comparative historical linguisticsn
also comparative philology, philology, historical linguistics
a branch of linguistics which studies language change and language relation-
ships. By comparing earlier and later forms of a language and by comparing
different languages, it has been possible to show that certain languages
are related, e.g. the indo-european language. It has also been possible
to reconstruct forms which are believed to have occurred in a particular
language before written records were available. For example *pin an
ancestor language to all the Indo-European languages is said to be related
to /p / in Sanskrit as in pita “father” and /f/ in English as in father.
see also diachronic linguistics
comparative linguisticsn
a branch of linguistics which studies two or more languages in order to
compare their structures and to show whether they are similar or different.
Comparative linguistics is used in the study of language types (see typology)
and in comparative historical linguistics. It is also used by some
applied linguists for establishing differences between the learner’s native
language and the target language^1 in the areas of syntax, vocabulary,
and sound systems.
see also contrastive analysis
comparative philologyn
another term for comparative historical linguistics
comparative relative clausen
also object of comparative relative clause, OCOMP
see noun phrase accessibility hierarchy
comparative sentencen
another term for comparative clause
comparison and contrast methodn
see methods of development
compensatory instructionn
also compensatory education
a special education programme for children whose home background is
said to lack certain kinds of language experience. For example, children
who are not read to at home or who do not have story books at home.
see also cultural deprivation
comparative historical linguistics