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 J ournal for  E uro Li nguisti X  6 (2009): 52-54

Joachim Grzega

Review on The World Atlas of Language Structures* 

The World Atlas of Language Structure (WALS), ed. by Martin as!el"ath et al., #$ford:#$ford: %ni&ersity 'ress 2009, is a huge &olu"e that urolinguists ill not be able to ignorein their future or*. +t !resents 42 !hononologial, "or!hologial, syntatial, le$ial and

 !aralinguisti features on "a!s and in ao"!anying inter!retati&e te$ts o"!osed by a broadrange of linguists. ontributions on "or!hology and synta$ are by far the "a/ority. +naddition, there is a (ith only a fe layout shorto"ings) that allos users to o"bine

to linguisti features fro" the 13 and to ha&e their indi&idual "a!s !rodued then.o"e "a!s of the atlas o&er u! to ,000 languages the original target "ini"u" as 200languages !er "a!, but this as not be reahed in e&ery asehih is astonishing hen youread that the editors had !ro&ided linguisti e$!erts for e&ery one of the 200 ore languagesand hen you ta*e into aount that the "issing languages are often languages that are elldou"ented.

+n general, the 13 !ro&ides readers ith a first &aluable introdution to a linguisti issue, but readers also ha&e to *no hat *ind of data is inluded. 7or so"e languages, there are&ery !rofessional, ell elaborate ditionaries and gra""ars, for others there are not. 7or so"elanguages, there are nor"ati&e standard &arieties, for other languages there are not. 1ith &ie

to uro!ean languages, readers ha&e to be aare that hat is re!resented on the "a!s are thestandard &arieties in their ritten for" re!resenting the su!!osably "ost neutral for". o"eof the authors inlude a hedging re"ar* on this !roble" in their o""ents. 8ut it isne&ertheless a !ity that non-standard &arieties ere !ratially fully negleted, es!eiallysine this ould in se&eral ases ha&e led to different !itures.

+n ha!ter 45, 'oliteness istintions in 'ronouns, for instane, the inlusion of s!o*enlanguage ould re&eal that the T;raia ; 7iguerra 200?:?@).

+n ha!ter 49, =u"ber of ases, >er"an ould be gi&en as ha&ing ? ases, not 4 ases,sine it has beo"e ides!read to renoune a syntheti ase distintion of no"inati&e andausati&e in all delension lasses (instead of the original differenes beteen Friede A!eaeB&s. Frieden A!eae-.>B and Präsident A!residentB &s. Präsidenten A!resident-.>B,"any !eo!le ha&e generaliCed Frieden and Präsident ).

+f non-standard &arieties had been inluded, ryer ould not lai" on !. 455 that oublenegation is also ides!read, e$e!t for uro!e, but he ould say that double negation isides!read in uro!e. nd =ihols and 'eterson ould realiCe that not only nglish la*s a2nd !erson singular !ronoun inluding a DtE (beause it as re!laed by the original 2nd

F This te$t as originally a re&ie ritten for the /ournal WORD in 2006. s + ha&e not heard anything fro"the 1#G editors sine then and as the issues see" to ha&e eased being !ublished, + offer it here. The te$thas been slightly su!!le"ented by referenes to the reent artile by Hort"ann (2009). This re&ie fousseson uro!ean languages a re&ie foussing on languages fro" other !arts of the orld as ritten Mar*onohue for 3+=>%+T 3ist I.055 (2006).

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 !erson !lural), but also se&eral !anish dialets, !artiularly in 3atin "eria (here thesa"e !roess ha!!ened).

