Mouton de Gruyter, 2009. — vi, 409 pages. — (Empirical Approaches to Language Typology). — ISBN 978-3-11-019308-4.The opening chapter in this collection, aims to give the interested linguist some basic information about databases. The chapter also provides an overview of how databases work. Two chapters describe databases with information about pronominal systems. Further two chapters describe databases focusing on morphology. The characteristic feature of the databases designed by this research group is that they favour
a deep view rather than a wide view. These databases do not contain data from a large language sample, instead being designed to allow access to very detailed data from a small number of languages. These databases reflect the ‘canonical’ approach to typology. The results which are presented show that this methodology is one that can produce valuable results. Still another chapter discusses the problems encountered in designing and implementing a system that can provide simultaneous, integrated access to several diverse databases of typological information. The project brings up again the issues of partial and non-commensurable representations that have already been discussed in this introduction, since such an interface requires a way of dealing with the conceptual, structural and terminological differences between the component databases. The solution acknowledges that different theoretical frameworks are rarely equivalent or inter-convertible, and provides a thought-provoking glimpse of one direction in which linguistic typology, assisted by computers, may develop. A database is described that is concerned with the expression of particular meanings manifested as the word classes intensifiers and reflexives. problem of tracking morphosyntactic variation across dialects. The project is also interesting for its use of a questionnaire as a data-gathering tool, and (in its latest incarnation) for the incorporation of audio examples into the
web interface.ContentsIntroduction
Designing linguistic databases: A primer for linguists
A typological database of personal and demonstrative pronouns
Databases designed for investigating specific phenomena
How to integrate databases without starting a typology war: The Typological Database System
A contribution to ‘two-dimensional’ language description: The Typological Database of Intensifiers and Reflexives
StressTyp: A database for word accentual patterns in the world’s languages
The typological database of the World Atlas of Language Structures
Typology of reduplication: The Graz database
The Romani Morpho-Syntax (RMS) database
A database on personal pronouns in African languages
