This introduction to linguistic methodology and theory acquaints students with the analytical study of language and the ways in which linguists think and approach their material. Reader-friendly and highly accessible, the book assumes no previous background in linguistics.

Linguistics is unique among texts today in that it brings the reader face-to-face with current cutting-edge theories. It covers in depth the five core areas of theoretical linguistics - phonetics, phonology, morphology, syntax, and semantics - and adds brief discussions of conversation interaction and historical/comparative linguistics where appropriate.

Throughout the book, readers are asked to consider various hypotheses and to use them to account for a range of data. Accordingly, problem sets are included at the end of each chapter. While the data in these problems are drawn from multiple languages, all chapters contain problem sets on at least English, a Romance language, Japanese, and American Sign Language.