Reviewed by Thomas Hoffmann, University of Osnabrück

As its subtitle suggests, Focus particles in German investigates the syntax, information structure, and prosody of German focus particles such as nur ‘only’ and auch ‘also’.

After a brief introductory chapter (1–4) outlining the scope and organization of the study, Ch. 2, ‘Theoretical background’ (5–31), provides an in-depth overview of S’s theoretical assumptions. In particular, he discusses the various linguistic levels that have been claimed to affect the focus particle construction, and presents the generative, modular view of grammar adopted in his analysis. Ch. 3, ‘The semantics of focus particles’ (33–57), shows that the semantic contribution of focus particles crucially depends on their interaction with the focus-background partition of a sentence. Moreover, S claims that these properties can be modelled equally well within either the alternative semantics or structured meanings frameworks.

Ch. 4, ‘Focus particles, syntax, and information structure’ (59–148), then argues that focus particles in German are best analyzed as VP-adjoined maximal categories that behave like adverbials and have a fixed syntactic position. Additionally, focus particles are shown to be sensitive to the independent focus-background partition of a sentence, with the domain of the particle being the sentence focus (except for stressed additive focus particles whose domain functions as a contrastive topic). In Ch. 5, ‘The scope of focus particles’ (149–71), S emphasizes that their scope is different from their domain. Among the variables that determine scope are several syntactic nodes (CP, DP, and PP).

Ch. 6, ‘The prosody of sentences with stressed additive focus particles’ (173–246), proceeds to an empirical investigation of focus particles, starting with a corpus study and several speech production and perception experiments on the prosodic realization of the constituent associated with the stressed additive particle auch. As these studies show, the associated element is normally marked by a high or rising pitch accent, while the particle itself exhibits a falling accent. However, the corpus data indicate that pronominal associated elements tend to be non-accented. Furthermore, S points out that in the prosodic marking of the associated element, continuous phonetic factors (such as the gradual realization of the F0-peak, F0-rise, and duration) seem to play a more important role than phonological marking (i.e. a specific accent type).

Ch. 7, ‘Focus particles and contrast’ (247–87), investigates the prosodic realization of the associated elements of unstressed focus particles and provides experimental evidence that these can carry contrastive as well as new information focus. As S argues, the actual type of focus is thus not determined by the particle but the overall information-structural properties of a sentence. Finally, Ch. 8, ‘Conclusion’ (289–91), provides a short summary of S’s main findings.

Not all readers might share S’s theoretical view on the mental architecture of grammar. Nonetheless, this book is an important contribution to a growing body of research that investigates the interaction of syntax, prosody, and information structure, and should therefore be of interest to those working in any of these three fields.

Reviewed by Andrew Carnie, University of Arizona

Focus and topic are among the most useful terms in information structure and the syntax, pragmatics, and semantics of discourse, and yet at the same time they are among the most poorly or inconsistently defined technical notions we work with. Part of the problem is that no clear correspondence holds between these semantico-pragmatic concepts and the syntactic constructions that are supposed to realize them. Luis López provides us with an innovative way to think about the relationship between information structure and the syntactic and semantic interfaces. L asks us to abandon primitive notions of topic/focus and instead characterize various syntactic constructions in terms of features: [+a] for strongly anaphoric items, [+c] for contrastive items, and [+spec] for specifics. This innovation has important theoretical implications: e.g. pragmatic interpretation is interleaved with syntactic phase generation, and  the information structure status of syntactic terms is determined by their feature-triggered structural positions.

Primarily using data from Catalan, L argues that there is no one-to-one link between particular discourse-related constructions—such as clitic left dislocation (CLLD), clitic right dislocation (CLRD), focus fronting—and their discourse function. He argues instead that there is a clear correspondence between the construction, the [±a, ±c] features, syntactic positions, and the precise meaning of each expression. The [±a] and [±c] features are assigned by special pragmatic rules to items in the edges of phases: [+a] is assigned in the specifier of vP and [+c] is assigned in the specifier of FinP. L gives clever arguments from scope and bound variable interpretation for the syntactic position and value associated with each feature: CLLD constructions are [+a, +c], CLRD is [+a, -c], focus fronting is [-a, +c], and default rheme status is [-a, -c]. [±a, ±c] features are assigned derivationally through pragmatic rules at phase boundaries rather than being base generated.

