This textbook provides a critical introduction to major research topics and current approaches in linguistic typology. It draws on a wide range of cross-linguistic data to describe what linguistic typology has revealed about language in general and about the rich variety of ways in which meaning and expression are achieved in the world's languages.

• 1: Linguistic typology: An introductory overview


• Part I Foundations: Theory and method


• 2: Unity and diversity in the world's languages


• 3: Typological analysis


• 4: Linguistic typology and other theoretical approaches


• 5: Language samples and sampling methods


• 6: Data collection: Sources, issues and problem


• 7: Typological asymmetry: Economy, iconicity, and frequency


• 8: Categories, prototypes, and semantic maps


• Part II Empirical dimensions


• 9: Phonological typology


• 10: Basic word order


• 11: Case alignment


• 12: Grammatical relations


• 13: Valency-manipulating operations


• 14: Person marking


• 15: Evidentiality marking

Jae Jung Song was Professor of Linguistics at the University of Otago. His research interests included linguistic typology, Korean linguistics, Oceanic linguistics, and language policy. He is the author of Linguistic Typology: Morphology and Syntax (Longman, 2001), The Korean Language: Structure, Use and Context (Routledge, 2005), and Word Order (CUP, 2012), and the editor of The Oxford Handbook of Linguistic Typology (OUP, 2010; paperback 2013). He has held visiting appointments with Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology (Leipzig) and La Trobe University (Melbourne).