The main conclusion Östen Dahl argues for in this book is that ‘peripheral’ varieties of Swedish, though morpho-syntactically conservative in many ways, display a number of innovative features that the standard language does not have. It is argued that these innovations originated from a common source in central Sweden, from where they were later pushed out by varieties that were to form the basis for Standard Swedish. The data on which the argument for innovation rests come from the behaviour of noun phrases; particularly there are three aspects of noun-phrase structure which are central to the argument: (i) the expanded use of definiteness marking, (ii) attributive modification, and (iii) possessive constructions.

There is a long tradition of descriptive studies of dialects of Swedish and the other Mainland Scandinavian languages. Relatively recently established cross-Scandinavian projects such as Scandinavian Dialect Syntax (ScanDiaSyn, http://www.tekstlab.uio.no/nota/scandiasyn/), with the subproject SweDiaSyn, and the Nordic Center of Excellence in Microcomparative Syntax (NORMS, http://www.hf.uio.no/iln/english/about/organization/text-laboratory/about/norms/) have contributed empirically, but also ensured that detailed and systematically collected dialect data contribute to theoretical grammar models. The work reported on in this book, with its focus on a subset of varieties of Swedish, complements such projects and differs from them in combining a diachronic approach with a typological perspective on the data.

‘Peripheral’ is defined geographically and includes varieties spoken in Northern Sweden, Finland and Estonia, indeed one of the texts included in the study is from Swedish spoken in the Ukraine, though these data are not referred to directly. Northern Sweden as defined in the book does not correspond directly to any current administrative division, but to a natural and cultural boundary of historical significance which runs slightly further south than that of the region called Norrland ‘north land’ in Swedish.

The issue of determining whether a variety is an independent language or a dialect of some over-arching language is a long-standing one in linguistics. Dahl argues that the differences between some of the varieties he deals with and Standard Swedish are greater than those between it and standard varieties of the other Mainland Scandinavian languages, hence he does not refer to them as ‘dialects’, but as ‘vernaculars’ or ‘(local) varieties’. The data used for the book come from the traditional dialect literature – including collections of texts – as well as some more recent, theoretically oriented, work. In addition, data sets specifically relating to the constructions dealt with in the book were collected by means of a questionnaire designed specifically for the purpose. Furthermore, a children's story originally written in Elfdalian, a variety that has received attention in the literature largely because of its conservative features, has been translated into a number of other local varieties and these texts provide comparable data across a number of varieties.

The expansion of the use of the definite article constitutes the central part of the argument and is therefore dealt with most thoroughly by Dahl. Swedish and other Scandinavian languages have two definiteness markers: the bound marker that forms definite nouns and the syntactic marker generally associated with prenominal modification in the standard language. According to Dahl, the syntactic marker is less frequent in the peripheral varieties, but the bound one has expanded its use in a way that is consistent with principles generally assumed to fall under grammaticalisation. There are four major environments into which definite forms have expanded: (i) generic uses as exemplified by Kaffen ä allt bätter än ten Footnote ¹ ‘coffee.def be.prs sure better than tea.def ’ (p. 46); (ii) ‘non-delimited’ uses, to which I will return below; (iii) after quantifiers as in hon fann inge ägga ‘she find.pst no.pl egg.def.pl ’ (p. 74); and (iv) a range of uses with low referential singular count nouns, for instance Wi addum äst'n dö i wa lit'n ‘we have.pst.1pl horse.def when I be.pst small’ (p. 89). In all cases the standard language would use an indefinite form. For each environment, there are examples from across the peripheral areas to illustrate how definiteness marking patterns across the varieties, and there is reference to similar uses found in older varieties, including written medieval Swedish.

The ‘non-delimited’ use is that which has been referred to as the ‘partitive article’ by for instance Delsing (Reference Delsing1993), by parallel to the French or Italian partitive article, but Dahl prefers to reserve this term for constructions that clearly involve a part–whole relationship. Hence the use of the definite form in an example such as ji å a Karolina nåppe snottren i höst ‘I and pda.f Karolina pick.pst cloudberries.def.pl in autumn’Footnote ² (p. 55) exemplifies the non-delimited use of the definite form in a Northern Swedish variety, where the standard language would not allow the definite form but would have plockade hjortron ‘pick.pst cloudberries’.

Dahl critically assesses and rejects two potential explanations suggested in the literature for the extended use of definite nouns in the peripheral varieties (Holmberg & Sandström Reference Holmberg and Sandström2003 and Rießler Reference Rießler2002). Instead, he proposes that the change is the result of progressive grammaticalisation, and after a discussion of the semantics of the generic use proposes this as the bridging context.

