The Linguistic Bibliography for the years 2005‐2008 is the successor to the impressive 2004 volume (RR 2009/309) and continues to be published by the prestigious Permanent International Committee of Linguists (CIPL) under the auspices of the International Council for Philosophy and Humanistic Studies. This volume does however differ from its predecessors which contained the linguistic publications of a single year as the editors explain in the preface: “from now on the year of the title page and the back will represent the year in which the indexed literature was collected, independently of the actual date of publication of the individual works”. A result of this four‐year accumulation is the greater currency of the entries in what is already an indispensable reference resource for linguists.
The format of the 2005‐2008 volume remains the same though additional entries on non Indo‐European languages and lesser known Indo‐European languages have been given greater emphasis as part of a revised editorial policy. The continued use of the editors' English translations of many of the titles in hundreds of languages assist readers with better understanding the content of the book or article. Additional funding and staffing have allowed the editors to also keep the print publication more up to date. Another of their aims is to reduce the backlog of more general publications in the next two volumes.
Although a few contributors have changed since the 2004 volume, the range and depth of the Linguistic Bibliography have been maintained as seen in the extensive Index of Languages (pp. 1253‐87) from Abipón to Zuni. The other two indexes Subjects (pp. 1288‐354) and Names (pp. 1121‐252) contribute to the volume's usefulness to academic staff and researchers in this field and academic librarians. However a word of warning! The Names Index should not be used, as it is the wrong index for this publication. A separate enlarged Index of Names (pp. 1‐177), together with an apology from Brill, accompanies the main volume. A positive benefit of this error is that when locating an entry in the Names Index, the supplement can be left open at the correct place rather than having to flick back and forth within the main volume or noting down the entry numbers.
Librarians and researchers alike should use either the print or the online version depending on the size of their budgets and space on their shelves. Details of the online version of the Linguistic Bibliography can be found on the Brill website at lb.brillonline.nl. Unlike the 2005‐2008 volume the coverage of the online Linguistic Bibliography is from 1993 to the present and is updated monthly.