L observes a pattern whereby the feature valuation of a constituent and any subconstituent extracted from it must be identical, but only when the movement crosses a phase boundary. Movement within phases does not obey this constraint. From this L concludes that the feature must have been assigned during the derivation (at the phase boundary) and not in the lexicon/numeration; otherwise we would expect no contrast in behavior as the critical feature would be present throughout the entire derivation. L extends these results to various phenomena using object movement.

This book is not for the layperson; it is highly technically sophisticated. It covers significant ground in syntactic and pragmatic theory. It is also highly innovative and challenges some very foundational assumptions people make both about information structure and syntactic structure. L’s book is lush with interesting data, and the argumentation effectively uses the clever interplay and interaction of grammatical processes. This results a work that belongs on the reading list of every linguist interested in the intersections of syntax, semantics, and pragmatics.

Reviewed by Adam Głaz, Maria Curie-Skłodowska University, Lublin, Poland

This is the third volume on cognitive grammar by Ronald W. Langacker, the previous two having appeared in 1990 and 1999, consisting of articles either published or submitted for publication in various sources. (A notable exception in the present case is Ch. 8, written especially for the collection.) It is also L’s second book-length publication within the span of two years, following Cognitive grammar: A basic introduction (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008).

The need for such works is hardly surprising, as cognitive grammar has been widely recognized and practiced throughout the globe since its beginnings in the early 1980’s. Coherent collections of articles by L are welcome to both practitioners and critics of the theory, if only to permit easier access to otherwise scattered pieces. The coherence of the present volume is achieved through slightly re-editing the individual contributions, omitting redundancies, and providing a single reference section, but above all through the treatment of ‘a number of overlapping topics’ viewed ‘from different perspectives and in relation to one another’ (v).

The volume includes: Ch. 1 ‘Constructions in cognitive grammar’ (1–39), Ch. 2 ‘Metonymy in grammar’ (40–59), Ch. 3 ‘A constructional approach to grammaticization’ (60–80), Ch. 4 ‘Possession, location, and existence’ (81–108), Ch. 5 ‘On the subject of impersonals’ (109–47), Ch. 6 ‘Enunciating the parallelism of nominal and clausal grounding’ (148–84), Ch. 7 ‘The English present: Temporal coincidence vs. epistemic immediacy’ (185–218), Ch. 8 ‘A functional account of the English auxiliary’ (219–58), Ch. 9 ‘Aspects of the grammar of finite clauses’ (259–89),  Ch. 10 ‘Finite complements in English’ (290–326), Ch. 11 ‘Subordination in cognitive grammar’ (327–40), and Ch. 12 ‘The conceptual basis of coordination’ (341–74). A recurrent motif applicable to several of these topics is that of ‘control’ or the ‘control cycle’, discussed in Chs. 5,  6, 7, 9, and 10.

The volume is a treat for cognitive grammar advocates. It presents in a succinct yet profound manner the theory’s present-day state of the art and sketches possible future developments. In doing so, it may be viewed as a continuation of the 2008 volume. If that volume systematically introduces L’s model to a new generation of linguists, then this collection builds upon it and traces a selection of topics in greater depth. Cognitive grammar continues to be one of the most fully developed models of language, if not the most fully developed, within the realm of cognitive linguistics. With the appearance of the present volume, one cannot help but be impressed by the model’s solid foundations, which remain basically unchanged since the launch of the project, and by its proven ability to account for ever new aspects of language use.