This la* of inlusion of non-standard and non-ritten &arieties is also &ieed &ery ritially

 by Hort"ann (2009, f. !artiularly !. I@f., here he !oints out that nglish is !redo"inantly a language ith a relati&e !artile, not a language ith relati&e !ronouns, andthat nglish dialets abound ith "ulti!le negation).

ere are so"e "ore ritial re"ar*s on uro!ean languages that + noted at first reading:+n ha!ter 24, 3ous of Mar*ing in 'ossessi&e =oun 'hrases, =ihols and 8i*eldistinguish beteen () head "ar*ing, (2) de!endent "ar*ing, (?) double "ar*ing and (4) no"ar*ing of !ossessi&e relationshi!. 3et us ta*e the !hrase AJohnBs houseB. 7or uro!e, Ty!e 2and ? are gi&en as the ty!ial onstrutions. Ty!e 2 ould be re!resented by >.  Johanns

 Haus and Guss. dom !ana (and the sa"e holds for the other la&i languages, hih are notre!resented on the "a!). Ty!e 2 is also said to be re!resented by ungarian. +n fat, though,the neutral onstrution in ungarian is Ty!e , J"nos h"#a (lit. JKnos house-his) a "ar*edonstrution is Ty! ?, J"nosna$ h"#a (lit. JKnos-T house-his) ty!e 2 does not e$ist intandard ungarian. 7or !anish, ty!e ? is gi&en as the usual onstrution, hile 7renh isseen as being a ty!e 4 language. s a "atter of fat, there is no strutural differene beteena !anish la casa de Juan and a 7renh la maison de Jean (and an nglish the house of John).ine there is e$atly one "ar*er, the !ossible lassifiations an only be seen as Ty!e or asTy!e 2. The authors ategoriCe the nglish of -onstrution (their e$a"!le !hrase is the %riceof oil ) as Ty!e 2 (for hih there are good !honeti reasons, as !auses are !otentially "ade

 before and ne&er after of ). 8ut then the 7renh and the !anish onstrutions need to besubsu"ed here as ell. nd the sa"e holds for +talian and uth, hih are not re!resentedon this "a!.

+n ha!ter 49, =u"ber of ases, +ggesen ado!ts 8la*eBs (994) definition of ase: ase isa syste" of "ar*ing de!endent nouns for the ty!e of relationshi! they bear to their heads.Traditionally the ter" refers to infletional "ar*ing. 1ith this definition, nglish islassified as ha&ing 2 ases for nouns. oe&er, it is doubtful hether the s-"ar*er an really

 be seen as a ase "ar*er in this definition, onsidering the fat that as a rule the "ar*er is notattahed to the head noun of a !hrase, but at the end of the entire noun !hrase, e.g. the &ueenof 'nglands famil, not the F&ueens of 'ngland famil.

+n ha!ter 5?, #rdinal =u"bers, tolC and . drei * dritter+ u. drie * derde. This also holds true for "any "e"bersof the seond grou!: nglish, +talian, !anish, 3adin, ungarian, Gussian, for e$a"!le. ndif a se!arate grou! first;one-th, to-th, three-th is defined for Go"ani is !ut in a se!arategrou!, then 7renh should not be !ut in the abo&e-"entioned >rou! 2, but in a se!arate grou!first, seond;to-th, three-th.

+f in ha!ter 65, 'erfeti&e;+"!erfeti&e s!et, ahl and

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+n ha!ter ?, =u"eral 8ases, o"rie s!ots three languages in uro!e that ha&e hybrid&igesi"al-dei"al syste". This is right for 8asLue and anish. 8ut it is not that si"!le for+rish. +t is true that  fiche A20B is synhronially not related to dh" A2B, but it is so

synhronially. The for" daichead A40B on the other hand is indeed A2$ 20B diahronially (d" fichead , f. ol de Am?rica, adOC: er&iio de'ubliaiones de la %ni&ersidad.

7rethei", Thorstein (2005), 'oliteness in =oray: o an you be !olite and sinereN, in: i*ey, 3eo ;teart, Miranda (eds.), Politeness in 'uro%e, 45-5@, le&edon et.: Multilingual Matters.

Hort"ann, 8ernd (2009), (=iht-tandard-)