The science of complexity deals with systems that display an overall behavior that is not easily predictable from the individual description of system parts (the behavior of cars in traffic, for example, is complex, while the workings of a single car is merely complicated). This work is dedicated to an exploration of complexity within the realms of phonetics and phonology. The editors (three of whom are associated with the Laboratoir Dynamique Du Langage, U. de Lyon and Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, France; and a fourth associated with Darmouth College, US) have organized the volume's 14 contributions into four sections dealing with the nature of relevant primitives in sound systems in light of complexity at the phonetics/phonology interface; typological approaches to measuring complexity in phonology; the nature and organization of human phonological representations in the light of complexity; and the contribution of models of complexity to understanding the balance between universal and language-specific constraints in phonological acquisition. Annotation ©2010 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)