Language Variation in South Asia

by William Bright

South Asia presents the linguist with a bewildering variety of regional dialects, social dialects, formal and informal registers, literary standards, languages, writing systems, and language families. Written over a period of more than twenty years, these essays by a leading authority on South Asian language cover a broad range of topics in South Asian linguistics. The essays address social dialect, structural borrowing, areal linguistics, the relation between literary and colloquial standards, and the role of written language in South Asian culture from the times of the ancient Indus Valley civilization. Offering a sociolinguistic approach, and encompassing both descriptive and historical studies, this collection of twelve of Bright's most important essays reflects his extensive research on the linguistics of South Asia.

192 pages, Hardcover

First published October 4, 1990

About the author

William Oliver Bright was an American linguist and toponymist who specialized in Native American and South Asian languages and descriptive linguistics.