social sciences, finds 
verification in statistical procedures. The reliability 
of such conclusions depends on representativeness and 
accuracy of observation, which will improve as further 
languages are incorporated in the body used for typo­
logical generalizations. 
Conclusions must not be based on individual instances 
of phenomena in single families or in disregard of vary­
ing structures in different language types. Historical 
linguistic theory has its best possibilities for reliable 
conclusions in three language families of longest attesta­
tion: Afro-Asiatic, Indo-European and Sino-Tibetan. The 
status of historical theory may be indicated by recalling 
that of these only the Indo-European has been rigorously 
investigated, and that there still are gaps in our know­
ledge of its development. Historical theory will be 
amplified as these gaps are filled and the two other 
families with a long period of materials are further 
investigated, and as language families attested for 
shorter periods, like Caucasian, Dravidian and Finno-
Ugric are explored. 
In the current state of historical theory two 
potential dangers may be briefly noted: generalization 
from an instance of which we have no further information, 
and erroneous evaluation of data. As an example of the 
former we may note the Japanese expression for the 
reflexive by means of a "pronoun" zibun and a pronominal 
prefix zi-, both of which may be translated 'self'. Our 
current understanding of syntactic likelihood in an 
OV language like Japanese leads us to expect expression 
for reflexivization through a verbal suffix, as in 
Turkish and Quechua. Fortunately our scant knowledge 
of the history of Japanese is adequate to permit us to 
recognize its means for reflexivization as borrowed from 
Chinese, in this way avoiding the danger of proposing 
counter-evidence to our OV framework. 
This example illustrates the hazards of basing 
generalizations on languages of the Americas, of Africa 
and of other regions for which we have no early records 
that would provide the means to identify external 
influences and borrowings. Aberrancies in expression of 
clause order, relative clauses, reflexivization and so 
on may be due to borrowing like that of the Japanese 
expression for reflexivization from Chinese. If our 
information on Japanese were less, we might be tempted to 
modify our framework, since Japanese is in general highly 
consistent in OV patterning. As it is, we are faced 
with a particular problem which with our meager data on 
8 WINFRED P. LEHMANN 
Old Japanese may be insoluble. 
Similarly we are fortunate in having adequate informa­
tion about the history of Sinhalese, so that we can 
account for irregularities in its syntactic patterns, 
as in the arrangement of its elements in the teen numerals 
(Ratanajoti 1976, Lehmann 1978:404-405). Most, have the 
OV pattern [ten + unit], but two do not, and for these 
an elegant solution was found. Regrettably, we have no 
such information on the early Turkic teen numerals, which 
have been recklessly used as counter-evidence for the 
generalizations on their typical arrangement (Miller 
1979). Nor do we have such information on many current 
languages which have been cited as counter-evidence to 
generalizations based on well-known language families. 
Principles for historical linguistics
cannot be proposed 
with data from languages without records from the past 
through which we might identify patterns that may have 
been borrowed. 
Investigators may be led to erroneous evaluations 
of data in a narrowly based science like linguistics by 
its terminology, which is taken almost entirely from 
study of a small number of Indo-European dialects. A 
ready example is the term "passive", which needs no 
extensive discussion here in view of the transparent 
misapplication in recent years of a particular syntactic 
construction — the passive in English — in attempts to 
account for constructions in other languages which are 
supposedly comparable because they have also been 
designated by the term passive. The passive of related 
languages like English and German differs, not to speak 
of that in older stages of Indo-European languages such 
as Homeric Greek and Vedic Sanskrit, and of the adver­
sative passive of Japanese and other Southeast Asian 
languages. Another term with misleading implications is 
"conditional clause"; still another is "relative clause." 
The designations for these have shifted in meaning, 
directed by connotations of the terms "conditional" and 
"relative" in English. Happily the role of conditional 
clauses has been identified in a penetrating study by 
Haiman entitled "Conditionals as Topics" (1978). Haiman's 
conclusions recall those of the Classical grammarians, 
as indicated by their designations: Gk hypothesis 'a 
proposed thesis or topic' and Lat. condicio 'an agreed 
premise on which to base a conclusion.' In their original 
use the force of the terms 'conditional' and 'hypotheti­
cal1 is not focussed on conjecture or contingency but 
rather on a posited situation, a protasis which is to be 
commented on in an apodosis. A modern interpretation of 
Classical grammars might interpret their terms for the 
DIACHRONIC LINGUISTICS 9 
two segments of conditional sentences as topic and 
comment. 
Similarly, the term "relative" was applied to a clause 
associated with another clause; the relationship does not 
require a relative pronoun or other marker as implied by 
Lightfoot in his recent book on historical theory when 
he states that the lack of a relative pronoun in a lan­
guage deprives that language of the "recursive function 
...of relativization," leaving the language "finite ... 
and radically different from all attested languages" 
(1979:30, fn. 1). Lightfoot here refers to discussions 
of Latin and Proto-Indo-European. But the types of 
relativization proposed for these has long been identi­
fied. Henri Weil in 1844 — translation into English 
1887 — compared the early use of the Latin relative 
pronoun and complementation patterns to that of Turkish, 
a language which permits recursion without relative pro­
nouns as readily as do Japanese and many other OV 
languages. Similarly, Jacbbi provided data from many 
languages with such relative clauses (189 7). Unfortu­
nately his accurate analysis of relative clauses lacking 
relative pronouns was disregarded by his contemporaries 
and later scholars. 
