Most cited papers in Linguistics and language evolution
What are the most cited papers in Linguistics and language evolution?
The most cited paper in Linguistics and language evolution is "Impersonal Passives and the Unaccusative Hypothesis" (David M. Perlmutter, 1978), with 1,806 citations. Next come "The Phonology of English as an International Language" (1,797) and "Language-tree divergence times support the Anatolian theory of Indo-European origin" (1,116).
Showing 50 of 100 papers. Every paper with more than 175 citations is listed.
| # | Paper | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Impersonal Passives and the Unaccusative Hypothesis David M. Perlmutter · Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society | 25 Sep 1978 | 1,806 |
| 2 | The Phonology of English as an International Language Judy B. Gilbert, John M. Levis, Jennifer A. Jenkins · TESOL Quarterly | 2001 | 1,797 |
| 3 | Language-tree divergence times support the Anatolian theory of Indo-European origin Russell David Gray, Quentin Douglas Atkinson · Nature | Nov 2003 | 1,116 |
| 4 | Etymological Dictionary of Greek Stuart James · Reference Reviews | 26 Oct 2010 | 1,098 |
| 5 | Farmers and Their Languages: The First Expansions Jared M. Diamond, Peter S. Bellwood · Science | 25 Apr 2003 | 1,081 |
| 6 | Mapping the Origins and Expansion of the Indo-European Language Family Remco Bouckaert, Philippe Lemey, Michael J Dunn et al. · Science | 23 Aug 2012 | 819 |
| 7 | Case and grammatical functions: The Icelandic passive Annie Zaenen, Joan Maling, Höskuldur Þráinsson · Natural Language & Linguistic Theory | Nov 1985 | 721 |
| 8 | Deglaciation of Fennoscandia Arjen Peter Stroeven, Clas Hättestrand, Johan Klemån et al. · Quaternary Science Reviews | 24 Oct 2015 | 682 |
| 9 | The Blackwell Companion to Phonology Martin Guha · Reference Reviews | 13 Jan 2012 | 680 |
| 10 | How to do things with junk: exaptation in language evolution Roger Lass · Journal of Linguistics | Mar 1990 | 677 |
| 11 | The Noun Phrase Anna Szabolcsi | 26 Dec 1994 | 599 |
| 12 | On multiple questions and multiple WH fronting Catherine Rudin · Natural Language & Linguistic Theory | Nov 1988 | 593 |
| 13 | Frequency of word-use predicts rates of lexical evolution throughout Indo-European history Mark D. Pagel, Quentin Douglas Atkinson, Andrew J. Meade · Nature | Oct 2007 | 587 |
| 14 | The Founder Principle in Creole Genesis Salikoko S. Mufwene · Diachronica | 1996 | 572 |
| 15 | Etymological Dictionary of Proto-Germanic Guus Kroonen | 2012 | 570 |
| 16 | GREEKS AND THEIR PAST IN THE SECOND SOPHISTIC E. L. Bowie · Past & Present | 1970 | 522 |
| 17 | PHONOLOGY AND MORPHOLOGY RICHARD M. HOGG · Cambridge University Press eBooks | 31 Jul 1992 | 505 |
| 18 | Language Change: Progress or Decay? Jean Aitchison · Language | 1994 | 487 |
| 19 | Lexicon Iconographicum Mythologiae Classicae Haïganuch Sarian · Revista do Museu de Arqueologia e Etnologia | 24 Nov 2016 | 465 |
| 20 | Indo‐European and Computational Cladistics Don Ringe, Tandy J. Warnow, Ann Taylor · Transactions of the Philological Society | Mar 2002 | 455 |
| 21 | the domain of emotion words on Ifaluk Catherine A. Lutz · American Ethnologist | Feb 1982 | 414 |
| 22 | Features, Syntax, and Categories in the Latin Perfect David Embick · Linguistic Inquiry | Apr 2000 | 390 |
| 23 | Tense and aspect Richard M. Weist · Cambridge University Press eBooks | 22 May 1986 | 387 |
| 24 | Predication and Equation David Adger, Gillian Catriona Ramchand · Linguistic Inquiry | Jul 2003 | 383 |
| 25 | Language in the Americas Joseph H. Greenberg · Lingua | Jul 1989 | 378 |
| 26 | The Indo-Aryan Languages Colin P. Masica | 26 Apr 1991 | 368 |
| 27 | From Old French to the theory of pro-drop Marianne Adams · Natural Language & Linguistic Theory | Feb 1987 | 348 |
