Download or read book Definiteness a Linguistic Study Volume 1 written by Sylvester Carey and published by . This book was released on 2022-09-27 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Definiteness is a semantic feature of noun phrases that distinguishes between entities that are specific and identifiable in a given context, and those which are not. The typical noun phrase picks out a unique, familiar, specific referent. The expression of definiteness varies considerably across languages. Definiteness is usually marked in the English language by the selection of determiners, such as articles. Certain determiners like 'a', 'an', 'many', and 'some', along with numbers mark indefinite noun phrases, while others like 'the', 'that', etc., mark definite noun phrases. Definiteness is also marked morphologically in a few languages. Some languages like Japanese do not express definiteness at all. This book is a compilation of chapters that discuss the most vital concepts and emerging trends in the study of definiteness. Different approaches, evaluations, methodologies and advanced studies on this topic have been included herein. A number of latest researches have been included to keep the readers up-to-date with the global concepts in this area of linguistics.

Download or read book Definiteness a Linguistic Study Volume 2 written by Sylvester Carey and published by . This book was released on 2022-09-13 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Definiteness is a semantic feature of noun phrases that distinguishes between entities that are specific and identifiable in a given context, and others which are not. The typical noun phrase picks out a unique, familiar, specific referent. The expression of definiteness varies considerably across languages. Definiteness is usually marked in the English language by the selection of determiners, such as articles. Certain determiners like 'a', 'an', 'many', and 'some', along with numbers mark indefinite noun phrases, while others like 'the', 'that', etc., mark definite noun phrases. Definiteness is also marked morphologically in a few languages. Some languages like Japanese do not express definiteness at all. This book is a compilation of chapters that discuss the most vital concepts and emerging trends in the study of definiteness. Different approaches, evaluations, methodologies and advanced studies on this topic have been included herein. A number of latest researches have been included to keep the readers up-to-date with the global concepts in this area of linguistics.

Download or read book Definiteness across languages written by Ana Aguilar-Guevara and published by Language Science Press. This book was released on 2019 with total page 502 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Definiteness has been a central topic in theoretical semantics since its modern foundation. However, despite its significance, there has been surprisingly scarce research on its cross-linguistic expression. With the purpose of contributing to filling this gap, the present volume gathers thirteen studies exploiting insights from formal semantics and syntax, typological and language specific studies, and, crucially, semantic fieldwork and cross-linguistic semantics, in order to address the expression and interpretation of definiteness in a diverse group of languages, most of them understudied. The papers presented in this volume aim to establish a dialogue between theory and data in order to answer the following questions: What formal strategies do natural languages employ to encode definiteness? What are the possible meanings associated to this notion across languages? Are there different types of definite reference? Which other functions (besides marking definite reference) are associated with definite descriptions? Each of the papers contained in this volume addresses at least one of these questions and, in doing so, they aim to enrich our understanding of definiteness.

Download or read book On Definiteness written by Andrew Chesterman and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1991-01-10 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book proposes a new theory of definiteness in language. It argues that definiteness should be viewed as a cover-term comprising three basic oppositions within the areas of familiarity (locatability), quantity (inclusiveness) and generality (extensivity). Further, the oppositions are not discrete but scalar, and lend themselves to characterization in terms of fuzzy set theory. Dr. Chesterman examines these themes, firstly by drawing on several traditions of research on the rich system of articles in English, and then by looking at how the concept of definiteness is realized in Finnish, a language that has no articles and typically leaves definiteness to be inferred by a variety of means. On Definiteness provides a thorough and sensitive discussion of an intricate semantic problem. It highlights two important theoretical points: the fuzziness of the linguistic concept of definiteness, and the differences among languages in the ways in which they draw the line between syntax, semantics and pragmatics.

Download or read book Definiteness in a Language Without Articles a Study on Polish written by Adrian Czardybon and published by Düsseldorf University Press. This book was released on 2017-06-13 with total page 268 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The aim of this book is to investigate how definiteness is expressed in Polish, a language which is claimed to have no definite and in-definite articles. The central question is how the difference in definiteness is indicated between 'a woman' and 'the woman' in Polish. In English, the definite article 'the' and the indefinite article 'a' express the category of definiteness explicitly. Since definiteness is also relevant in articleless languages, there are other means to indicate that a nominal phrase is definite or indefinite.0This study is delimited to four means for expressing definiteness in Polish, which are demonstratives, aspect, case alternation, and information structure. Each strategy is investigated independently from the others, although they interact in a complex way, which is shown at the end of this book resulting in a decision tree. Polish is not investigated in isolation, however, the study is complemented by comparisons with other Slavic languages and also with a Polish dialect called 'Upper Silesian', which differs from Polish.0The analysis in this book is based on Löbner?s theory of 'Concept Types and Determination' (CTD). Löbner?s distinction of the four concept types (sortal, relational, functional, individual) is crucial since definiteness phenomena under discussion can be explained. Therefore, the interaction of the four concept types with the four definiteness strategies plays a central role in this book.