Reviewed by Elly van Gelderen, Arizona State University

Teiwa is an endangered language spoken on the island of Pantar in Eastern Indonesia, just North of Timor. Though still spoken by 4,000 people, it is being replaced by Malay and Standard Indonesian in the schools and churches so that most children no longer speak it. Since it and some of its neighbors are Papuan and not Austronesian languages, the question arises how the over twenty Alor-Pantar outlier languages are related to each other and possibly to the other Papuan languages some 1,000 kilometers away.

The book provides a very rich description of Teiwa in Ch. 1, ‘Introduction’. Marian Klamer presents an excellent description of the history, geology, linguistic situation and affiliations, and a typological sketch of Teiwa and its speakers. K discusses two main views on the genetic affiliation of the Alor-Pantar languages to the other Papuan ones: (i) originating from a Trans New Guinea family and moving further West, and (ii) assuming the languages on Alor and Pantar are ‘stay-behind’ descendants.

K shows that Teiwa is head-final with the verbs, conjunctions, and negatives occurring finally (the verb preceding the negative and conjunction). It has an accusative alignment but no Case. Additionally, it lacks adpositions but uses serial verb constructions. Teiwa has few affixes, realis and applicative markers on the verb, and it marks the person and number of animate objects. K concludes that the ‘phonology, morphology and syntax are relatively simple’ (30). K shows that Teiwa shares the head-final characteristic and the frequent use of serial verb constructions with other Papuan languages, but she also chronicles many differences, e.g. no gender, no bound subject, and no contrast between medial and final verbs, that make it ‘morpho-syntactically simpler than many other Papuan languages’ (31).

Ch. 2 ‘Phonology’ provides the phonemic inventory, the syllable structure, and stress assignment. Teiwa has eight vowels, eight stops (including a uvular and glottal stop), five fricatives (including a pharyngeal and glottal), two liquids, three nasals, and two glides.

Other aspects of the Teiwa grammar are presented in the following chapters: Ch. 3 ‘Word classes’, Ch. 4 ‘Grammatical relations’, Ch. 5 ‘The noun phrase’, Ch. 6 ‘Non-verbal clauses’, Ch. 7 ‘Verbal clauses: The marking of reality status, modality, and aspect’, Ch. 8 ‘Negative, interrogative, and imperative clauses’, Ch. 9 ‘Serial verb constructions’, Ch. 10 ‘Clause combinations’, and Ch. 11 ‘Information structure’.  Each chapter has a wonderful synopsis at the end. Anyone working on serial verbs, negatives, or interrogatives will benefit immensely from these chapters.

The grammar is based on primary field data, collected by K between 2003 and 2007. There are some glossed and translated Teiwa texts of various genres included, as well as a word list. It is another outstanding volume in the Mouton Grammar Library series, and will be extremely helpful to Papuan scholars, typologists, and general linguists.

Reviewed by Francesca Bargiela-Chiappini, University of Warwick, UK

With its two prefaces, an extended introduction, thirty-eight chapters, and a concluding essay that bravely seeks to predict possible future developments, The Oxford handbook of applied linguistics re-confirms its credentials as a respected and distinctive presence in the expanding linguistics handbook genre. Especially new to this second edition are parts of the introduction that presents an authoritative yet concise guide to applied linguistics and the addition of three new chapters.

Part 1 ‘Introduction’ was particularly useful as a reminder of the history and the trends of an eclectic field which, in the time between the two editions, has confirmed its inherent multidisciplinarity. Scholars who for various reasons have been concerned with presenting and defending applied linguistics (AL) as a unified endeavour will be at least partially reassured by the space that this volume devotes to traditional areas of enquiry that represent the backbone of AL, such as the four skills (speaking, listening, reading, and writing) (Part 2), second language learning and teaching (Parts 4 and 5), and bilingualism and multilingualism (Parts 7 and 8).

In some regards, the volume is too reliant on a conservative approach to the field, but it does do well in presenting some recent and exciting developments in AL: e.g. language for specific purposes (LSP), such as in Ch. 22, ‘Language uses in professional contexts’ (318–32), by Mary McGroarty. Other aspects of the field, such as English for specific purposes, particularly current empirical research on Business English as a Lingua Franca, or, more generally, business communication in its US and European manifestations were omitted from this current volume.

