The Amazon Basin is the least known and the most complex linguistic region in the world today. It is the home of some 300 languages many of which (often incompletely documented and mostly endangered) show properties that constitute exceptions to received ideas about linguistic universals. This book is the first in English to provide an accessible overview of this rich and exciting linguistic area. It will provide a basis for further research on Amazonian languages as well as a point of entry to important data for theoretical linguists.

This book considers how and why forms and meanings of different languages at different times may resemble one another. The author explains the relationship between areal diffusion and the genetic development of languages, and reveals the means of distinguishing what may cause one language to share the characteristics of another.
Aikhenvald uses the example of Arawak and Tucanoan languages spoken in the large area of the Vaupes river basin in northwest Amazonia, which spans Colombia and Brazil. In this region language is seen as a badge of identity: language mixing, interaction, and...

Linguistic typology identifies both how languages vary and what they all have in common. This Handbook provides a state-of-the art survey of the aims and methods of linguistic typology, and the conclusions we can draw from them. Part I covers phonological typology, morphological typology, sociolinguistic typology and the relationships between typology, historical linguistics and grammaticalization. It also addresses typological features of mixed languages, creole languages, sign languages and secret languages. Part II features contributions on the typology of morphological processes, noun...