The problem once again may be partially terminologi­
cal, compounded by generalization from relative clause 
patterns in the SVO languages of modern Europe. Like 
many western grammatical terms, relative clause derives 
from traditional grammar, which does not preserve the 
insights of Greek grammarians concerning such relation­
ships. The Greeks identified a major class of words as 
belonging to the class "arthron", which like the Latin 
translation articulus means 'joint1. The sub-variety 
of "articles" used to join relative clauses to principal 
clauses was labeled hypotaktikon; for the Greeks the 
relative clause was a form of hypotactic or subordinate 
clause. Recognizing the problem which might be caused 
by the subsequent designation, Jespersen preferred as 
a "more pertinent name" connective or conjunctive (1922: 
85). Whether we retain the established name or introduce 
a substitute, the relative construction is a subordinate 
clause associated with nouns. The signal for subordina­
tion varies among language types. OV languages do not 
need characteristic "joining words" as found in SVO 
languages. Linguists dealing with historical syntax must 
be concerned with the construction itself and not be 
misled by the designation. If Weil's understanding of 
relative clauses had been incorporated in the body of 
historical linguistic theory, many problems might long 
ago have received appropriate treatment. 
10 WINFRED P. LEHMANN 
Moreover, historical theory has long incorporated 
procedures which scholars may neglect only with unfortu­
nate results. Among these is suspicion of conclusions 
based on the argumentum ex silentio, that is, on the 
absence of evidence. Havers illustrates the dangers 
of such a procedure by referring to the historical 
present, which as has long been known is not found in 
Homer or in other selected texts in Greek, Germanic and 
Slavic. But he vigorously rejects the conclusion that 
for this reason it was absent in Proto-Indo-European 
(1931:3-4). Yet precisely this conclusion was proposed 
once again, with no greater credence (Kiparsky 1968). 
The procedures and principles of past scholarship are 
indeed open for modification. Yet some are so well-
established that any disregard of them needs explicit 
justification. 
Like Havers and the predecessors he cites, historical 
linguists must know the sources, including stylistic 
and dialectal characteristics, and deal with them 
appropriately, that is, in accordance with general 
linguistic findings from earlier study. Havers warns 
explicitly, if pithily, about the need to exercise care 
in the treatment of translations like the Gothic (19 31: 
4). Some specialists consider wulfila's translation 
such a close reproduction of Greek that a monolingual 
speaker of Gothic could not have understood it. We 
cannot verify this point of view, but any Gothic scholar 
knows that Gothic syntax is for the most part the 
syntax of a Greek Bible, which to complicate the problem 
has not been identified. Many other early texts as well 
are translations influenced by the original, both in 
Indo-European languages like Tocharian, Armenian, Old 
Church Slavic and so on, as well as in other families. 
The textual problems may be equally hazardous when 
syntactic patterns are incorporated that have not been 
influenced by direct translation but rather by syntactic 
borrowings, as in areal phenomena. The procedures 
developed by past scholars must be applied with 
increasing rigor. 
Assuming that we apply such procedures, we may ask 
what are perspectives that can now be proposed for 
historical linguistics. In broad terms these have to 
do with closer attention to the relationships between 
significant or carriers of meaning and signifie or 
meanings, and with language change in the complex 
societies of today. 
Concentration on carriers of meaning, on structures 
composed of entities identified by meaning but treated 
after such identification only as points in a structure, 
DIACHRONIC LINGUISTICS 11 
has to be sure made contributions to historical theory. 
Some of these were corrective. Excessive concern with 
meaning and function had led to assigning unrealistic 
effects of these on form. Examples are available in the 
history of English phonology from 1400-1950 entitled 
Laut und Leben (Horn-Lehnert 1954). Its cardinal 
principle is stated p. 56: "Parts of the word which 
have l i t t l e function can be weakened/ parts that have 
no function can be weakened or lost. And by contrast, 
parts of the word with important function are maintained" 
(my translation). A more extensive presentation of this 
theoretical view was provided in Horn's earlier monograph 
(1921, 1923). Examples illustrating application of the 
view
can be found throughout both works, as in the treat­
ment of weakly stressed vowels (1954:591-642). For 
example, in contrast with its widespread loss, -e- "had 
to be maintained [in forms like houses, edges, ended] 
because it was functionally important. The language as 
a purposeful activity insisted on its rights" (1954:595; 
my translation). Structuralism swept away any such 
attributions of language-internal influence as little 
more than vicious circles of reasoning and limited 
itself to the observation of forms in change. See also 
Labov's essay here, Section 3, for subsequent observation 
of losses in connection with the function of the concerned 
elements. 
The structural concentration on form applied through­
out grammar, whether dealing with phonological units or 
with syntactic units like NP and VP, or with lexical 
units like roots and suffixes. Attention was concen­
trated on the interrelations of the identified units. 
