Robert A. Hall

Some recent studies on Port-Royal and Vaugelas

Abstract The Grammaire universelle et raisonnee, or “Grammaire de Port-Royal”, of Claude Lancelot and Antoine Arnauld (first published in 1660; third, definitive edition, 1676) has undergone several fluctuations in critical esteem. On its first appearance, and for nearly two centuries thereafter, it enjoyed great popularity, going through five editions and fifteen reprints up to 1846. 1 Cf. the list given in Brekle (ed.) 1966:xix-xxi. It is widely recognized 2 Cf. such discussions as those of Brunot (1913:4.57–60); Harnois (1928:21); Sahlin (1928, passim); Donze (1967, passim); Kukenheim (1966:41–46); etc. that Port-Royal was a prime source of the “universal grammar” movement of the eighteenth century, influencing such theoreticians as Du Marsais, 3 Cf. the detailed discussion of Du Marsais in Sahlin 1928. Beauzee, Destutt de Tracy, Court de Gebelin, etc., down to Girault-Duvivier. 4 For Girault-Duvivier, cf. Levitt 1968. In the nineteenth and early twentieth century, especially under the influence of his...

Italian [z] and the converse of the archiphoneme

Abstract Discussion of the present phonemic status of [z] in standard Italian — on the border-line between significant and non-significant — and of the different ways of solving the problem of partial complementation.

Pidgin english and linguistic change

Abstract A brief discussion of the relationship between pidginized or creolized languages (especially Pidgin English) and the languages from which they have developed, and their implications for such aspects of linguistic history as substratum influence, abrupt structural change, and comparative method.