The World Atlas of Language Structures

by Martin Haspelmath (Editor)

The World Atlas of Language Structures is a book and CD combination displaying the structural properties of the world's languages. 142 world maps and numerous regional maps - all in colour - display the geographical distribution of features of pronunciation and grammar, such as number of vowels, tone systems, gender, plurals, tense, word order, and body part terminology. Each world map shows an average of 400 languages and is accompanied by a fully referenced description of the structural feature in question.

The CD provides an interactive electronic version of the database which allows the reader to zoom in on or customize the maps, to display bibliographical sources, and to establish correlations between features. The book and the CD together provide an indispensable source of information for linguists and others seeking to understand human languages.

The Atlas will be especially valuable for linguistic typologists, grammatical theorists, historical and comparative linguists, and for those studying a region such as Africa, Southeast Asia, North America, Australia, and Europe. It will also interest anthropologists and geographers. More than fifty authors from many different countries have collaborated to produce a work that sets new standards in comparative linguistics. No institution involved in language research can afford to be without it.

Genres: Linguistics, Nonfiction, Language

693 pages, Hardcover

First published July 21, 2005

Reviews

[Ans Schapendonk · Rating 1 out of 5]

Haspelmath's book The World Atlas of Language Structures is is absolutely wrong since he now has written another new article entitled 'Defining the Word'. And he still has no idea what the universal sound helix is about, because he is unable to admit that linguists have only understood since 2013 that there are no words, clitics or suffixes, except sounds. Sounds are hidden in the spaces of words, which seem to have disappeared with a sigh, but which are indeed present. This is noticeable when you look not at the languages but at the dialects. Moreover, in his comparison of the languages French, English and German, Haspelmath avoids mentioning the origin of these languages: Flemish, alias Dutch. He will always need Dutch speakers to interpret older meanings. In his completely unnecessary article Defining the word (PDF) on Research Gate, one will find 4 more publications in the bibliography that will only appear in 2023 and 2024. Then it is about 'unexpandable roots' and therefore about Dutch, because those 'roots' are what other linguists call 'phonaesthemes' or 'splinters' such as the K in I KNOW, which is written, but no longer heard. If we look at the Dutch helix I from IK, the K is suddenly noticeable, while in I the actual final sound is a J /aaj/. In English, what is actually heard is hardly written. The definition of a word is therefore 'a collection of sounds', but then the question should follow what the definition of a 'sound' is. This is called the Droste effect, because it will never end. Therefore, this article and those mentioned below are redundant. What's worse is that Haspelmath plagiarizes Ans Schapendonk's research results, which were also on Research Gate, but were removed here! All her books are in the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek Leipzig, the German place where Martin Haspelmath works. When Schapendonk rediscovered the universal sound helix, it was decided to accuse her of sexual harassment at the Philipps-Universität-Marburg, resulting in her immediate dismissal. Since then, German linguists have been taking her discovery en masse. Unfortunately, these linguists still do not understand the point of this sound helix. This makes the fourth dimension – that is time – visible. One can use it to reconstruct the past, but only correctly, but one can also use it to SPELL the future and therefore PREDICT it. This also means that the plagiarism that Martin Haspelmath commits with the oeuvre of Ans Schapendonk COMES TO LIGHT. He is CAUGHT that in German ERWISHT means, which means that he KNEW this oeuvre, which means that he (1) WIST which means in Dutch: knows it very well, but (2) WIST which also means in Dutch: that he hides it away.

(1) Haspelmath, Martin. 2023a. “Types of Clitics in the World’s Languages.” Linguistic Typologyat the Crossroads (to appear).
(2) Haspelmath, Martin. 2023b. “Word Class Universals and Language-Particular Analysis.” In Oxford Handbook of Word Classes, edited by Eva van Lier, 15–40. Oxford: Oxford University Press. (to appear).
(3) Haspelmath, Martin. 2023c. “Inflection and Derivation as Traditional Comparative Concepts.” Linguistics. (to appear).
(4) Haspelmath, Martin. 2024. “Compound and Incorporation Constructions as Combinations of Unexpandable Roots.” (to appear). https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.8137251.

[Pedro Martins · Rating 5 out of 5]

Along with its web counterpart (wals.info), this book is the main reference for any linguist interested in the typology of languages or looking for a valuable guide into their general outline.