Amazon.com Product Description (ISBN 0340607580, Paperback)

This is a major introduction to historical linguistics, designed for students who have no background in historical linguistics but who have at least some knowledge of phonetics, phonology, and morphology. The author introduces all major types of change, consequences of change (dialect and language families), and methods in historical linguistics. Later chapters deal with sociolinguistic aspects of change, language contact, birth and death of languages, language and prehistory, and finally the issue of very remote relations.