Thomas Brunner, Simplicity and typological effects in the emergence of New Englishes: The noun phrase in Singaporean and Kenyan English (Topics in English Linguistics, TiEL 97). Berlin: De Gruyter, 2017. Pp. xix+341. ISBN 9783110516593 (hardback).

Abstract

Reviewed by Steffen Schaub, University of Bremen This monograph presents a comparative, corpus-based study of noun phrase structure in Singaporean and Kenyan English (with British English included as a yardstick). The study's goal is to investigate two processes of language change theorised to be at work in New Englishes, namely cross-linguistic influence, induced by language contact, and simplification, a universal process of language change. The construction under analysis is the noun phrase (NP), a hitherto under-researched syntactic construction in the World Englishes paradigm, which is still dominated by research into phonological, lexical and morphosyntactic variation. In this review, I will first situate the study in the larger context of the discipline, then I will provide a chapter-by-chapter overview of the book, followed by a critical evaluation. In his introduction to an edited volume, Jucker (1993) declares that '[t]he English noun phrase has always been treated as the lesser brother of the verb phrase. It seems to be less problematic, simpler, and more straightforward than the verb phrase, which consequently is taken to offer more exciting and more rewarding research questions' (Jucker 1993: 7). Undoubtedly understood as a call to action, the research situation has since improved in favour of the English noun phrase, which is reflected in a number of monographs devoted to understanding structure, variation and diachronic change of the English NP from a range of different perspectives (see, e.g.