As the editor mentions in the Preface to the second edition, the book ‘is not intended to represent all areas of applied linguistics, nor is it intended to cover the entire global geography’ (xi). The result of a necessary selection process means that Anglophone countries dominate the geographic distribution of contributors. Perhaps this is one of the reasons why topics such as computer mediated communication, critical approaches to AL, qualitative and quantitative methodologies in and for AL, as well as non-western contributions to AL have not found a place in the current edition. I trust that the third edition, hopefully compiled again under Robert Kaplan’s direction, will consider reflecting the expanded scope of what remains a fast-growing and increasingly varied field of academic enterprise.

Reviewed by Louisa Buckingham, Sabanci University Writing Center, Turkey

This is the second edition of a university textbook for advanced students of Spanish in the US originally published in 2001. Changes include two new chapters, an extensive revision of other sections, and the incorporation of new exercises. It comprises eight chapters that range from a general introduction to linguistics as a cognitive science to dialectal aspects of Spanish. It does not assume prior knowledge of linguistics. Only two sections, the first introductory chapter and the section on pragmatics, are not specifically related to Spanish; otherwise, all chapters provide insights into varieties of Spanish, as well as such contact languages as Catalan, Basque, and Amerindian languages. In most chapters, examples of contemporary language use are provided that contrast different dialect forms (or different languages).

Each chapter begins with a statement of objectives and ends with a series of exercises (often recommending the use of the internet), a summary, and a brief bibliography. Short comprehension exercises also appear in the course of each chapter. A glossary, a bibliography for each chapter, and an index are provided at the end.

Ch.2, on phonetics and phonology (45–122), introduces the International Phonetic Alphabet with a focus on Spanish phonemes, allophones, and suprasegmentals (e.g. word stress and intonation). Variations in pronunciation are discussed with examples from a wide range of dialects, and reference is also made to current changes in pronunciation as evidenced by the speech of the youth in particular regions. The third chapter, on morphology (123–200), has a rich discussion of word derivation and compound word formation, in addition to the general overview of Spanish conjugation and gender systems. The fourth chapter, on syntax (201–78), covers simple and complex sentences in Spanish with occasional contrasts with aspects of English and Basque syntax.

The following chapter on the history of Spanish (279–339) focuses primarily on the evolution of Spanish from Latin, but includes a mention of pre-Roman languages, such as Iberian Celtic and Basque. Consideration is given to phonological, morphological, and semantic changes. After a brief discussion of the standardization of Spanish, culminating in the establishment of the Real Academía Española in the eighteenth century, and an overview of the lexical contributions from Arab and Amerindian languages, the chapter closes with a discussion of the main dialectal features of Peninsular and Latin American Spanish and a brief look at Judeo-Spanish and the Aragonese dialect.

After a general chapter on semantics and pragmatics (340–90), the penultimate chapter on variation in Spanish (391–444) covers phonological and morphosyntactic features of the more well known sociolects and diatopic variants of Spanish, and some less well documented variants such as Judeo or African Spanish. The final chapter, Ch. 8 (445–503), provides a detailed overview of phonological, morphosyntactic, and sociolinguistic features of Spanish spoken in the US. Of particular interest is the description of different Spanish dialects in contact.

This is an outstanding, professionally produced publication that students will find absorbing and motivating. A comprehensive work of this type offering such balanced and up-to-date coverage of the Spanish-speaking world is a rare find.

Reviewed by Elly van Gelderen, Arizona State University

The third volume of Speaking Sitimaxa: A learner’s grammar and reader contains a Sitimaxa-English (10–188) and English-Sitimaxa (189–618) lexicon. The last speakers of Sitimaxa died over seventy years ago and the grammar, reader, and dictionary will help members of the tribe in Southern Louisiana relearn the language.

