Clitics: An IntroductionAndrew Spencer, Ana R. Luis

2000 د.ج

In most languages, we find “little words” that resemble full words but cannot stand alone. They must “lean on” a neighboring word, as seen in English examples like the ‘d’ve, and unstressed ’em in Kim’d’ve helped’em (“Kim would have helped them”). These are called clitics, and they occur in languages worldwide. In English, clitics generally appear in the same position as their full-word counterparts, but in many other languages, their placement follows distinct rules. This book is the first comprehensive introduction to clitics, offering a complete overview of their properties, functions, and the reasons they fascinate linguists, as well as the various theoretical approaches proposed to analyze them. Drawing on data from over 100 languages, it explores a wide range of clitic systems and their patterns.