Laurel J. Brinton

rdf:langString Laurel J. Brinton

rdf:langString Laurel J. Brinton (born 1953) is an American-born Canadian linguist. Her research explores areas of Modern English grammar, historical change in English discourse markers, grammaticalization and lexification in English, corpus linguistics, and the pragmatics of English. Her body of linguistic research spans several decades, with a focus on English linguistics. Her premier work is Lexicalization and Language Change, which focuses on understanding the relationship between lexicalization and grammaticalization in language change. The book was the first to attempt a unified report of all existing approaches to lexicalization. She has made significant contributions in the areas of historical discourse analysis and corpus linguistics, especially with respect to historical corpora. She has completed a number of diachronic studies of the English language, including examinations of comment clauses and pragmatic markers, the latter of which has been taught as a university course with much discussion on her theories of pragmatics and discourse markers. She was part of the team who set up the Dictionary of Canadianisms on Historical Principles, 1st edition, in an online form. She is the daughter of Robert K. Brinton. Her sisters are epidemiologist Louise A. Brinton and author and educator Donna M. Brinton.