The place of the investigated units was precisely 
determined, as in Benveniste's thorough study of the 
Proto-Indo-European suffixes -ti- and -tu- (1948). 
However valuable such studies are, they give little 
attention to the role of language in its social context. 
A more significant critique for attention to language 
itself finds shortcomings in such studies because they 
may overlook deeper structural relationships in their 
major attention to form. Treatment of relative clauses 
as illustrated above provides an example. When identi­
fied as modifiers introduced by a relative pronoun, they 
are determined by superficial characteristics rather 
than by their role in language. 
Historical linguistics will also seek to determine 
more general principles regulating relationships. Still 
in its initial stages, such scrutiny has led to differ­
ences of classification. Many syntactic constructions, 
for example, are grouped together in Vennemann's 
12 WINFRED P. LEHMANN 
"principle of category-constancy"; proposed some time 
ago, this principle is now presented succinctly in the 
important book published conjointly with Bartsch (1982: 
34-35). By the principle, the relationship of subject 
to verb and object to verb are equated, as well as those 
of non-finite verb form and auxiliary, adjective and 
noun, grade modifier and adverb, in all, more than a 
dozen constructions. The constant factor in these con­
structions is taken to be endocentricity: each construc­
tion is "essentially of the same category as its major 
constituent" (34). And the entire analysis of syntax 
is shaped by this assumed function. 
Whether this basis for determining deeper relation­
ships leads to an accurate view of language and its 
change is not the chief concern here. As with all theory, 
the proof is in application: does the principle accord 
with and clarify the facts of language? In judging its 
accuracy, one must note that the principle of category-
constancy equates two forces long distinguished in 
grammatical analysis: government and modification. 
Through such equation it faces a problem in dealing with 
titles, given names, etc. such as Japanese Tanaka sensei, 
Tanaka Michio versus English Professor Tanaka, Mickey 
Tanner. By Vennemann's approach titles like sensei and 
given names contrast in arrangement with adjectives and 
so on. When one on the other hand distinguishes the 
forces government and modification, titles are treated 
as standards (Lehmann 1978, 16-17, 174), whose arrangement 
reflects that of government constructions rather than 
modifiers. This approach accounts for the consistent 
difference in arrangement between adjectives and titles, 
which might well seem to belong in the same class when 
one applies a "principle of natural serialization" 
(Vennemann 1974:347). The approach recognizing this 
distinction, illuminates the history of Indo-European as 
well as other languages (Lehmann 1974, 1978). Yet both 
principles illustrate that the central concern in current 
perspectives is with functional and semantic as well as 
formal relationships. And the functional relationships 
are located at a deeper level than are those of studies 
like Horn-Lehnert's. 
The search for deeper structural relationships and 
their expression in language may well be the distinguish­
ing feature of current historical linguistics. Historical 
study in the past, for example, posited readily identi­
fiable units of expression in sorting out roots, bases 
or stems and affixes. Malkiel's essay here points to 
subtler configurations of form. The introduction, main­
tenance or loss of these, as well as their interplay with 
DIACHRONIC LINGUISTICS 13 
the grosser units of past historical treatments, may well 
be examined in linguistic families outside the Indo-
European for their improved understanding. 
Attention to deeper elements of language has also led 
to examination of such qualifiers as interrogative, nega­
tive, causative and others examined in modal logic. 
Not always identifiable by like formal expression in 
languages of different types or in successive stages of 
a language, these have eluded adequate historical inve­
stigations. 
Causative may serve as a relatively straightforward 
example. In its most transparent form, it is expressed 
by means of prefixes in VSO languages, e.g. the Hebrew 
inflection, by suffixes in OV languages, e.g. 
Japanese yomaseru 'cause to read'. The Indo-European 
languages illustrate one possibility of change, from 
the suffixed form expected of OV structure, e.g. Sanskrit 
sadáyati 'places < causes to sit', Gothic satjan 'set' 
vs. Sanskrit sadati, Gothic sitan 'sit down'. Productive 
in the OV stages of the Indo-European systems, the suf­
fix gradually was eroded as dialects moved to SVO 
structure. In current English the causative, like many 
verbal qualifiers, is expressed through auxiliaries or 
lexically. Even related lexical pairs: sit set, lie lay, 
have merged in general speech, leaving such pairs to be 
determined solely by semantic criteria, such as kill die. 
Similarly, as a long-established SVO language, spoken 
Chinese expresses the causative lexically (Chao 1968: 
310). Even though expression for causative, like that 
for interrogative and negative, is relatively trans­
parent, investigations of expression for it in various 
languages and various stages of a language are valuable 
in improving our understanding of the essential features 
of language. Such investigations must'take as their 
fundamental criteria of analysis the semantic bases of 
qualifiers rather than particular surface expressions. 
