Sociomeeting: Bartoli’s areal norms revisited: an agent-based modeling approach

For this research, computational agent-based modeling and simulation is used to  evaluate the linguist Matteo Bartoli’s areal norms regarding the relationship between  language change and spatial features. To achieve this, a simple modeling  algorithm was developed to allow the transmission of innovative linguistic elements  within a network based on European geographical data. The results obtained show  differences between propagation patterns of items originating from and reaching  more connected, more isolated and more peripheral regions. These outcomes  support Bartoli’s theory, including regarding West Iberian languages (such as  Portuguese and Galician) and their sometimes archaizing tendencies.

Paper: Buzato, Dalmo, and Evandro Cunha. "Bartoli’s areal norms revisited: an agent-based modeling approach." Proceedings of the 16th International Conference on Computational Processing of Portuguese. 2024.