The story of the re-emergence of Sitimaxa is fascinating. Morris Swadesh and Mary Haas worked with the last speakers and gathered material on Sitimaxa in the 1930s. These data, some of which were spoken records, were then given to Julian Granberry by Swadesh and Haas in 1943 with a suggested orthography. The materials were meant to be developed into a dictionary and grammar for the non-linguist language learner. G did this, while adding eighteenth and early nineteenth century material, to develop the dictionary as part of his undergraduate work at Yale. The present edition is a reprint of the 1949 edition prepared by G.

The volume starts with an introduction to the alphabet used. There are five vowels (i, e, a, o, u) and each has a short and long form. They are represented in an International Phonetic Alphabet fashion, e.g. the i in kica ‘woman’ sounds ‘like e in English Pete’ (6). Sitimaxa has six stops (p, t, k, b, d, g), two nasals (m, n), two glides (w, y), a glottal stop and glottal fricative (q, h), two fricatives (s, x), and two affricates (c, j). Compared to other languages, liquids are absent and there are fewer fricatives.

Entries in the Sitimaxa-English part list the word in the standard orthography, followed by part of speech, syllable structure, phonemic transcription, and meaning with etymology. Sources are also given, to the 1802 Duralde, the 1880s Gatschet, and the twentieth century Swanton and Swadesh work. Their orthographic convention is also provided. An example of a simple entry is ‘gan part (gan) /k^ʔãn/ not’ (24) with the negative labeled a particle. Additional detail on negatives in Sitimaxa is provided in the English-Sitimaxa part. In this section, there are multiple entries on negatives that might require a closer linguistic analysis. A slightly more complex dictionary entry is ‘nenwi– vt (nen·wi-) /ne͂n-w-i-/ 1. remove from a container; 2. take out of a container (nen– ‘out of water’ + –w < –wa singular action + –i verbalizer) [Swd (47) nenwi-].

According to the Ethnologue, Sitimaxa is sometimes classified as an isolate but is listed as part of the Gulf language family alongside other extinct languages Tunica, Atakapa, and Natchez (http://www.ethnologue.com/show_family.asp?subid=2891-16). Having access to a good dictionary might also help shed light on the genetic relationships.

Reviewed by Biljana Radić Bojanić, University of Novi Sad

This much needed book in the field of discourse analysis comprises the results of research on discourse particles, which has been increasingly interesting for linguists in the past few decades. The reason for choosing South Slavic languages as the sources of material and field of investigation rests in their abundance of discourse particles.

The volume consists of seven chapters, the first of which is ‘South Slavic discourse particles: Introduction’ (1–22), written by Mirjana Mišković-Luković and Mirjana N. Dedaić. This chapter provides a general introduction to the field of discourse particles on the one hand and to South Slavic languages on the other. It intends to demarcate the terms discourse particle, discourse marker, pragmatic marker, and discourse connective and explain the choice of the term discourse particle from the title of the book. Additionally, this chapter explicates the linguistic and political situation concerning the South Slavic languages by illustrating both historical and linguistic factors that have influenced the present-day status of Slovenian, Croatian, Bosnian, Serbian, Macedonian, and Bulgarian.

Ch. 2, ‘Ama, a Bulgarian adversative connective’ (23–44) by Grace E. Fielder, integrates relevance theory and discourse analysis to scrutinize the Bulgarian adversative connective ama. The research relies on the data from spoken discourse and a nineteenth century novel with a variety of registers, aiming to establish if the status of ama has changed with the passage of time. The author ascertains that ama has an interactional function in present-day colloquial speech because it expresses the adversative reaction of the speaker towards the preceding discourse or an extralinguistic element.

Alexandre Sévigny relies on relevance theory to focus on the Macedonian kamo in Ch. 3, ‘Kamo, an attitudinal pragmatic marker of Macedonian’ (45–63). The author analyzes the material collected in the Macedonian speech community in Canada composed of second and third generation speakers and establishes that kamo, a seemingly polysemous word, marks the speaker’s attitudes of disbelief towards an attributed utterance.

