Linguistics: An Introduction to Linguistic Theory is a textbook, written for introductory courses in linguistic theory for undergraduate linguistics majors and first-year graduate students, by twelve major figures in the field, each bringing their expertise to one of the core areas of the field - morphology, syntax, semantics, phonetics, phonology, and language acquisition. In each section the book is concerned with discussing the underlying principles common to all languages, showing how these are revealed in language acquisition and in the specific grammars of the world's languages.

Key book features:

• Written by twelve linguists all internationally recognized as leaders in their fields of specialization.
• Exercises and data-analysis problems within and at end of each chapter help students learn what it means to actually do linguistics.
• Includes the latest developments in theoretical linguistics; for example, Optimality Theory.
• Other pedagogical tools include: extensive glossary of key terms, chapter summaries, further reading lists.