Reviewed by Michael Zock, LIF – CNRS, Marseille

This book was written by the creator of the concept of word grammar. Richard Hudson argues that language is a conceptual network in which language can be described in terms of nodes and their relations (2–3). The book is divided into five chapters.

Ch. 1, ‘Introduction’ (1–62), describes H’s assumptions concerning language, its structure, and its processing. While he assumes that language is basically a network, he argues that language processing is mainly activation spreading.

Ch. 2, ‘Morphology’ (63–116), uses the same theory of word grammar to describe linguistic forms. H explains that ‘morphological patterns are represented as a network of relations among words, morphs, and sounds or letters’ (63).

In Ch. 3, ‘Syntax’ (117–82), Hposits that syntactic structures are best described in terms of dependency-structures (DSs). He justifies this choice by claiming that DSs (i) are simpler than phrase structures, (ii) can account for long distance-dependencies, (iii) have desirable mathematical properties, (iv) are used by most parsers, and (v) have psychological reality.

Ch. 4, ‘Gerunds’ (183–210), explains gerunds as a hybrid unit. H states that ‘English gerunds are … single words which are both verbs and nouns…nothing more is needed in order to generate ordinary gerunds, though special provisions are needed for possessive subjects and no/any’ (210).

In the last chapter, Ch. 5 ‘Meaning: Semantics and sociolinguistics’ (211–48), H deals with meaning, considering it both from a semantic and pragmatic point of view. For example, the word cookie signals not only the fact that we want to talk about a certain kind of biscuit, but also that we adhere or belong to a certain speech community (224). One of the many questions addressed in this section deals with the acquisition of meaning. H explains that people are able to store so many structures and words due to recycling, a mechanism that allows speakers to build new objects out of old ones.

I found the book to be highly stimulating and would definitely recommend it to anyone interested in understanding how language is represented or structured in peoples’ minds. Although there were some noticeable omissions, this book functions as a nice introduction to language processing and psycholinguistics.