A multi-model approach to contact-induced language change

This volume deals with some never before described morphosyntactic variations and changes appearing in settings involving language contact. The primary purpose of the articles it presents is to identify different factors in language change. These changes are not treated as phenomena amenable to explanation from a single source: they constitute a dynamic domain of complex, complementary, and correlated processes that have to be treated with a finegrained approach. The development of morphosyntactic structures in a situation of language contact should not be analyzed through a single lens. Contact-induced changes are generally defined as dynamic and multiple, involving internal change as well as historical and sociolinguistic factors. The identification and consideration of a variety of explanations constitutes a first step; analyzing their relationships forms a second. Only a multifaceted methodology enables this fine-grained approach to contact-induced change. A range of methodologies are proposed in the following chapters, but they generally have their roots in a typological perspective. The contributors recognize the precautionary principle: for example, they emphasize the difficulty of studying languages that have not been described adequately and for which diachronic data