In the chapter on definite noun phrases containing attributive modification, Dahl identifies three alternatives to the Standard Swedish construction that requires prenominal adjectives (as far as I can tell, modification is exemplified exclusively with adjectives) to be preceded by a syntactic definite element and followed by a noun in its definite form, as in den lilla pojken ‘def little.wk boy.def’. The alternatives are (i) the adjective is incorporated into a definite noun and there is no syntactic definite element, as in stur-buttn ‘big-can.def’ (p. 145); (ii) the adjective occurs without a syntactic definite element and with a definite noun, but is not incorporated, as in lìssl påjtjôn ‘little.wk boy.def’ (p. 135); and (iii) as in Standard Swedish, the adjective is not incorporated, is preceded by a syntactic definite element and occurs with a definite noun, but the syntactic definite element is not the one used in Standard Swedish – instead, an element which still also functions as a demonstrative in the local variety is used, as in an dar swart rattj-in ‘that there black dog-def.nom.sg’ (p. 136). Of these, it is the incorporated adjective which has received most attention in the literature and it can be found throughout most of the areas of Sweden included in this book, but it is more weakly represented in the eastern varieties. There are a number of factors that make it more difficult for any account of this construction to be as detailed and complete as that of expanding definiteness; generally, adjectival modification is rare in definite noun phrases, but there is also variation – between speakers and between contexts – for instance certain adjectives may be more likely to be incorporated than others. With respect to alternative preposed articles, there is the additional problem that the context in the texts available may not make it possible to establish whether they are still used as a demonstrative.

Though Dahl does not see the distinction between incorporation and compounding as a clear-cut one, he argues that the majority of examples considered under (i) are best described as incorporation. In terms of the historical development of incorporated adjectives, the apocope of the vowel of the weak ending on the adjective can be assumed to have played a role. However, as Dahl shows, there are complications both in that there are incorporations that cannot be put down to apocope and in that there are apocopated adjectives that have not been incorporated. Still, there is to my mind not sufficient discussion of how categories (i) and (ii) are distinguished in these predominantly spoken varieties. The assumption seems to be that it is clear whether the adjective is or is not incorporated, but no formal criterion is offered. The fact that apocope leaves behind a trace in the form of a grave accent in both incorporated and non-incorporated constructions means that prosody is not an obvious clue. I suspect there is no easily applicable criterion, but this makes a discussion of the distinction all the more relevant.

Dahl refers to Larm (Reference Larm1936:64) for the claim that the preposed article ƿæn, from which the Standard Swedish den developed, cannot be older than the bound definiteness marker, and shows that in written medieval Swedish it was not uncommon to have prenominal modification without the preposed article. The conclusion is, then, that the syntactic marker is a late arrival compared to the morphological definiteness marker on the noun.

In the chapter on possessives, Dahl includes all constructions that involve a modifier that is functionally equivalent to a genitive. Scandinavian languages display a puzzling multitude of competing ways of expressing possession, and the vernaculars are no different. The variation is most striking with full lexical possessors and it is on these that Dahl focuses. As for definite noun phrases containing modification, it is difficult to make firm generalisations because ‘noun phrases with full NP possessors are less frequent in spoken and informal written language than one would like as a linguist studying this construction’ (p. 157). The s-genitive of Standard Swedish, which combines with a non-definite noun but yields a definite noun phrase, is weakly represented in Peripheral Swedish, but in its canonical form also in other local varieties of Swedish. The alternatives that occur in Peripheral Swedish include (i) a possessor marked by -s combining with a definite noun as in Alfreds käringa ‘Alfred.gen wife.def’ (p. 160); (ii) two types of dative-marked possessors; (iii) a construction consisting of possessee – possessive pronoun – possessor, in that order, kLänninga hännasj Lina ‘dress.def her Lina’ (p. 185), which is referred to as the ‘h-genitive’ following Delsing (Reference Delsing2003); (iv) prepositional constructions freo att n'Alfri ‘wide.def poss pda.m Alfred’ (p. 191); and (v) possessor incorporation as in the example Svän-Jons-pojken ‘<first name><patronymic>-boy.def’ (p. 194), which is typical of this construction in that it involves a personal name and a kinship term.