The middle, which includes reflexive and reciprocal 
force, may serve as an example of even more varied formal 
expression. Like causative, it involves affixation: 
prefixation in VSO languages, e.g. Hebrew Niphal and 
and suffixation in OV structure, e.g. Turkish 
-in- or giyinmek 'dress oneself, get dressed'. In SVO 
languages it is expressed characteristically by pronominal 
elements like self, each other. Earlier works failed to 
associate the SVO expression with that of OV languages, 
and accordingly to depict adequately the history of the 
middle inflection in Indo-European; in the oldest texts, 
this expression was through a suffix, like that of 
Turkish. Moreover, a transitional form by expression 
14 WINFRED P. LEHMANN 
through adjectives was generally misinterpreted. Homeric 
Greek phi los is often mistranslated 'dear' rather than 
by an appropriate equivalent of the middle, e.g. 'dear 
fatherland' for 'his fatherland1. This example may 
illustrate how syntactic analysis linked closely to form 
failed both in associating such comparable expressions 
for the middle in languages of various types and in 
stating the relationships of those patterns in successive 
stages of the language, as well as in instructing students 
and literary scholars in their
interpretation. 
Identification of such varying patterns and their 
change is now an important task. On it will depend much 
of the success of efforts to understand historical 
developments in syntax and discourse. The treatment of 
modality has scarcely been examined historically, except 
when identified by surface forms. As one example, 
Lightfoot recognizes modals by the following criteria 
(1979:98): 
a. "They do not undergo Number Agreement or do 
Support but 
b. "do undergo Subject-Auxiliary Inversion and 
Negative Placement. 
C. "They cannot appear in infinitives and gerunds, 
d. "cannot occur adjacent to each other and cannot 
take normal complementation forms," 
If these criteria, with the exception of (d), were 
distinctive for modals, German would have no modals. 
Yet the role of modals in German syntax is much like 
that in English; and some dialects of English also 
permit (d). Rather than attempting to define syntactic 
features by surface criteria, we must recognize quali­
fiers, such as Necessitative and Voluntative, and set 
out to determine their manners of expression in the 
various types of languages. 
In Proto-Indo-European these logico-semantic 
categories of modality are expressed through suffixes, 
as one would expect in an OV language. In the subse­
quent SVO structures, auxiliaries were introduced, as 
in English and German. Yet in both stages of the language 
the same categories are prominent (cf. Calbert 1975). 
Study of the Indo-European languages has then disclosed 
fundamental verbal qualifiers. But it is unclear which 
we need to posit. When one examines languages with 
clearest surface representation, such as Quechua, the 
number of verbal categories expressed is considerably 
greater than in Indo-European. Quechua includes suffixes 
for Frequentative, Extemporaneous, Collaborative and 
Benefactive among others (Bills et al· 1969:235). 
DIACHRONIC LINGUISTICS 15 
And logicians have identified modalities which they 
treat in deontic logic, alethic logic, epistemic logic, 
and so on. We may ask whether these modalities are to 
be recognized as verbal qualifiers and examined for 
their means of expression in different language types and 
differing stages of languages. 
Conversely morphological or lexical expressions found 
in specific languages or language types must not be 
assumed for other types without careful analysis. The 
passive is one example. Syntactically transparent in 
the Indo-European languages of SVO structure, where it 
serves to topicalize "objects", it has been posited also 
for OV structure, where the discourse effect of SVO 
passives is expressed by other means, such as particles. 
Moreover, passive forms of Classical Latin, Classical 
Greek and late Sanskrit have been reconstructed to 
include a passive in Proto-Indo-European, even though the 
Classical Latin and Greek forms develop largely from the 
older Middle, though the Vedic Sanskrit forms are not 
parallel with those of Greek and Latin, and though 
Hittite lacks parallel forms. Closer attention to the 
meaning of the passive might well have forestalled such 
reconstruction, and the assumption of a passive universal­
ly. 
As Indo-European studies move beyond the 19th century 
reconstructions centered on Classical Latin, Greek and 
Sanskrit with primary attention to morphological struc­
ture, and as other language families are studied for 
their historical development, the categories treated in . 
historical linguistics will be more heavily based on 
semantic examination and identified through study of 
universals and their expression in languages of various 
types. 
Paths towards such broadened understanding are laid 
out by Justus and Traugott. In extending its concern 
historical linguistics will draw on such well-charted 
areas as Romance etymological studies, as sketched here 
by Dworkin. It will also make use of advances in 
phonological theory, related here by Dressier to semi­
otics, and of advances in sociolinguistics. 
Recent work in sociolinguistics has begun to provide 
historical linguists with 'new information' through 
'systematic research' which Meillet hoped for in the 
last of his excellent Oslo lectures of 1924 (Meillet 1967: 
124-138). Such research, stimulated by the influential 
article of Weinreich, Labov and Herzog (196 8), and 
pursued with energetic guidance from Labov is in accord­
ance with Meillet's dictum: "What interests the linguist 
is not the norms but the way in which the language is 
16 WINFRED P. LEHMANN 
used" (op.cit. 133). Earlier sociolinguistic study 
focussed on rural and village dialects "where every­
body is approximately at the same social level, where 
everybody has approximately the same culture." That 
study explicated the situation which we may assume for 
the communities of Proto-Indo-European, Vedic Sanskrit, 
Proto-Germanic and even Homeric Greek speech. 
But "the dialect of a city where there are people 
of different condition, of different educations, and 
of different cultures is another thing" (Meillet 1967: 
133). Even the cities vary in their conditions, such as 
Istanbul "where peoples speaking five or six different 
languages live side by side" as opposed to Paris, Tiflis 
and so on. The quantitative techniques applied to gain 
insights into the different conditions of urban civiliza­
tion are providing historical linguistics with improved 
understanding of language in use, and as it changes. 
