Download or read book Existentials and Locatives in Romance Dialects of Italy written by Delia Bentley and published by . This book was released on 2015 with total page 331 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 International licence. It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations. This book provides the first ever large-scale comparative treatment of there sentences (there copula NP), in over 100 Italo-Romance and Sardinian dialects spoken in Italy. It comprises detailed discussions of focus structure, predication and argument realization, definiteness effects, and the linking between semantics and syntax in there sentences, advancing novel proposals in each case. The authors test influential hypotheses on existential constructions against first-hand dialect evidence; they argue that existential and locative there sentences differ in focus structure and semantics, even though they display similar morphosyntactic features. The volume also provides the historical background of Romance there sentences, relying on the findings of the analysis of a substantial corpus of early Italo-Romance vernacular texts. Couched in the framework of Role and Reference Grammar, the discussion fully engages with the vast available literature on existentials and locatives, thus being of interest to linguists of any theoretical persuasion. Through the investigation of existentials and locatives, the volume addresses key issues in linguistic theory, while offering an invaluable source of data for research on the Romance languages and a model in fieldwork-based microvariational analysis.
Download or read book Expletives in Existentials written by Jutta Hartmann and published by . This book was released on 2008 with total page 313 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "This thesis refutes the generally accepted claim within Generative Grammar that English there is an expletive (meaningless element) that is only present to satisfy a syntactic requirement. Instead it is argued that there is a proform that picks up a situation (or location) from the context. There is a part of the predication structure in existential sentences, which state about the situation that it contains an individual (or amount of a property) specified by the postverbal noun phrase. New data that are relevant for the definiteness effect are presented and it is demonstrated that we need to distinguish between two types of there-sentences: the results of a Magnitude Estimation Experiment for example show that these so-called there-BE and there-V sentences behave differently with respect to wh-movement (among other differences). Therefore, the two construction types are analysed differently: in there-BE sentences, there is proposed to function as the subject of predication, whereas it functions as the predicate in there-V sentences (just like in the locative inversion construction). The thesis concludes with applying the result of the investigation of English there to German da, and shows that also da is a proform that can pick up locations, times and complex situations in the context. The study offers new insights into the analysis of existential sentences and has implications for the analysis of potential subject positions, the EPP, and the classification of expletives in the Germanic languages. It is therefore interesting for scholars working in these fields and syntax in general."--P. [4] of cover.
Download or read book A Typological Study of the Existential Clause written by Wang Yong and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2024-06-21 with total page 209 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book investigates the existential clause (EC) from a cross-linguistic perspective and within the framework of Systemic Functional Linguistics. The prototypical EC in the less familiar languages is identified through its functional equivalents in the more familiar ones, which share the common semantic basis of ‘there exists something in some location’. Topics addressed include the morpho-syntactic features of the EC, the subject of the EC, the definiteness effect and its manifestations in the EC, the EC as impersonals, the distinction between entity- vs. event-existentials, and the EC and its related constructions. Drawing on both cross-linguistic observations based on the language sample and in-depth investigations in particular languages (e.g., in Chinese and English), the study aims to unravel how the lexico-grammar of EC is related to its meanings and functions, that is, how meaning is realised in form. The title will appeal to scholars and students in the field of linguistics, especially functional linguistics, and syntax.
Download or read book The Syntax of the Be possessive written by Hakyung Jung and published by John Benjamins Publishing. This book was released on 2011 with total page 284 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is the first attempt to provide a unified account of the "be-"possessive syntax and its extension to the modal and the perfect constructions in Russian/North Russian within a generative framework. Apparently diverse constructions are construed as deriving from the "have/be" parameter, which depends on the utilization of the prepositional complementizer with a Case feature. The "be"-perfect structure provides an adequate environment where ergativity is encoded via verbal nominalization. The relevance of the "be"-perfect structure for a split ergative pattern shows that the ergative system is a syntactically conditioned phenomenon rather than a purely morphological diversity. This volume also offers the diachronic study of the "be"-syntax, investigating the evolution of the "be"-perfect and "be"-modal constructions, which has rarely been explored within a formal framework. Concrete scenarios are proposed for the developmental paths of the "be"-perfect and the "be"-modal constructions, based on textual evidence in old North Russian.
Download or read book Impersonal Constructions written by Andre? L?vovich Mal?chukov and published by John Benjamins Publishing. This book was released on 2011 with total page 653 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Features the contributions that deal with various types of impersonality, namely constructions featuring nonagentive subjects, including those with experiential predicates, presentational constructions with a notional subject deficient in topicality, and constructions with a notional subject lacking in referential properties.
