Linguistic change in two directions

Linguistic changes of a simplifying kind are common in high-contact areas and were long assumed to be natural. But changes in the opposite direction – leading to greater complexity – have also been observed, particularly in areas which are relatively isolated.

As Trudgill points out, the historically atypical experience of educated, standard European language speakers tends to cloud our judgement of what is ‘normal’ in language. This needs to be modified if language diversity and change is to be properly understood:

If we are serious about understanding language change, then we need to turn our attention to low-contact and often poorly documented languages as well as those with which we are most familiar. And we had better get a move on: with only 10 per cent of the world’s languages reckoned to be ‘safe’ for the remainder of this century, a wealth of potentially fascinating data is disappearing fast.