LANGUAGE AND THE LEXICON: AN INTRODUCTION. David Singleton. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000. Pp. xii + 244. $65.00 cloth, $19.95 paper.

Abstract

David Singleton observes in the opening lines of Language and the lexicon that “almost everything in language is related in some way or other to words” (p. 1). There is little wonder, therefore, that the lexicon has been at the center of linguistic research and controversies for a long time. Organized into 10 chapters, this book offers a concise overview of major topics in contemporary research. The first chapter provides necessary background information and an overview of the volume. The remaining nine chapters cover a wide range of issues relevant to the lexicon, lexicology, and lexicography. Chapter 2 looks at the lexicon-syntax interface and introduces some contemporary approaches to linguistics and to the lexicon in particular. Chapter 3 presents basic aspects of morphology and word formation, whereas chapter 4 deals with “lexical partnerships,” especially collocations, and rudimentary information on language corpora. Chapter 5 turns to lexical semantics and problems involved in analyzing meaning, and chapter 6 briefly investigates the relations between words, sounds, signs, and writing systems. Chapters 7 and 8 focus on different dimensions of lexical change. Chapter 7 tackles the social, regional, and situational aspects of lexical variation, and chapter 8 describes lexical change, historical processes, language contact, and lexical engineering. Chapter 9 explores the mental lexicon and models of lexical processing. This chapter includes a disappointingly short section on the lexicon in SLA. Finally, the last chapter surveys key concepts and developments in lexicography.