Download or read book The Formal Grammar of Switch Reference RLE Linguistics B Grammar written by Daniel L Finer and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2014-02-03 with total page 231 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book studies the syntax of switch-reference and its implications for the theory of grammar. Switch-reference, found in many genetically and geographically diverse languages, is a phenomenon whereby referential identity between subjects of hierarchically adjacent clauses is encoded by the presence of a morpheme, usually suffixed to the verb of the subordinate clause. This book argues that switch-reference should be analysed as a syntactic rather than a purely pragmatic or functional feature of language.

Download or read book The Formal Grammar of Switch reference written by Daniel Leroy Finer and published by . This book was released on 1996 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Switch Reference 2 0 written by Rik van Gijn and published by John Benjamins Publishing Company. This book was released on 2016-10-25 with total page 503 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Switch reference is a grammatical process that marks a referential relationship between arguments of two (or more) verbs. Typically it has been characterized as an inflection pattern on the verb itself, encoding identity or non-identity between subject arguments separately from traditional person or number marking. In the 50 years since William Jacobsen’s coinage of the term, switch reference has evolved from an exotic phenomenon found in a handful of lesser-known languages to a widespread feature found in geographically and linguistically unconnected parts of the world. The growing body of information on the topic raises new theoretical and empirical questions about the development, functions, and nature of switch reference, as well as the internal variation between different switch-reference systems. The contributions to this volume discuss these and other questions for a wide variety of languages from all over the world, and endevaour to demonstrate the full functional and morphosyntactic range of the phenomenon.

Download or read book The Formal Grammar of Switch reference written by Daniel L. Finer and published by . This book was released on 1985 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Advances in Role and Reference Grammar written by Robert D. Van Valin, Jr. and published by John Benjamins Publishing. This book was released on 1992-01-01 with total page 583 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume presents research on major issues in syntactic theory within Role and Reference Grammar. This theory was first presented in detail in Functional Syntax and Universal Grammar [FSUG], and these papers represent both expansions and applications of the theory to a wide range of phenomena. The first section contains an introduction to the theory which is the most thorough statement of it since FSUG, summarizing the features of Role and Reference Grammar established there and developing new theoretical components and analyses of syntactic phenomena not discussed in the earlier work. Throughout the discussion features of RRG are compared and contrasted with comparable features of other syntactic theories. The remainder of the volume is devoted to detailed analyses of specific problems, e.g. control, case marking, in a wide variety of languages, e.g. Mandarin Chinese, Nootka, Mparntwe Arrernte and Turkish. Thus the works presented here illustrate well the strong cross-linguistic approach to syntactic theory and description in Role and Reference Grammar.

Download or read book The Formal Grammar of Switch reference written by Daniel L. Finer and published by . This book was released on 1984 with total page 214 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Accessing Noun Phrase Antecedents RLE Linguistics B Grammar written by Mira Ariel and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2014-02-03 with total page 277 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Accessing Noun-Phrase Antecedents offers a radical shift in the analysis of discourse anaphora, from a purely pragmatic account to a cognitive account, in terms of processing procedures. Mira Ariel defines referring expressions as markers signalling the degree of Accessibility in memory of the antecedent. The notion of Accessibility is explicitly defined, the crucial factors being the Salience of the antecedent, and the Unity between the antecedent and the anaphor. This analysis yields an astonishing array of new results. The precise distribution of referring expressions in actual discourse is directly predicted. Several universals of anaphoric relations are stated. Thus, although not all languages necessarily have the same markers, and nor do they assign them precisely the same function, Ariel shows that they all obey the same Accessibility marking hierarchy. This book will be compulsory reading for anyone with an interest in the semantics and pragmatics of referring expressions, in the interaction of semantics and pragmatics, and more generally in the interaction between peripheral and central cognitive systems.

Download or read book Basic Word Order RLE Linguistics B Grammar written by Russell S Tomlin and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2014-02-03 with total page 283 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book examines the frequencies of the six possible basic word (or constituent) orders (SOV, SVO, VSO, VOS, OSV, OVS) provides a typologically grounded explanation for those frequencies in terms of three independent, functional principles of linguistic organization. From a database of nearly 1,000 languages and their basic constituent orders, a sample of 400 languages was produced that is statistically representative of both the genetic and areal distributions of the world’s languages. This sample reveals the following relative frequencies (in order from high to low) of basic constituent order types: (1) SOV and SVO, (2) VSO, (3) VOS and OVS, (4) OSV. It is argued that these relative frequencies can be explained to be the result of the possible interactions of three fundamental functional principles of linguistic organization. Principle 1, the thematic information principle, specifies that initial position is the cross-linguistically favoured position for clause-level thematic information. Principle 2, the verb-object bonding principle, describes the cross-linguistic tendency for a transitive verb and its object to form a more tightly integrated unit, syntactically and semantically, than does a transitive verb and its subject. Principle 3, the animated principle, describes the cross-linguistic tendency for semantic arguments which are either more animate or more agentive to occur earlier in the clause. Each principle is motivated independently of the others, drawing on cross-linguistic data from more than 80 genetically and typologically diverse languages. Given these three independently motivated functional principles, it is argued that the relative frequency of basic constituent order types is due to the tendency for the three principles to be maximally realized in the world’s languages. SOV and SVO languages are typologically most frequent because such basic orders reflect all three principles. The remaining orders occur less frequently because they reflect fewer of the principles. The 1,000-language database and the genetic and areal classification frames are published as appendices to the volume.