Download or read book The Representation of in definiteness written by Eric J. Reuland and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 1987 with total page 374 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Representation of(In)definiteness collects the most important current research, reflecting a wide range of approaches, on a central theoretical issue in linguistics: characterizing the distinction between definite and indefinite expressions. The authors of these 11 original essays, which draw on current work in theoretical syntax and semantics, were charged by the editors to take more than usual heed of alternative analyses offered by other theories, thereby promoting cross fertilization of syntactic and semantic ideas, concepts, and argumentation. The project as a whole is grounded in the belief that explicit comparison of seemingly incompatible approaches is essential to improve our understanding of the nature and structure of natural language. Eric J. Reuland and Alice ter Meulen are Professors of Linguistics at the Rijksuniversiteit Groningen and the University of Washington respectively. The Representation of (In)definiteness is fourteenth in the series Current Studies in Linguistics, edited by Samuel Jay Keyser.

Download or read book Definiteness and Indefiniteness written by John Hawkins and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2015-07-03 with total page 317 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: First published in 1988, this book is concerned with the definite and indefinite articles in English. It provides an integrated pragmatic-semantic theory of definite and indefinite reference, on the basis of which, many co-occurance restrictions between articles and non-modifiers are explained. At the general theoretical level, this book looks at the role of semantics in the prediction of all and only the grammatical sentences of a language. A generalisation is proposed uniting semantic oppositions underlying ungrammaticality with syntactic oppositions between conditions of application on transformational generative rules. A procedure is suggested for distinguishing semantic from syntactic causes of ungrammaticality. At a more particular level, the book explores the nature of reference. It examines an important selection of subjects such as the contrast between definiteness and indefiniteness, the relationship between definite and demonstrative reference, and the relationship between pragmatic and logical aspects of determining meaning.

Download or read book Quantification Definiteness and Nominalization written by Anastasia Giannakidou and published by OUP Oxford. This book was released on 2009-01-29 with total page 432 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book addresses recent developments in the study of quantifier phrases, nominalizations, and the linking definite determiner. It reflects the intense reconsideration of the nature of quantification, and of fundamental aspects of the syntax and semantics of quantifier phrases. Leading international scholars explore novel and challenging ideas at the interfaces between syntax and morphology, syntax and semantics, morphology and the lexicon. They examine core issues in the field, such as kind reference, number marking, partitivity, context dependence and the way presuppositions are built into the meanings of quantifiers. They also consider how in this context definiteness and the definite determiner D play a central role, and the way in which D is also instrumental in nominalizations. With nominalization, the lexical semantic contribution of verbs and their arguments becomes central, and within the perspective of this book the question is asked whether syntactic nominalizations share with noun phrases the same external layer, namely the functional projection DP. If so, what exactly is the contribution of D in this case, and how much of the lexical correspondence between nouns and verbs is preserved? This book presents the latest thinking on cross-paradigm and cross-linguistic approaches in three of the most vibrant and productive research areas in linguistics. It paves the way towards a more comprehensive understanding of how quantification, definiteness, and nominalizations are encoded in the grammar.

Download or read book Definiteness written by Christopher Lyons and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1999-03-13 with total page 408 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This 1999 textbook investigates definiteness both from a comparative and a theoretical point of view, showing how languages express definiteness and what definiteness is. It surveys a large number of languages to discover the range of variation in relation to definiteness and related grammatical phenomena, such as demonstratives, possessives and personal pronouns. It outlines work done on the nature of definiteness in semantics, pragmatics and syntax, and develops an account on which definiteness is a grammatical category represented in syntax as a functional head (the widely discussed D). Consideration is also given to the origins and evolution of definite articles in the light of the comparative and theoretical findings. Among the claims advanced are that definiteness does not occur in all languages, though the pragmatic concept which it grammaticalizes probably does.

Download or read book Historical Linguistics 1991 written by Jaap van Marle and published by John Benjamins Publishing. This book was released on 1993-08-06 with total page 415 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume contains 22 of the 95 papers presented during ICHL 10. The articles included here clearly reflect the on-going interest in the general mechanisms of language change, the close relationship between present-day historical linguistics and linguistic theory, and the renewed interest in language contact. The papers deal with more general issues as well as with specific problems in diverse languages and language groups. The volume contains three indexes: of names, of languages, and of subjects.

Download or read book Syntax Theory and Analysis Volume 1 written by Tibor Kiss and published by Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG. This book was released on 2015-02-17 with total page 894 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This Handbook represents the development of research and the current level of knowledge in the fields of syntactic theory and syntax analysis. Syntax can look back to a long tradition. Especially in the last 50 years, however, the interaction between syntactic theory and syntactic analysis has led to a rapid increase in analyses and theoretical suggestions. This second edition of the Handbook on Syntax adopts a unifying perspective and therefore does not place the division of syntactic theory into several schools to the fore, but the increase in knowledge resulting from the fruitful argumentations between syntactic analysis and syntactic theory. It uses selected phenomena of individual languages and their cross-linguistic realizations to explain what syntactic analyses can do and at the same time to show in what respects syntactic theories differ from each other. It investigates how syntax is related to neighbouring disciplines and investigate the role of the interfaces especially the relationship between syntax and phonology, morphology, compositional semantics, pragmatics, and the lexicon. The phenomena chosen bring together renowned experts in syntax, and represent the consensus reached as to what has to be considered as an important as well as illustrative syntactic phenomenon. The phenomena discuss do not only serve to show syntactic analyses, but also to compare theoretical approaches with each other.

