Notas sobre lingüística histórica (II)

Abstract

Campbell and Poser offer what is probably the most accurate and balanced discussion on the issue, i.e. genealogy in linguistics. Authors make use of the research done with well known language families, already with a contrasted tradition in the field of historical and comparative linguistics, e.g. Indo-European and Uralic, to show how historical linguists work and why this is a very serious, complex, and sometimes not well-considered specialization, where unfortunately there is too much free space for the unfounded elucubrations of dilatants and amateurs. It is very regretable that authors did not actualize some of the topics to adapt them to current times (e.g. including new genealogical links likely to be proven in a near future) or to re-check some observations on the historiography of historical and comparative studies of some philologies to avoid obvious mistakes. All in all, this is a must reading for all those who, having already gained some insights into general matters, wish to go deeper in the field.