These investigations "will furnish precise ... informa­
tion on states of languages, " as Meillet hoped in the 
final words of his last Oslo lecture (op. cit. 138). 
The perspectives acquired through studies like 
those presented here will indeed bring about changes 
in principles and theory, as Meillet hoped. One may 
in turn hope that those perspectives will be sought with 
clarity of outlook comparable to Meillet's. Urges to 
overgeneralize, to overextend observations, to declare 
previous approaches obsolete must arouse hesitation. 
For as Meillet noted, "nothing differs more from one 
state of language than another state of language" 
(op.cit.133). Urban dialectology may well clarify the 
linguistic situation at the beginning of our era for 
Rome, as it does that today; but these differ from that 
of Rome of the seventh centuries B.C. and A.D. As for 
Meillet, requisite application of linguistic principles 
and of the findings of sociolinguistic and psycholinguis-
tic study "depends on the tact, the judgment, and the 
good sense of linguists" (op.cit. 1251 
We present these essays in the hope that they will 
suggest means for increased understanding of language, the 
highly flexible and complex system which in spite of its 
constant change provides the agency for societies to 
maintain themselves. Precise studies of languages in 
linguistic communities today as well as increasingly 
penetrating studies of languages in linguistic communities 
of central concern to historical linguists may fulfill 
expectations for the future of linguistics suggested by 
these perspectives. 
BUILDING ON EMPIRICAL FOUNDATIONS 
WILLIAM LABOV 
University of Pennsylvania 
At the first conference on Directions in Historical 
Linguistics in 1966, Weinreich, Labov and Herzog [WLH] 
proposed principles for the empirical foundations of 
a theory of language change.1 Since that time, a number 
of research efforts have been designed with these princi­
ples in mind, and many interpretations of research results 
have made reference to the principles involved. It is 
not too soon to attempt an assessment of the progress 
that has been made in building on these empirical founda­
tions, and to see what kind of theories of language 
change have begun to emerge from research of this type. 
1. The fundamental principles 
Looking over the general statements in the first
section of the 1966 article, and reviewing the points 
found most important by later writers, it seems that 
the central principles of this exposition can be stated 
in the form of two "empirical foundations". 
1.1 Normal heterogeneity. The normal condition of 
the speech community is a heterogeneous one: we can 
expect to find a wide range of variants/styles, dialects, 
and languages used by members. Moreover, this hetero­
geneity is an integral part of the linguistic economy of 
the community, necessary to satisfy the linguistic 
demands of every-day life. 
For this heterogeneity to be worth remarking, it must 
be distinguished from free variation on the one hand, and 
free expression on the other. Free variation is an 
inevitable consequence of linguistic structure, the 
(17) 
18 WILLIAM LABOV 
obverse of the fundamental notion of linguistic "same". 
The heterogeneous elements that create a problem for 
traditional linguistics description are much greater in 
size and extent, including variation among phonemes, 
morphemes, syntagms and sememes that are the invariants 
of such description. To include them under the heading 
of free variation is to reduce the notion of structure 
to vacuity. Free expression is an inevitable consequence 
of the different histories and personalities of the users 
of the language: they have different things to say. The 
heterogeneous character of the community appears in 
the fact that there are many alternate, semantically 
equivalent ways of saying "the same thing".2 
The term "structured heterogeneity" emphasizes 
another aspect of this phenomenon that distinguishes it 
further from free variation. The occurrence of the 
variants in question is often correlated with features 
of the internal environment, though not exactly predict­
able from those features, and also with external charac­
teristics of the speaker and the situation: contextual 
style, social status and social mobility, ethnicity, 
sex and age. 
1.2. Linguistic community. The object of linguistic 
description is the grammar of the speech community: the 
system of communication used in social interaction.3 
Techniques for linguistic description must be adequate to 
deal with the heterogeneous character of this object, 
and many of the methods developed in sociolinguistic 
research have accordingly been devoted to the description 
of variation. 
The heterogeneous nature of the community raises the 
question of how this object can be circumscribed: what 
are the limits of the speech community to be described? 
The heterogeneity discussed so far is largely a feature 
of speech production. The community is defined on the 
level of interpretation; the obverse of heterogeneous 
speech production is homogeneity in the interpretation 
of the variants. Given semantic equivalence of the 
variants, such interpretation appears in the form of 
social evaluation, overt for a few social stereotypes, 
covert for the great majority of variables. A variety 
of experimental techniques have been used to detect 
this type of evaluation, with consistent and convergent 
results, but this is not the only aspect of homogeneity 
of interpretation in the speech community. There is also 
a common direction of style shifting, common directions 
of self-correction, and common directions of change. 
Those who acquire the vernacular of the speech community 
BUILDING ON EMPIRICAL FOUNDATIONS 19 
in their formative years show this general agreement, 
but others do not, even when they show many of the 
community features of speech production. 
