Michael Clyne, Dynamics of language contact: English and immigrant languages

Michael Clyne, Dynamics of language contact: English and immigrant languages. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 2003 Pp. xv, 282. Hb $65.00, pb $24.00. Ever since Thomason & Kaufman 1988 reawakened linguists to the role of external contacts in language change, and the origin and development of creoles became a major research topic (largely after Bickerton 1981), the field of contact linguistics has burgeoned. Sociolinguists have always been interested in the social side of language contact, but today the grammatical side of contact also is attracting researchers. Books published just since 2000 give some idea of the research activity. Three monographs exemplify the wide interest in grammatical aspects of codeswitching: Hlavac 2003 deals with codeswitching among second-generation Croatian speakers in Australia; and Kovács 2001 treats Australian Finnish and Hungarian in contact with English; and Canut & Caubet 2001 is a collection of articles on codeswitching involving French in various francophonie communities.