Download or read book The Syntax of the Be Possessive written by Hakyung Jung and published by John Benjamins Publishing. This book was released on 2011-05-18 with total page 285 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is the first attempt to provide a unified account of the be-possessive syntax and its extension to the modal and the perfect constructions in Russian/North Russian within a generative framework. Apparently diverse constructions are construed as deriving from the have/be parameter, which depends on the utilization of the prepositional complementizer with a Case feature. The be-perfect structure provides an adequate environment where ergativity is encoded via verbal nominalization. The relevance of the be-perfect structure for a split ergative pattern shows that the ergative system is a syntactically conditioned phenomenon rather than a purely morphological diversity. This volume also offers the diachronic study of the be-syntax, investigating the evolution of the be-perfect and be-modal constructions, which has rarely been explored within a formal framework. Concrete scenarios are proposed for the developmental paths of the be-perfect and the be-modal constructions, based on textual evidence in old North Russian.
Download or read book Language Use and Linguistic Structure Proceedings of the Olomouc Linguistic Colloquium 2023 written by Janebová, Markéta and published by Palacký University Olomouc. This book was released on with total page 239 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The latest volume of OLINCO proceedings is a selected set of sixteen papers that grew from presentations at OLINCO 2023 - the international Olomouc Linguistics Colloquium held at Palacký University in June 2021. The papers collected here are unified by the topic of the colloquium: Language Use and Linguistic Structure, in that they all, in one way or the other, address the central questions of the study of human language. They all use standard scientific methodology and theory and solidly researched empirical evidence in favor of formalized structural representations of the language system.
Download or read book Diachronic Syntax written by Susan Pintzuk and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2000 with total page 396 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This text reflects developing trends in linguistic research, specifically the study of syntax and its pivotal position in current theories of language acquisition.
Download or read book The Limits of Syntactic Variation written by Theresa Biberauer and published by John Benjamins Publishing. This book was released on 2008 with total page 536 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Against the background of the past half century s typological and generative work on comparative syntax, this volume brings together 16 papers considering what we have learned and may still be able to learn about the nature and extent of syntactic variation. More specifically, it offers a multi-perspective critique of the Principles and Parameters approach to syntactic variation, evaluating the merits and shortcomings of the pre-Minimalist phase of this enterprise and considering and illustrating the possibilities opened up by recent empirical and theoretical advances. Contributions focus on four central topics: firstly, the question of the locus of variation, whether the attested variation may plausibly be understood in parametric terms and, if so, what form such parameters might take; secondly, the fate of one of the most prominent early parameters, the Null Subject Parameter; thirdly, the matter of parametric clusters more generally; and finally, acquisition issues.
Download or read book Negative Inversion Social Meaning and Gricean Implicature written by William Salmon and published by Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG. This book was released on 2020-06-08 with total page 232 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Relying on a wealth of new data, this book argues that long-standing puzzles of Negative Inversion (NI) syntax are not puzzles at all when viewed through the lenses of Gricean pragmatics and Labovian sociolinguistics. Focusing on sentences such as "Can't nobody lift that rock" in African American, Anglo, and Chicano Englishes in Texas, the book provides tidy solutions to problems such as: the NI’s relationship to its non-inverted counterpart, its relationship to existential “there” sentences, to modal existential sentences, to the definiteness effects surrounding its NP subject, the emphatic meaning with which it seems to be associated, and more. The book argues that such issues, which have been explored in the syntax and semantics literature since the late 1960s, are handled more fruitfully via Gricean reasoning, demographics of use, and a simple semantics. As such, the book argues that NI can be freed from the “syntactico-semantic straitjacket” into which it has often been forced. It also demonstrates ways in which pragmatic and sociolinguistic thought can be brought together to inform larger linguistic analyses.
Download or read book Parametric Variation written by Theresa Biberauer and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2010 with total page 375 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Parametric variation in linguistic theory refers to the systematic grammatical variation permitted by the human language faculty. This book is a defence of the parametric approach to linguistic variation, set within the framework of the Minimalist Program.
Download or read book Romance Languages and Linguistic Theory 2006 written by Danièle Torck and published by John Benjamins Publishing. This book was released on 2009-11-12 with total page 283 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The annual conference series ‘Going Romance’ has developed into a major European discussion forum where ideas about language and linguistics and about Romance languages in particular are put in an interactive perspective, giving room to both universality and Romance-internal variation. The current volume contains a selection of the papers that were presented at the 20th Going Romance conference, held at the VU University in Amsterdam in December 2006. The papers in the volume deal with current issues in phonology, morphology, syntax, and semantics, and range across a variety of Romance languages.