Ch. 4, ‘Markers of conceptual adjustment: Serbian baš and kao’ (65–89) by Mirjana Mišković-Luković, also couches her account of Serbian particles baš and kao in the relevance-theoretic framework, showing that both function as semantic constraints on the explicit content of an utterance but in different ways. While baš encodes either literalness or pragmatic strengthening, kao signals a weak pragmatic loosening. Her examples are either constructed or taken from naturally occurring discourse recorded in Belgrade and Novi Sad, Serbia.

Using relevance theory, Aida Premilovac analyzes Bosnian informal discourse as the context of occurrence of ono in ‘The Bosnian discourse particle ono’ (91–108). Shedding light on the fact that there are certain problems with the traditional approach to the analysis of ono, she suggests that it is a non-truth-conditional and procedural linguistic device, similar to English like, which signals loose interpretation of the utterance.

Ch. 6, ‘Reformulating and concluding: The pragmatics of the Croatian discourse marker dakle’ (109–31) by Mirjana N. Dedaić, concentrates on the analysis of the Croatian dakle (‘consequently’, ‘then’, ‘so’), using examples from conversations, media talk shows and reports, written material, and the Croatian National Corpus. After setting the scene in the account of dakle as a discourse marker, the author provides a detailed description of a number of different meanings of dakle, including reformulation, its most prominent function.

The last chapter, ‘Pa, a modifier of connectives: An argumentative analysis’ (133–62) by Igor Ž. Žagar, analyzes data from contemporary press in order to investigate the meaning of the Slovenian connective pa, especially in the phrases ker pa ‘but since’ and sicer pa ‘anyway’. The results of his analysis show that pa in the mentioned compound connectives invokes either background knowledge or discursive information, which without pa remains unavailable.

This book, whose contributions follow the dialectal continuum of South Slavic languages from South to North, thus covering an impressive number of languages, is an extremely valuable resource for everyone interested in discourse particles as it provides authoritative data on the semantic and pragmatic aspects of a number of discourse particles.

Reviewed by Svetlana Pashneva, Kursk State University

This book is an edited collection of papers focusing on the role non-conscious processes and memory representations play in perception. The book provides both a theoretical and empirical overview of the various topics of and approaches to the question in focus. A number of studies of implicit memory representations, employing various methods (e.g. psychologi­cal, neuroscience, and computational modeling) are presented. The results reviewed in this book were mostly obtained through recording event-related brain potentials (ERP) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI).

The volume consists of nine chapters, each addressing a different topic from the same approach.  Empirical evidence is evaluated in terms of its importance to models of the processes underlying conscious perception.

In ‘Conscious and unconscious aspects of working memory’ (1–35), Amanda L. Gilchrist and Nelson Cowan review the role working memory plays in conscious and non-conscious cognitive processing. The discussion of the various models of working memory is followed by the suggestion that activation-based models, particularly those that include nested processes are at an advantage in delineating conscious, preconscious, and subliminal processing. In ‘Markers of awareness? EEG potentials evoked by faint and masked events, with special reference to the “attentional blink”’ (37–70), Rolf Verleger discusses ERP components related to subjective experience and non-conscious processes. István Winkler proposes a conceptual model of auditory object formation in ‘In search for auditory object representations’ (71–106), and discusses in a common framework such important functions of the auditory system as the separation of auditory streams and auditory deviance detection. He shows that predictive sound representations exist in the human auditory system and suggests that such representations form the basis of auditory objects in the brain.

István Czigler focuses on the role sensory memory plays in au­tomatic visual change detection and perception in ‘Representation of regularities in visual stimulation: Event-related potentials reveal the automatic acquisition’ (107–31). Minna Huotilainen and Tuomas Teinonen’s chapter,‘Auditory learning in the developing brain’ (133–46), discusses the role learning and implicit memory play in perceptual development. Susan L. Denham, Salvador Dura-Bernal, Martin Coath, and Emili Balaguer-Ballester present a neurocomputational approach to model the processes underlying perceptual objects. They review models of perceptual organization in the vi­sual and auditory modalities and argue for an interpretation of perception as a process of inference. They suggest that making predictions is an effective strategy for dis­covering what’s out there, and for refining and verifying the accuracy of repre­sentations of the world.

