Approaches to language typology

What do all languages have in common, and what gives each language its individuality? 'Language typology', which has developed in response to these fundamental questions, is concerned with the construction of theoretical frameworks capable of delimiting the range of possible human languages and of capturing constraints on cross-linguistic variation. 'Language typology' is a concern of all contemporary schools of linguistics, yet a coherent image of the field is difficult to form because of the diversity of theoretical orientations and practical methodologies. This collection brings together for the first time original contributions from major schools of typological research, from the Prague School to the Generative Grammar tradition.