Download or read book Definiteness Across Languages written by Violeta Vázquez-Rojas Maldonado and published by Saint Philip Street Press. This book was released on 2020-10-09 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Definiteness has been a central topic in theoretical semantics since its modern foundation. However, despite its significance, there has been surprisingly scarce research on its cross-linguistic expression. With the purpose of contributing to filling this gap, the present volume gathers thirteen studies exploiting insights from formal semantics and syntax, typological and language specific studies, and, crucially, semantic fieldwork and cross-linguistic semantics, in order to address the expression and interpretation of definiteness in a diverse group of languages, most of them understudied. This work was published by Saint Philip Street Press pursuant to a Creative Commons license permitting commercial use. All rights not granted by the work's license are retained by the author or authors.

Download or read book The Article and the Concept of Definiteness in Language written by Jiří Krámský and published by Janua Linguarum. Series Minor. This book was released on 1972 with total page 220 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: No detailed description available for "The Article and the Concept of Definiteness in Language".

Download or read book The Concept of Definiteness and Its Application to Automated Reference Resolution written by Zaur Kambarov and published by Peter Lang. This book was released on 2008 with total page 170 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is a study of the category of definiteness in the light of research on mental spaces and frames. The author formulates a set of eight uniform rules for the use of the definite, indefinite, and zero articles in English and German. The Concept of Definiteness presents an algorithm for nominal reference resolution that uses the definiteness value of each noun phrase to guide the search for its referent. The book discusses the results of the application of an automated system based on the proposed algorithm to texts in modern English. It also demonstrates applicability of the selected approach to text fragments representing all major historical variants of the German language.

Download or read book Language Typology and Syntactic Description Volume 1 Clause Structure written by Timothy Shopen and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1985-07-25 with total page 416 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The three volumes of Language Typology and Syntactic Description offer a unique survey of syntactic and morphological structure in the languages of the world. Topics covered include parts of speech; passives; complementation; relative clauses; adverbial clauses; inflectional morphology; tense, aspect and mood; and deixis. The major ways these notions are realized in the languages of the world are explored, and the contributors provide brief sketches of relevant aspects of representative languages. Each volume is written in an accessible style with new concepts explained and exemplified as they are introduced. Although each volume can be read independently, together they provide a major work of reference that will serve as a manual for field workers and anyone interested in cross-linguistic generalizations.

Download or read book Essays on Typology of Iranian Languages written by Alireza Korangy and published by Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG. This book was released on 2019-10-21 with total page 190 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Iranian languages are one of the world's major language families. With an estimated 150 to 200 million native speakers, these languages constitute the western group of the larger Indo-Iranian family, which represents a major eastern branch of the Indo-European languages. Geographically, the Iranian Languages are spoken from Central Turkey, Syria and Iraq in the West to Pakistan and western edged of Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region of China in the east. Iranian languages have long been among the major interests of the philologists and general linguists, and European scholars have made tremendous contributions to the study of this language family. In light of such efforts, now we know that the Iranian languages can be historically divided into three phases, that are old, middle and new Iranian languages, and the new Iranian languages may be generally grouped as Eastern and Western. In recent years, the orientation towards typology has led to the appearance of somewhat more ponderance on the subject but the work has not included description of some of the very important languages of the Caspian, and or of the religious minorities (such as those of the Zoroastrians or the Jewish community), of the four-fold Central Plateau dial.

Download or read book Second Language Acquisition of Articles written by MAR?A DEL PILAR GARC?A MAYO and published by John Benjamins Publishing. This book was released on 2009 with total page 285 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Introduction : the interest of article acquisition for theories of SLA / María del Pilar García Mayo and Roger Hawkins -- Article choice in L2 English by Spanish speakers : evidence for full transfer / María del Pilar García Mayo -- Accounting for non-target like performance in L2 English article production by native speakers of Syrian Arabic and French / Ghisseh Sarko -- Questioning the validity of the article choice parameter and the fluctuation hypothesis : evidence from L2 English article use by L1 Polish and L1 Mandarin Chinese speakers / Marta Tryzna -- The processing role of the article choice parameter : evidence from L2 learners of English / Lucy Kyoungsook Kim and Usha Lakshmanan -- Accounting for patterns of article omissions and substitutions in second language production / Danijela Trenkic -- Article use and generic reference : parallels between L1- and L2-acquisition / Tania Ionin and Silvina Montrul -- Variability in the L2 acquisition of Norwegian DPs : an evaluation of some current SLA models / Fufen Jin, Tor A. Åfarli, and Wim A. van Dommelen -- Articles in Turkish/English interlanguage revisited : implications of vowel harmony / Heather Goad and Lydia White -- Article choice and article omission in the L3 German of native speakers of Japanese with L2 English / Carol Jaensch