The principles put forward by WLH were supported by 
reference to a considerable body of evidence; empirical 
foundations are necessarily empirical. They were also 
supported by a detailed critique of opposing positions 
which have had a strong influence on linguistic research 
for more than a century, though they have no such 
empirical basis. Opposed to the first principle of WLH 
is the assumption that the speech community is normally 
homogeneous. A long history of investigations, begin­
ning with Gauchat 1905, has shown that when this idea 
is taken as a null hypothesis, it must be rejected. Yet 
it re-appears as an underlying assumption in many 
theories of linguistic change, and even more clearly in 
the apologies of field workers for the speech community 
that they have studied, as they explain that the normal 
processes of historical change cannot apply in the face 
of the widespread variation that they happen to have 
found. 
The vigor of the assumption of homogeneity also 
appears in the continued life of the second opposing 
principle, that the proper object of linguistic 
description is the idiolect. As WLH showed, the 
empirical refutation of the homogeneity assumption led 
many linguists to retreat to the margins of the arena of 
empirical research, or even to withdraw outside of that 
arena. In the tradition of structural linguistics, the 
idiolect became reduced to the speech of one person 
talking on one subject in one context for a very short 
time. In the generative framework, it has become the 
privileged introspections of the theorist, immune from 
contradiction or counter-evidence. But in spite of the 
theoretical and methodological weaknesses of this notion, 
it has remained useful for those who feel that the object 
of description should and must be homogeneous, and who 
have neither the inclination nor the motivation to deal 
with the variations found in everyday speech. 
So far, everything that has been said applies equally 
well to synchronic description or diachronic studies. Why 
then did WLH propose principles specifically as founda­
tions for the theory of language change? The first reason 
is a tactical one. The demand for homogeneity, and the 
consequent retreat to the idiolect, are not unreasonable 
moves as the first steps of a synchronic linguistic 
description.4 But it is quite otherwise for the study of 
linguistic change. It is possible to study completed 
changes as a series of discrete replacements of elements 
20 WILLIAM LABOV 
in homogeneous systems. But no one has ever quite lost 
sight of the fact that change is the process of replace­
ment, not the outcome of that process. When we study 
the process directly we are immediately confronted with 
the heterogeneous character of linguistic systems. Change 
implies variation; change is variation. Since the time of 
Gauchat, we identify change in progress by the co­
existence of older and younger variants. Furthermore, 
that progress is rarely represented by the categorical 
replacement of one form by another, but normally by 
changes in the relative frequencies of the variants and 
changes in their environmental constraints. 
The second reason is a matter of general strategy. 
There is a natural alliance between dialect geographers, 
who study heterogeneity in space; sociolinguists, 
who study heterogeneity in society; and historical 
linguists, whose concern is heterogeneity in time. 
Historical linguistics may be characterized as the art 
of making the best use of bad data, in the sense that 
the fragments of the literary record that remain are 
the results of historical accidents beyond the control 
of the investigator. The data of dialect geography 
expand enormously the number of cases that can be 
considered; the data of sociolinguistic studies greatly 
increase the fineness of resolution of the process of 
change. On the other side of the ledger, the dialect 
geographer and sociolinguist are handicapped by the 
shallowness of their temporal perspective. Many of 
their interpretations rest on shaky ground unless 
they have obtained additional time depth from historical 
records of their own speech community: this is par­
ticularly true of inferences about change in progress 
(section 3.1). In any event, inferences
drawn from the 
records of the present will always be more valuable if 
they can be supported by parallel cases drawn from 
completed changes extended over time. 
The uses of the past to explain the present, and 
the uses of the present to explain the past, rest upon 
two underlying assumptions. One is the uniformitarian 
doctrine: that the events that produced the historical 
record are the same type as those that can be observed 
operating around us today (Lyell 1833). The other is 
the traditional position of historical linguistics: that 
we understand some element of linguistic structure when 
we understand how it came to be (Jespersen 19 24). 
At first glance, these two supporting positions 
appear to involve two opposite views of the relation of 
past and present. The uniformitarian doctrine says 
that things are pretty much the same. As far as 
BUILDING ON EMPIRICAL FOUNDATIONS 21 
language is concerned, this means that the growth of 
literacy, mass media, rapid communications and the 
exposure of more people to standard languages have not 
altered the basic processes of change that affect 
linguistic systems. On the other hand, the historical 
doctrine holds that things are not the same: explanations 
based on universal principles of human nature or the 
relatively constant physiology of human beings are not 
enough to explain historical events. This implies that 
the initial conditions and environmental contexts of 
one set of linguistic changes are significantly different 
from another. 
The contradiction is resolved when we realize that 
the uniformity of the uniformitarian doctrine is at 
a relatively high level of abstraction: the processes 
and relations between processes that ultimately govern 
historical developments. This uniformity may itself 
rest upon the constants of human physiology and psychol­
ogy that are the explanatory resources of those who 
search for universals of language or language change. 
