Overview

Eugenio Coseriu counts among the most important linguistic scholars of the second half of the 20th century. He is known mainly as a structuralist and a Romance linguist, but his work is in fact far more expansive in scope, including a comprehensive linguistic theory as well as writings on a wide range of issues, from semantics, syntax, typology, variational linguistics, language change, pragmatics and text linguistics to Vulgar Latin, the history of the philosophy of language and the history of Romance linguistics. Coseriu’s thought is founded on solid philosophical principles, and his life brought him into contact with a number of different academic traditions and cultures. However, for a variety of reasons (among which, the languages in which he tended to publish: Spanish, Italian, French and German), knowledge of his thought is rather marginal in the Anglo-American world. This book aims to go some way to addressing this situation by offering an overview in English of Coseriu’s main contributions to linguistics, and indeed to other disciplines. It is of general interest for the study of linguistics, the history of linguistics, and the philosophy of language, as well as for a broader reading public.

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9783110716153

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Reviews

""El libro de Kabatek me ha resultado de enorme utilidad porque proporciona una visión, externa e interna a la vez, de los fundamentos, las posibilidades y, también, las carencias del modelo coseriano. No tengo la menor duda de que, aunque todo libro es mejorable, tardaremos mucho en poder disponer de una introducción a Coseriu más completa, más actual y más profunda que la que he reseñado."" (Ángel López García, Universitat de València, in: Energeia IX/2024, 331) ""[...] the book [...] can serve as a model for similar works in terms of the scope of analysis, specifically the shift from the work of the author being discussed to the topic itself: we observe a progression from precise heuristic work with specific texts and manuscripts to interpretation, and then to the context of other works by the same author and other authors on the same subject. In both of these aspects, Kabatek is the best follower of his teacher's legacy, as Coseriu also conceived the history of linguistics in this vein"" (Vít Boček, Czech Language Institute of the Czech Academy of Sciences, in: Slovo a slovesnost 86:1/2025, 86-87). ""Kabateks Buch vermittelt ein lebendiges und detailreiches Bild von Coserius Schaffen, dessen sprachphilosophische Intentionen stets im Blick bleiben. Coserius Werk erschließt sich sozusagen ""from the bottom up""; das Buch macht vertraut mit den sprachwissenschaftlichen Themen und ermöglicht so einen fundierten Zugang zu Coserius Sprachphilosophie. Für den Schritt ""über die Philosophie hinaus"", den die interdisziplinäre Thematik nahelegt, bietet die Lektüre von Kabateks Monographie eine wertvolle Hilfestellung. Hilfreich für die weitere Auseinandersetzung mit Coserius Sprachphilosophie sind auch das umfassende Verzeichnis seiner Publikationen und eine ausführliche Liste der Forschungsliteratur zu Coseriu."" (Christoph Staub in: Philosophischer Literaturanzeiger 1/2024)

Author Information

Johannes Kabatek, Zurich University, Switzerland.

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