This book is a comprehensive introduction to the study of language contact and its outcomes, as well as the social and linguistic factors involved.

• Provides a comprehensive introduction to the field of contact linguistics.
• Examines a wide range of language contact phenomena from both general linguistic and sociolinguistic perspectives.
• Offers an account of current approaches to all of the major types of contact-induced change.
• Discusses the general processes and principles that are at work in cases of contact.

Donald Winford is Professor of Linguistics at Ohio State University. He is author of Predication in Caribbean English Creoles (1993), and co-editor of several volumes, including Focus and Grammatical Relations in Creoles (1993) and The Structure and Status of Pidgins and Creoles (1998). He was president of the Society for Caribbean Linguistics (1998–2000), and is currently editor of the Journal of Pidgin and Creole Languages.