| 28 | Is a Structural Dialectology Possible? Uriel Wèinreich · WORD | Aug 1954 | 328 |
| 29 | Clause structure and V-movement in the languages of the Balkans Marı́a Luisa Rivero · Natural Language & Linguistic Theory | Feb 1994 | 316 |
| 30 | Ancestry-constrained phylogenetic analysis supports the indo-european steppe hypothesis Will Chang, Chundra Cathcart, David W. Hall et al. · Language | Mar 2015 | 315 |
| 31 | Atlas of Pidgin and Creole Language Structures Online Susanne Maria Michaelis, Philippe Maurer, Martín Haspelmath et al. · Zurich Open Repository and Archive (University of Zurich) | 14 Jul 2026 | 314 |
| 32 | From Ausonius' Schooldays? A Schoolbook and its Relatives A. C. Dionisotti · The Journal of Roman Studies | Nov 1982 | 311 |
| 33 | Domestication of Pulses in the Old World Daniel Zohary, María Hopf · Science | 30 Nov 1973 | 311 |
| 34 | On the place of phrase accents in intonational phonology Martine Grice, D. Robert Ladd, Amalia Arvaniti · Phonology | Aug 2000 | 301 |
| 35 | Indo-European Linguistics: An Introduction James Clackson | 26 Nov 2007 | 297 |
| 36 | International encyclopedia of linguistics Tony Bex · Language and Literature International Journal of Stylistics | May 1992 | 291 |
| 37 | The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the World's Ancient Languages Stuart James · Reference Reviews | Oct 2004 | 290 |
| 38 | PROCEEDINGS OF THE 1ST EUROPEAN WORKSHOP ON PERIODONTOLOGY Roy C. Page · The Journal of the American Dental Association | Apr 1995 | 289 |
| 39 | Extraction and reconstruction Diana Cresti · Natural Language Semantics | Feb 1995 | 287 |
| 40 | The hermeneutic style in tenth-century Anglo-Latin literature Michael Lapidge · Anglo-Saxon England | Dec 1975 | 287 |
| 41 | Lexical word-formation Laurie Bauer, Rodney Huddleston · Cambridge University Press eBooks | 15 Apr 2002 | 271 |
| 42 | The Syntactic Forms of Predication Susan Rothstein · Studies in linguistics and philosophy | 2004 | 270 |
| 43 | New reflections on grammaticalization and lexicalization Christian O. Lehmann · Typological studies in language | 12 Apr 2002 | 266 |
| 44 | Vp-Internal structure and object shift in icelandic Chris Collins, Höskuldur Þráinsson · Linguistic Inquiry | Jun 1996 | 264 |
| 45 | Past Tense and the Hypothetical a Cross-Linguistic Study Deborah James · Studies in Language | 1982 | 263 |
| 46 | Introducing linguistic morphology Laurie 1949- Bauer · Lingua | Aug 1990 | 263 |
| 47 | A Grammar of Gestural Coordination Adamantios I. Gafos · Natural Language & Linguistic Theory | May 2002 | 260 |
| 48 | Some applications of Middle English dialectology Michael L. Samuels · English Studies | 1963 | 259 |
| 49 | Linguistic Anthropology: How is the study of language part of anthropology? A review of language and linguistics in introductory textbooks - Victor Barnouw, An introduction to anthropology: Ethnology. Homewood, Ill.: The Dorsey Press, 1978. - Carol R. Ember and Melvin Ember, Anthropology. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts. 1973. - Marvin Harris, Culture, people and nature. New York: Thomas Y. Crow Susan S. Bean · Language in Society | Apr 1979 | 258 |
| 50 | Language and Identity: An introduction John Edwards | 5 Jun 2012 | 258 |
Citations are OpenAlex's own counts, from its 2026-09-23 snapshot, so the ranking can differ from Google Scholar or Web of Science. A paper is listed for a field when OpenAlex files it under one of the field's topics; retracted papers and papers whose citation count cannot be traced to citing works are left out, and a preprint and the article it became are shown once. Release dates are OpenAlex's: where a source gave only a month or a year, that is what is shown. How the lists are chosen.