With respect to dative possessors, Dahl distinguishes two types: plain and complex. The plain dative possessive construction has the possessor in the dative, as in skoN paitjåm ‘shoe.sg.def boy.dat.sg.def’ (p. 161), but involves a fair amount of variation when it comes to order, definiteness marking on the possessee and even the overtness of the case marking. The complex dative possessor is more limited in its geographical distribution, used productively ‘only in Dalecarlian, notable Elfdalian’ (p. 169). It involves an ending -es added to the dative form of the possessor: kullum-es saing ‘girl.def.pl.dat-poss bed’ (p. 170). Dahl hypothesises that this construction originally was an alternative to the plain dative possessor in specific contexts, but it is now increasing in use, possibly under influence of the possessive -s in Standard Swedish. Dahl compares the construction with the development of the possessor – possessive pronoun – possessee (distinguished from the h-genitive largely by the order between the possessor and the possessee) in other varieties of Germanic. In this discussion, Allen (Reference Allen2008) deserves more than a footnote, and reference to Allen (Reference Allen1997) would have been appropriate.

The diversity of constructions and the variety within many vernaculars make it difficult to establish a clear picture of the distribution, but some patterns can be identified on the basis of which historical development can be hypothesised. For instance, the plain dative construction and the at prepositional construction hardly overlap. Dahl argues that both constructions find their origin in an external possessor construction, indeed in varieties where at has a limited distribution ‘at is not a general possessive marker but rather signals an external possessor construction’ (p. 192). This possibility has not received attention in the dialect literature, Dahl assumes this is because ‘the notion of “external possession” has not been salient for most people who have worked in the area’ (p. 192). Exactly for this reason, the book would have benefitted from a more detailed discussion of what distinguishes an external possessive construction from an attributive one – trivially, whether or not the possessor noun phrase belongs structurally within the noun phrase headed by the possessum or has the hallmarks of a dependent of the verb, but what criteria can be used to determine this in the constructions discussed here? There is a brief description of the characteristics of external possession, but it is not entirely clear how this relates to Norde's (Reference Norde1997:212) in essence semantic criteria that Dahl disputes (p. 169). More details on how the change from external to attributive or prepositional progresses would also have been helpful to the reader (external possession may not have figured in the dialect literature, but it is present in the diachronic literature on Germanic).

In the last substantial chapter, Dahl considers what development might have led to the peripheral varieties sharing these innovative features even though they are spread over a large non-contiguous area. Given that the specific development of the definiteness markers in Peripheral Swedish is typologically rare, he argues that the chances of it being a case of a similar change occurring independently in several places are slim. The most likely explanation for the pattern is instead that the innovations spread from one centre, but none of the current areas where Peripheral Swedish is spoken is a plausible candidate for being this original centre. Instead, an area south of the boundary of Peripheral Swedish, around lake Mälaren, that no longer has the relevant properties is assumed to have been their place of origin. The varieties of this area had the crucial properties, but they lost them because they were pushed out at a later stage by influence from the south and what was to become Standard Swedish. In this argument, Dahl is supported by Wessén (Reference Wessén1966), but he also provides examples of other innovations in the same varieties for which a push-back explanation is plausible. Dahl shows that the same peripheral varieties also share a number of conservative features which have similarly been pushed back in the areas of origin, which would put the date of the innovations quite early. A discussion of the cultural and social circumstances in the area around lake Mälaren at the time provides a plausible account of how the changes spread to the periphery. In a brief concluding chapter, some consequences of the study for historical linguistics more generally are drawn out.

All in all, I think this is a gem of a book, in particular because of the wealth of data and the typological take on varieties of a language. The main point relating to innovation in Peripheral Swedish is most clearly made with respect to the spread of definiteness, but Dahl recognises that issues with the data with respect to attributive constructions and possessive constructions make it harder to be as confident about the conclusions. Still, the general idea is well illustrated. The level of detail does at times make it hard for the reader to discern the overall pattern, but the wealth of data is a major asset of the book. More maps earlier in the book, illustrating the spread of major patterns across the varieties, would have been helpful here.

In order to ensure that this book would be as widely available as possible, the author did not publish it with a regular academic publisher, but made it downloadable for free from his webpage in 2010. It is now published, slightly revised, with the Open Access publisher Language Science Press. Given the uniqueness of this publishing initiative, it seems worth saying a few words about it. The publisher outlines the many advantages of their approach on their webpage (http://langsci-press.org/motivation), but also points out that there are challenges associated with this method of publishing when it comes to technical quality control. There are a number of typos and formatting inconsistencies in the book, but they are innocuous and there are certainly commercially published books with a similar number. More serious are erroneous internal page and example references and the fact that a figure mentioned on page 101 is absent in this version, though it was there in the 2010 version. However, even if this would have been picked up by a commercial publisher, maybe the occurrence of such errors is a small price to pay for the benefits that a publisher like Language Science Press offers.