But in the type of theory envisaged by WLH, uniformity 
also proceeds from certain constant relations within the 
speech community, and the embedding of that community 
in a larger spatial and temporal matrix. There may 
be universals of language change, independent of 
historical conditions. Many theories of language change 
are devoted entirely to the search for them. But we will 
see that if such ahistorical generalizations exist, 
they are rare. This alone may account for the limited 
success of recent efforts to use formal techniques to 
develop general theories of language change.5 
The alliance that WLH proposed between dialectology, 
sociolinguistics and historical linguistics is oriented 
towards a type of theory that would redress the balance 
between historical and synchronic explanation, correct­
ing the ahistorical bias of twentieth century general 
linguistics. The strategy of WLH then is to contribute 
to the general theory of language by way of a theory of 
language change. The central issues confronted by 
that theory of change may be usefully re-stated before 
we pursue the findings of recent research. 
2. Paradoxes and problems of linguistic change 
A general theory is constructed from answers to 
general questions about the object of interest; these 
questions in turn depend upon an accepted definition 
of the object, usually cast in structural-functional 
terms. Language is defined in the broadest terms as a 
22 WILLIAM LABOV 
system for transforming information held by one person 
into a form that can be symmetrically decoded and 
interpreted by others. The most general question posed 
about language is "How does the system work?". The" 
answer we are looking for is the mechanism that carries 
out this transformation. I will refer to this as the 
primary question for synchronic analysis. 
Since there are at first view many different languages 
that work in many different ways, a reasonable strategy 
is to begin with the primary question for a single 
language, "How does language X work?". Those interested 
in the general theory hope that a satisfactory answer 
to this question will be followed, as quickly as 
possible, by the answer for languages in general. The 
search for the simplest object of description — the 
homogeneous speech community or idiolect — was naturally 
initiated by those with the strongest general interests, 
rather than those who were primarily interested in the 
description of a particular language. 
Inherent variation creates serious problems for 
those who attack the primary question with the expecta­
tion of finding homogeneous structure. Given many 
alternative ways of saying the same thing, it is 
difficult for them to say how the language works or if 
it works at all. The consequent retreat to the idiolect 
and the rejection of the data from the speech community 
have been documented in WLH and Labov 1975. 
The empirical principles of normal heterogeneity and 
linguistic community permit us to transform the primary 
question in a way that resolves the paradoxes implicit 
in the pursuit of the idiolect. Answers to "How does 
language X work?" will include the ability of speakers 
to deal with the heterogeneous elements of language 
structure. This implies a more specific question: "How 
(and to what extent) do speakers of a language control 
forms that are not in their productive repertoire?" This 
reformulation of the primary synchronic question forms 
an essential background to our approach to a theory of 
language change. 
The existence of language change within a speech 
community creates even more serious problems for those 
who work with the expectation of a homogeneous structure. 
If language X is in process of change, there is in 
principle no one answer to the question, "How does 
language X work?". It works in several different ways. 
The first step in the construction of a general theory 
of this type is then not uniquely determined. As 
WLH pointed out, there is an implicit contradiction 
between the structuralist view of language and the facts 
BUILDING ON EMPIRICAL FOUNDATIONS 23 
of change: as linguists became more and more impressed 
with the systematic character of language structure, it 
became increasingly difficult to conceive of change 
within that system. 
For a dynamic phenomenon like language change, the 
primary question is one of cause rather than function, not 
"How does it work"? but rather "Why did it happen"? or 
more precisely, "Why did it happen in this particular 
way"? It is not merely a question of the search for 
initiating factors; curiously enough, as the question 
is made more specific the answers become more general. 
A satisfactory general theory of language change would 
give an account of the antecedent conditions that 
determined the initiation, rate, direction and termina­
tion of a given change and eventually the set of such 
conditions for language change in general. Certainly 
there are many profound and challenging problems 
associated with the causes of change. We do not know 
why change is continually renewed, why changes freeze 
or come to an end, or why some processes drift in the 
same direction for millennia. After many decades 
devoted to the study of the causes of change, both 
Saussure and Bloomfield (speaking of sound change) came 
to the conclusion that the causes of change were 
unknown.6 
WLH divided the primary question into more specific 
questions that are more amenable to an empirical 
attack. These will be restated in the second half of 
this section, and the sections to follow will report 
on progress made in answering these questions. But as 
WLH showed, the study of causes has always been heavily 
influenced by preconceived ideas about the effects of 
change that have dominated previous discussions of 
the issues. 
The "dysfunctional" character of language change. 
Beyond
the primary question of the causes of change, 
there is the equally challenging issue of its effects. 
Given the structural-functional concept of language, it 
must follow that a language in process of change will 
not carry out its functions as successfully as a 
stable language. If some members of the community have 
different systems for encoding and decoding than others, 
their outputs will not be as readily and symmetrically 
decoded by those others. 
Most theories of language change have in fact assumed 
that change was dysfunctional. Throughout the 19th 
century, systematic language change, and sound change 
especially, was portrayed as a negative, even destructive 
24 WILLIAM LABOV 
force. The causes proposed to account for change 
reflect this point of view: discontinuities in 
communication networks, the principle of least effort, 
generalizations of slips of the tongue, random drift 
of target positions. Change is envisaged as the result 
of interference from outside of the system: the system 
itself readjusts at times in compensation (analogical 
change). Curiously enough, this systematic adjustment 
is less systematic than the original interference from 
outside. Analogical changes rarely affect all categories 
and classes. Overt social correction is irregular in 
the extreme. Borrowing is unpredictable. Yet sound 
change, the malignant disease that these remedies would 
cure, is highly systematic. 
