Question on Grammatical complexity

[Kaius Sinnemäki]

(apologies for cross-postings)

Dear colleagues,

I'm a graduate student at the University of Helsinki working on
structural complexity and system economy of languages. It has long been
claimed that structurally languages have equally "rich" / "complicated"
/ "complex" / "economical" grammars. My aim is to find results that
would either verify or falsify the claim.

For this purpose, I'm looking for correlations (or their absence)
between the complexities of morphology, syntax and phonology. Some
relevant correlations have been attested (e.g. Zipf 1968) that seem to
support the claim. Yet, as far as I know, there's little relevant work
available (e.g. Dahl 2004, McWhorter 2001 and the Commentary in
Linguistic Typology 2001/5:2-3, Perkins 1992, Plank 1986).

I would very much appreciate any help in finding the relevant literature
(theoretical or empirical) and any results already available that have
addresses this issue. You can respond directly to me
(ksinnema at ling.helsinki.fi <mailto:ksinnema at ling.helsinki.fi>) and I'll
post a summary and list of references, if there's general interest.


Thanks in advance,

Kaius Sinnemäki
Graduate student
Department of General Linguistics
University of Helsinki



References:
Dahl, Östen 2004. /The Growth and Maintenance of Linguistic Complexity.
/Amsterdam: Benjamins.
McWhorter, John H. 2001. The World's Simplest Grammars are Creole
Grammars. /Linguistic Typology/ 5 (2-3): 125-156.
Plank, Frans 1986. Paradigm Size, Morphological Typology, and Universal
Economy. /Folia Linguistica /20: 29-48.
Perkins, Revere D. 1992. /Deixis, Grammar, and Culture./ Amsterdam:
Benjamins.
Zipf, George Kingsley 1968. /The psycho-biology of language: an
introduction to dynamic philology/. Cambridge, MA: The M.I.T. Press.



--
Kaius Sinnemäki, M.A., Researcher
General Linguistics, University of Helsinki
P.O Box 9 (Siltavuorenpenger 20A)
00014 University of Helsinki, FINLAND
Email: ksinnema at ling.helsinki.fi