An analysis of grammar which claims that grammaticalization theory has advanced to the point that it can be used with the comparative method to reconstruct the grammar of Proto-Languages, illustrated by the Cariban language family of South America. The text is volume 18 in the OXFORD STUDIES IN ANTHROPOLOGICAL LINGUISTICS series.

Gildea has two goals in this book, first to argue that grammaticalization theory has advanced to the point that it can be used with the comparative method to reconstruct the grammar of Proto-Languages; and second to give a detailed case study of this methodology in examining the typologically interesting Cariban language family in South America - a group of languages which has provided counterexamples to a number of proposed typological universals of morphosyntax. His conclusions challenge a long-standing tradition which asserts that syntax cannot be reconstructed. It will interest linguists working on South American languages as well as on grammaticalization, and linguists working in the descriptive or functional traditions.