Yury Shtyrov and Friedemann Pulvermüller in ‘Are you listening? Language outside the focus of attention’ (179–207) review and evaluate the theories of memory representations involved in speech percep­tion. They provide new insights into the non-conscious processes underlying speech perception and propose a new study paradigm. Stefan Koelsch proposes a theory of the perception of musical structure in ‘Unconscious memory representations underlying music-syntactic processing and processing of auditory oddballs’ (209–44), and emphasizes the role of non-conscious processes and implicit memory representations. Finally, in ‘On the psychophysiology of aesthetics: Automatic and controlled processes of aesthetic appreciation’ (245–57), Thomas Jacobsen reviews memory systems that operate at different levels of processing in aesthetic appreciation, demonstrating that aesthetic judgment of graphic patterns, faces, and musical cadences is preceded by the construction of information based on various memory systems operation unconsciously.

There is an appendix by Alexandra Bendixen, ‘Using electrophysiology to study unconscious memory represenations’ (259–71), which helps non-expert readers to understand the ERP method and assess the data reviewed in the various chapters of the book.

Reviewed by Kanavillil Rajagopalan, State University at Campinas, Brazil

In her introduction, Louise Cummings claims her task is ‘in part a critical one—a critical examination of our current state of knowledge in clinical pragmatics as well as of the application of this knowledge to the assessment and treatment of pragmatic disorders in children and adults’ (1). The field itself is relatively new, as C concedes, but she claims it is ‘a field of study in its own right’ (1).

The volume is made up of seven chapters: ‘Clinical pragmatics: Theory and practice’ (1–39), ‘A survey of developmental pragmatic disorders’ (40–87), ‘A survey of acquired pragmatic disorders’ (88–117), ‘The contribution of pragmatics to cognitive theories of autism’ (118–38), ‘The cognitive substrates of acquired pragmatic disorders’ (139–76), ‘The assessment and treatment of pragmatic disorders’ (177–215), and ‘A critical evaluation of pragmatic assessment and treatment techniques’ (216–55). This is followed by an up-to-date and fairly comprehensive forty-two page bibliography as well as an index of key terms and topics.

As is clear from the chapter headings, C considers it important to maintain the distinction between developmental and acquired pragmatic disorders. Symptoms can be confusing. Confusions arise from ‘describing as pragmatic, behaviors that are not pragmatic in any reasonable interpretation of [the] term’ just as much as ‘a failure to capture the essential pragmatic character of behaviors that are genuinely pragmatic in nature’ (218). Also, C readily dismisses the idea of ‘linking developmental and acquired pragmatic disorders to specific chronological periods’ (8) because the whole issue is yet to be further investigated.

But C also credits a good deal of the confusion in clinical pragmatics to the existence of multifarious approaches to the very question of what pragmatics is all about. Unlike their fellow researchers in syntax and semantics, ‘theorists in pragmatics lack even [the] the most basic consensus on what constitutes their domain of study’ (216).

C, however, does take a firm stand on certain crucial issues. Against what she sees as a pervasive trend of equating pragmatics with communication, effectively leaving nothing as off-limits for it, C invokes the authority of John Searle in order to ‘reverse the tendency set in motion by Chomsky’s famous competence/performance distinction by arguing for the integration of pragmatics within our linguistic competence’ (7).

The book presents the reader with a wide, panoramic view of the very young field of clinical pragmatics. For instance, the opening chapter presents ten items under the subsection title ‘Concepts and theories in pragmatics’. In the subsequent chapters, various mental disorders, both developmental and acquired, are discussed alongside useful insights into how knowledge gathered in the field of pragmatics might help understand what is going on and how best to address the problem clinically.

This book should attend to the needs of a newcomer to the field, but also has the potential to prod other researchers to divert their thoughts in directions hitherto not contemplated.