The negative character of linguistic change is 
particularly embarrassing for those interested in the 
larger evolutionary view of the matter. The parallels 
between biological and linguistic evolution are striking 
and inescapable. Darwin (1871) noted eighteen 
similarities between the two kinds of evolution: as for 
example, the effects of use and disuse; the existence of 
vestigial elements; the irreversibility of the extinction 
of a species or a language. But the most important 
homologue for Darwin was the existence of natural 
selection in both biological and linguistic evolution. 
He proposed to adapt Max Mueller's notion that words 
become better as they become shorter; but here linguists 
have failed to follow him. The consensus among linguists 
is that there is evolution in language in the sense of 
development and diversification, but not in the sense 
of progressive or adaptive evolution (Greenberg 19 59).8 
If one could find evidence for adaptive developments in 
language change, the search for the causes of change 
would be advanced. But no such evidence has been brought 
forward, and the census is the reverse: language change 
is dysfunctional. We are left with a massive but in­
complete parallel between the two kinds of evolutionary 
development. 
The empirical principles of WLH permit us to resolve 
the paradoxical opposition of structure and change. 
Language change is not viewed as exterior to the system, 
but rather as an integral part of its normally hetero­
geneous character. The negative view of change is not 
accepted without question. WLH pointed out that no 
one has yet brought forward evidence of negative effects 
of lessened systematicity in the course of change. 
The functional or dysfunctional character of language 
change must be viewed as an empirical issue. A primary 
problem of linguistic change may then be identified: 
BUILDING ON EMPIRICAL FOUNDATIONS 25 
"How does language change without interfering with 
communication between members of the speech community?" 
Ά functional perspective on the adaptive value of 
change. Throughout this discussion of language change, 
we will have many occasions to refer to the basic 
communicative function of human language: the 
representation of states of affairs. Though "reference" 
and "referential" are often used in this sense, these 
terms are perhaps too tightly associated with the 
application of terms or expressions to particular objects 
or events. I will use representational for this basic 
function, to include the capacity to represent immediate, 
distant, imaginary and even impossible configurations 
of our perceptual and conceptual experience. 
So far, the term "communication" has been used only 
in this fundamental sense, the communication of 
representational information, and language has been 
accepted as a device specialized for that function. If 
one were to take a sceptical position on this issue, and 
insist for example that language was no more functional 
than any other fashion like clothing or cosmetics, the 
problem of explaining language change would take a 
very different form. We could explain the continual 
changing of language forms by the same need for novelty 
in expressive forms that we observe in fashion. It 
is only when we insist that it is important for speakers 
and listeners to maintain clear differences between 
"I can" and "I can't", "He's tired" and "He's tight", 
that the problem of accounting for language change 
takes the acute form that it does. 
The primacy of the representational function in the 
organization of human language cannot be challenged. But 
the recognition of other functions in this organization 
is an important step in the resolution of the paradoxes 
of change. The possibility of an adaptive value of 
systematic linguistic change was all but rejected in 
the preceding discussion, but that discussion was limited 
to the framework of representational communication. The 
acceptance of normal heterogeneity within the community 
forces us to look more seriously at other functions. 
The alternate ways of saying "the same thing" which form 
the heterogeneous character of the community are 
representational sames, equivalent in this sense of 
meaning. One tendency in current semantic theory 
is to expand the range of meaningful distinctions to 
include degrees of emphasis, focus and style (Chafe 197 0, 
Bolinger 1973, Lakoff 1970). The direction of WLH is 
the opposite: to restrict the term "meaning" more 
26 WILLIAM LABOV 
narrowly and preserve the fundamental concept of 
referential or representational "same" (Weinreich 
1980: 270-271). Thus the variants available to members 
of the community are free to carry out the other 
functions in the three-membered configuration set out 
by Buehler (1934): 
Representational 
Expressive : : Directive 
Sociolinguistic studies have given concrete form to our 
knowledge of the expressive function, showing how the 
choice of variants identifies the speaker with certain 
social status, age group, sex and orientation towards 
the addressee. Speech act theory has begun to give more 
substance to our ideas about the directive function of 
language, including the choice of means for making and 
refusing requests, or supporting or challenging a 
relevant other. We add to these uses of language the 
other functions discussed by Jakobson (1957) and 
Hymes (1974: 22-3), including the aesthetic, phatic, 
metalinguistic, and playful. The problem of accounting 
for the effects of language change remains: how can 
change occur without interfering with the representa­
tional function? Yet it is evident that there are 
many possible ways that language could become better 
or worse adapted to human needs, beyond the communica­
tion of representational information. Pursuing this line 
of thought may give us more insight into other effects 
of change, and ultimately perhaps to a larger view of 
the evolutionary mechanism involved. 
2.1 Five problems for the study of language change. 
The primary questions identified above will serve 
ultimately as a guide for evaluating a general theory 
of language change. But the work of constructing such 
a theory will necessarily rest on solutions to more 
particular problems. WLH set out five specific problems 
that a theory of change must solve; it may be helpful 
to restate them here and relate them to the primary