English Linguistics In Focus

On this page we will publish all recent developments at the English Linguistics Department.

New Book Publication: Introduction to English Morphology

Morphology is the branch of linguistics that studies the internal structure of words, word-formation mechanisms that give rise to new words, and mechanisms that produce wordforms of existing words. Intended as a companion for students of English language and linguistics at both B.A. and M.A. levels, this textbook provides a comprehensive overview of the entire field of English morphology, including English word-formation and English inflectional morphology. The textbook discusses not only basic introductory issues requiring no prior background in linguistics but also fairly controversial theoretical issues which different linguists treat in a different way. As in the previous volumes of the TELL Series, most of the analyses are illustrated with authentic language data, i.e. examples drawn from language corpora like the Corpus of Contemporary American English and British National Corpus.

Tokar, Alexander. Introduction to English Morphology. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang.

New Book Publication: Toward Open Access Scholarship

Open access, the free availability of scholarly works in digital form, is more and more becoming the standard way in which researchers communicate their findings both to peers and to the general public. Yet the systemic change prompted by the move towards Open Access also means significant challenges for publishers, librarians and authors, as the established mechanisms of scholarly knowledge transmission are reconfigured.

This volume contains eight papers produced to expand the talks held at the Berlin 6 Open Access Conference that took place in November 2008 in Düsseldorf, Germany. It addresses the needs, views and fundamental aspects that are crucial to the success of Open Access: policy frameworks to enable it (Horst Forster, Deirdre Furlong), economic and organizational structures to make it viable and sustainable (John Houghton, Anne Gentil-Beccot, Salvatore Mele, and Jens Vigen), concrete platforms in different regions (Abel L. Packer et al.) and disciplines (Christiane Fritze, Sünje Dallmeier-Tiessen and Hans Pfeiffenberger) to serve as models, and finally technical standards to support it (Christian Zier). By presenting data, models and real-life examples related to the implementation that of Open Access this collection of articles demonstrates that OA is not merely progressive in theory, but essential to the dissemination of scientific knowledge in the future.

Cornelius Puschmann and Dieter A. Stein (eds.). 2010. Towards Open Access Scholarship. Selected Papers from the Berlin 6 Conference. Düsseldorf: Düsseldorf University Press / DUP.

New book release: Genres in the Internet

Genres in the Internet

Issues in the theory of genre

Edited by Janet Giltrow (University of British Columbia) and Dieter Stein (Heinrich-Heine-Universität Düsseldorf)

This volume brings together for the first time pragmatic, rhetorical, and literary perspectives on genre, mapping theoretical frontiers and initiating a long overdue conversation amongst these methodologies. The diverse approaches represented in this volume meet on common ground staked by Internet communication: an arena challenging to traditional ideas of genre which assume a conventional stability at odds with the unceasing innovations of online discourse. Drawing on and developing new ideas of genre, the research reported in this volume shows, on the contrary, that genre study is a powerful means of testing commonplaces about the Internet world and, in turn, that the Internet is a fertile field for theorising genre.

Giltrow, Janet and Dieter Stein (Eds.). 2009. Genres in the Internet: Issues in the theory of genre. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

For a table of contents and further information please visit the John Benjamins Publishing Company Website.

Language and Law - Book Publications

We are happy to announce the recent publication of two books on the topic of Language and Law:

Law and Language: Theory and Society (2008)

Language is what law is made of. The transported content and the mode of transportation are as close as two sides of a coin, whether it is in phrasing legal theory, in serving as the connection to society, in the analysis of the language and interpretation of legal discourses (written, spoken or implied), or in the practical application of the law in legal investigations.

This volume, with English contributions by prestigious international experts worldwide and representing the current state of research in classic issues and problems at the convergence of the two fields, gives both universities and practicioners of law a compendium to base their work on in research, teaching and practical application in a field that is increasingly becoming more important.

Law and Language: Theory and Society. 2008. Stein, Dieter, Frances Olsen and Alexander Lorz (eds.). Düsseldorf: Düsseldorf University Press.

Translation Issues in Language and Law (2009)

In a modern world with its growing internationalizaion i ntrade, commerce, business, science and culture, the increasing need for communication and contact between legal cultures is of the utmost importance. By addressing the major linguistic and legal issues arising in legal translation in an exemplary fashion the book presents a representative and scientifically based overview of the major issues in this field of contact between two disciplines and an indispensable introduction to the field for scholars, practicioners and students alike.

The individual chapters, written by an international cross-section of distinguished scholars, teachers and practicioners with competencies and experience in the field, meet the increasing demand for a scientifically based overview of the topic, ranging from the basis of translation difficulties in deeper differences between legal cultures and the effect of translation on legal systems via solutions offered in specific intercultural settins such as the EU to down-to-earth suggestions for handling specific translation problems in mediating between two concrete languages.

Translation Issues in Language and Law. 2009. Stein, Dieter, Frances Olsen and Alexander Lorz (eds.). Palgrave Macmillan.