Grande Grammaire Historique du Français (GGHF)

The existing major works on the history of the French language were published more than fifty years ago and are characterized by a largely a-theoretical approach. More than a hundred years after Ferdinand Brunot began to publish his monumental work, the ambition of the Grande Grammaire Historique du Français (GGHF) is to present the evolution of the French language in its totality, building on the contributions achieved by descriptive and theoretical research in recent decades. It also offers several innovative aspects.

The GGHF is a grammar organized by themes rather than by periods, and it reflects all major areas currently under debate in linguistics (phonetics / phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics, etc.). In addition, it is based on a balanced corpus of several million words that has been designed especially for the GGHF (with a selection of representative texts for each century). The consideration of this corpus and the quantification of facts enable the authors to establish a close relationship between variation and change: we believe that the interaction of these two aspects is the cornerstone for the interpretation of the evolution of French and of language in general. In addition to the description of the evolution of French, the analysis of language change thus also aims to contribute to the study of the evolution of language as such.

List of contributors

Dany Amiot (DA), University of Lille, STL, France

Wendy Ayres-Bennett (WAB), Cambridge University, Modern and Medieval Languages and Linguistics, UK

Claire Badiou-Monferran (CBM), Sorbonne Nouvelle University-Paris 3, CLESTHIA, France

Sylvie Bazin-Tacchella (SBT), University of Lorraine, ATILF, France

Eva Buchi (EB), CNRS / University of Lorraine, ATILF, France

Anne Carlier (AC), Sorbonne University, STIH, France

Yvonne Cazal (YC), University of Caen Normandie, CRISCO, France

Bernard Combettes (BC), University of Lorraine, ATILF, France

Walter De Mulder (WDM), University of Antwerp, GaP /C-APP, Belgium

Monique Dufresne (MD), University of Queen's, Canada

Benjamin Fagard (BF), CNRS / ENS-University PSL / Sorbonne Nouvelle University, Lattice, France

Randall Gess (RG), Carleton University, Canada

Julie Glikman (JG), University of Strasbourg, LiLPa, France

Céline Guillot-Barbance (CGB), ENS Lyon, IHRIM, France

Maj-Britt Mosegaard Hansen (MBMH), University of Manchester, Linguistics and English Language, UK

Thomas Hoelbeek (TH), Free University of Bruxelles (VUB), Département de Linguistique Appliquée, Belgium

Haike Jacobs (HJ), Radboud University, Centre for Language Studies, The Netherlands

Peter Koch (PK), University of Tübingen, Romanisches Seminar, Germany

Annie Kuyumcuyan (AK), University of Strasbourg, LiLPa, France

Bernard Laks (BL), Paris Nanterre University, Modyco, France

Elena Llamas-Pombo (ELP), University of Salamanca, IEMYRhd, Spain

Christiane Marchello-Nizia (CMN), ENS Lyon, ICAR, France

Evelyne Oppermann-Marsaux (EOM), Sorbonne Nouvelle University-Paris 3, CLESTHIA, France

Gabriella Parussa (GP), Sorbonne Nouvelle University-Paris 3, CLESTHIA, France

Adeline Patard (AP), University of Caen Normandie, CRISCO, France

Sophie Prévost (SP), CNRS / ENS-University PSL / Sorbonne Nouvelle University, Lattice, France

Magali Rouquier (MR), University Toulouse-Jean Jaurès, France

Tobias Scheer (TS), University of Côte d'Azur / CNRS, BCL, France

Catherine Schnedecker (CS), University of Strasbourg, LiLPa, France

Lene Schøsler (LS), University of Copenhagen, Institut for Engelsk, Germansk og Romansk, Denmark

Philippe Ségéral (PS), Saint-Germain-Village, France

Gilles Siouffi (GS), Sorbonne University, STIH, France

Anne Vanderheyden (AV), University of Antwerp, GaP, Belgium

Esme Winter-Froemel (EWF), University of Würzburg, Neuphilologisches Institut / Romanistik, Germany.