Download or read book Comparisons and Contrasts written by Richard S. Kayne and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2010-08-19 with total page 289 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Comparisons and Contrasts collects eleven of Richard Kayne's recent articles in theoretical syntax, with an emphasis on comparative syntax, which uses syntactic differences among languages to probe the properties of the human language faculty. Kayne attaches particular importance to uncovering the primitives of syntax/semantics, demonstrating the existence of silent elements that are syntactically and semantically active, and showing their distribution and limitations. He attempts to derive the very existence of the noun-verb distinction-and to account for the sharp differences between nouns and verbs and for the lack of parallelism between them-from the antisymmetric character of syntax. The common theme is an exploration of how wide a range of questions the field of syntax can reasonably attempt to ask and then answer. Comparisons and Contrasts will appeal to scholars and graduate students interested in syntax, semantics, and their effects on other areas of linguistics.
Download or read book Grammaticalization Paths of English and High German Existential Constructions written by Simone E. Pfenninger and published by Peter Lang. This book was released on 2009 with total page 386 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Existential constructions are a fundamental feature of many Indo-European languages, and constructions with non-referential subjects have developed in all of the latter, albeit at different stages in their histories. High German does not feature a prototypical existential construction that is equivalent in syntactic and pragmatic function and semantic meaning to the English existential there-construction. How did a prototypical existential structure originate in English? Why is it that High German has never developed such a construction? Has it ever shown a tendency towards developing one? How did two closely related languages such as English and High German come to differ so much with respect to these constructions? By means of investigating a variety of historical and contemporary data this study shows that not only semantic, pragmatic and syntactic factors are involved, which decide the choice of a certain construction, but also very much the more general different linguistic development that the two languages underwent in the course of time.
Download or read book A Semantics for the English Existential Construction written by Louise McNally and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-11-25 with total page 181 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: First published in 1997, this book addresses the question: What is the interpretation of English there-existential construction? One of the principal goals is to develop an interpretation for the construction that will specifically address other properties of the postcopular DP. After outlining the problem, the author goes on to present a syntactic motivation for the claim that the postcopular DP is the sole complement to the existential predicate, as well as for the claim that the optional final phrase is a predictive adjunct. In chapter 3 the interpretation for the basic existential construction is developed and then compared to analyses that take the postcopular DP to denote an ordinary individual or a generalised quantifier of individuals. This analysis is then augmented to account for the contribution of the final XP and shows how the predicate restriction can be derived from a more general condition on depictive/circumstantial VP-adjuncts. The final chapter contain some speculative discussion of the broader implications of the proposal in the context of data such as "list" existential and "presentational-there" sentences.
Download or read book Elementary Predicates and Related Categories written by Ludovico Franco and published by John Benjamins Publishing Company. This book was released on 2024-07-15 with total page 229 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book offers a fresh perspective on how natural languages encode grammatical relations, by delving into the interplay between oblique cases, adpositions, serial verbs, and applicatives. This book reveals, through a series of case studies, the pervasive role of the 'inclusion' relator across diverse linguistic contexts. Departing from traditional views that obliques lack interpretive content, this work presents a unified conceptual framework of relations in grammar. Drawing on minimalist principles, the book posits a preeminence of the lexicon in syntactic projection, shedding light on the underlying ontology of language. By exploring cross-categorial variation and syncretism, it outlines an inventory of primitives shaping morpho-syntactic derivations.
Download or read book The Role of Data at the Semantics pragmatics Interface written by Enikő Németh T. and published by Walter de Gruyter. This book was released on 2010 with total page 437 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Mouton Series in Pragmatics (MSP) is a timely response to the growing demand for innovative and authoritative monographs and edited volumes from all angles of pragmatics. Recent theoretical work on the semantics/pragmatics interface, applications of evolutionary biology to the study of language, and empirical work within cognitive and developmental psychology and intercultural communication has directed attention to issues that warrant reexamination, as well as revision of some of the central tenets and claims of the field of pragmatics. The series welcomes proposals that reflect this endeavour and exploration within the discipline and neighboring fields such as language philosophy, communication, information science, sociolinguistics, second language acquisition and cognitive science. MSP will provide a forum for authors who represent different subfields of pragmatics including the linguistic, cognitive, social, and intercultural paradigms, and have important and intriguing ideas and research findings to share with scholars who are interested in linguistics in general and pragmatics in particular.
