Language Problems & Language Planning 34:3 (2010), 273–275. doi 10.1075/lplp.34.3.07nue issn 0272–2690 / e-issn 1569–9889 © John Benjamins Publishing Company Carol A. Klee and Andrew Lynch. El español en contacto con otras lenguas. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press. 2009. xiv + 331pp. Reviewed by Frank Nuessel Te two authors of this volume possess impeccable academic credentials. Carol Klee is Professor of Spanish at the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities where she is also Assistant Vice President for International Scholarship. Andrew Lynch is As- sistant Professor of Spanish and Director of the Heritage Language Program at the University of Miami (Florida). Te book’s reference section contains a partial list of research on languages in contact carried out by the two authors (Klee 294–295, Lynch 298–299). Te title of the volume is reminiscent of Uriel Weinreich’s (1953) classic vol- ume Languages in Contact. In their preface (xiii), Klee and Lynch state that the purpose of the volume, a part of the Georgetown Studies in Spanish Linguistics series under the general editorship of John M. Lipski (Pennsylvania State Uni- versity), is to synthesize the hundreds of theoretical treatises on various sociolin- guistic topics related to the general theme of Spanish and other languages. Its goal is to provide a reference and a guide for future research. Tus, it is not intended to break new theoretical ground, but rather to provide experienced scholars and advanced graduate students with a basic research tool. Te seven chapters include an introduction in which the authors point out that previous research on languages in contact implied local, national, and region- al bilingualism; while languages in contact and bilingualism may be concomitant and synonymous, they are, in fact, diferent. Language contact research has tended to address linguistic variation and change in reference to linguistic, social, politi- cal, economic, historical, and cultural factors, whereas bilingual research has ad- dressed cognitive, psycholinguistic, and neurolinguistic factors (1). Te frst chapter provides an excellent overview of the historical factors that led to the development of Spanish on the Iberian peninsula and its subsequent spread world-wide through colonialism, especially during the sixteenth and sev- enteenth centuries. Basic information on languages in contact (theoretical con- siderations, interference, transference, simplifcation, types of contact situation, typological distance, markedness) is presented. Te authors discuss the ongoing polemic about what is more important to a theory of linguistic change in language contact situations — linguistic or social factors (22–24).