Accelerating our discovery of the linguistic past
Project Overview
Project
Accelerating our discovery of the linguistic past
Project members:
Prof Erich Round
Dr Steven Kaye
Dr Cormac Anderson
Dr Emily Lindsay-Smith
Dr Steven Mann
John Hutchinson
Alexandra Young
Madeleine Orr
Period of award
January 2021 - July 2024
Funder:
British Academy
Even closely related languages can exhibit a stunning diversity of morphological complexity, which raises the question: how does this complexity evolve over time, and can we design computational models that would allow us to turn the clock backwards? This project elaborates an evolutionary theory of inflectional systems, such as verb conjugations and noun declensions. It emphasises interdisciplinary parallels between linguistics and fields such as cultural evolution and seeks to demystify the potential of mathematical modelling for inquiry into the linguistic past.