Linguistic Typology in China

Abstract

Since the seminal works of Greenberg and Comrie were translated into Chinese in the 1980s, linguistic typology has drawn increasing attention among Chinese linguists and has inspired researchers to investigate language “facts” through crosslinguistic comparisons, typological classifications, and generalizations of implicational universals. There has since been a steady stream of research into certain languages under the rubric of linguistic typology that are associated in one way or another with corresponding features in other languages that are genetically or geographically unrelated. In Chinese academic circles, however, most typological studies are still occupied by the description of Sinitic languages from typological perspectives. Crosslinguistically unbiased studies of categories or constructions based on data drawn from balanced samples remain underdeveloped; the similar is true for more finely grained studies of languoids other than the authors’ native languages, especially those outside China. The recently emerged reference grammars, however, can present themselves to contribute to the theoretical and empirical aspects of linguistic typology. Additionally, Chinese typologists are also making efforts toward innovations in the development of typological theory and methodology.