Download or read book Control and Grammar written by R.K. Larson and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2013-03-09 with total page 351 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The articles in this volume grew from papers presented at the workshop on control held at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, March 1989. The work of the various authors comes at a moment in linguistic theory that is notable for two developments. First, there has been increasing involvement of syntactic theory in semantics and of semantic theory in syntax, with the result that the sorting of facts into syntactic and semantic has become a more complex and theory-laden affair. Second, there has been an enormous growth both in the breadth and depth of studies in languages other than English. Both of these develop ments have left their mark on the authors, directly and indirectly. They have also been responsible for the shifts that have given the key terminology its present range of application. In this introduction we discuss the background to the issues that were particularly prominent both at the workshop and in the authors' final drafts. We also com ment on the spirit of inquiry that they represent. Our goal is to provide some orientation to the specific contents of the essays and to supply material for reflection on a set of problems that will doubtless develop and deepen as rapidly in the foreseeable future as they have in the recent past.

Download or read book Switch reference and Universal Grammar written by John Haiman and published by John Benjamins Publishing. This book was released on 1983-01-01 with total page 359 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Canonical switch-reference is an inflectional category of the verb, which indicates whether or not its subject is identical with the subject of some other verb. Switch-reference may be analyzed from a structural or a functional point of view. Functionally, switch-reference is a device for referential tracking. Formally, switch-reference is almost always a verbal category, similar to the familiar category of verbal concord. In most languages switch-reference marking is indicated by a verbal affix, however in some languages it may be marked by an independent morpheme. The contributions to this volume are concerned with questions of form, function, and genesis of canonical switch-reference systems.

Download or read book Verb Valency Changes written by Albert Álvarez González and published by John Benjamins Publishing Company. This book was released on 2017-09-30 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume surveys a variety of verb valency change phenomena among diverse languages and from diverse theoretical viewpoints. It offers typological studies comparing languages in topics like applicative polysemy, complex predicate formation and locative alternation, but also works describing the different valency-changing operations in specific languages including West Circassian, Huasteca Nahuatl, Tlachichilco Tepehua and Seri, and works dealing with specific valency change constructions, such as tla- constructions in Nahuatl, resultatives in Yaqui, antipassives in Mocoví, and labile verbs in Arabic. This book aims to put this variety of backdrops in perspective and to clarify the notion and mechanisms of verb valency change. Both scholars and expert readers will get in these works a better understanding of the different verb valency changing operations and of the typological aspects involved in this phenomenon, together with a better grasp of how argument realization and verb morphology are connected in some languages.

Download or read book The Formal Theory of Grammar written by John P. Kimball and published by Prentice Hall. This book was released on 1973 with total page 152 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Thematic Relations written by Wendy Wilkins and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2020-01-13 with total page 322 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Thematic Relations provides information pertinent to thematic relations, which focus both on what sematic roles are expressible in the grammar and how these roles come to be associated with noun phrases. This book presents the interaction of components of the language faculty and other aspects of cognition. Organized into 13 chapters, this volume begins with an overview of the semantic relations involved in verb-argument structure. This text then examines the predicate-argument representations, which have come to figure prominently in all current generative theories of syntax. Other chapters consider the generalizations about thematic relations that are most insightfully captured at the level of syntax of at the level of semantics. This book discusses as well the importance of thematic roles to the grammar. The final chapter deals with the central role of thematic roles in language comprehension. This book is a valuable resource for linguists, syntacticians, and semanticists with an active involvement in research on natural language.

Download or read book Introduction to Formal Grammars written by Maurice Gross and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2012-12-06 with total page 238 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The present work originates in a course given by the authors during the last few years in various university departments and institutions, among which we should like to mention: the Centre de Linguistique Quantitative of the Faculte des Sciences de Paris, created at the instance of the late Professor Favard; the Chaire d'Analyse Numerique of the Faculte des Sciences de Paris (Professor Rene de Possel), curriculum of Troisieme Cycle; the Chaire de Physique Mathematique of the University of Toulouse (Professor M. Laudet), for the degree DiplOme d'Etudes Approfondies in the section "Traitement de I'Information" ; the department 1 of linguistics of the University of Pennsylvania (Professor Z.S. Harris); Institut de Programmation of the Faculte des Sciences de Paris for the troisieme niveau. the courses in the Written for purely didactic purposes, this Introduction to Formal Grammars makes no pretense to any scientific originality. Large portions of it have been borrowed from the fundamental and "classic" works cited in the bibliography, such as that of M. Davis, Computability and Unsolvability [9], and those of N. Chomsky, among others Formal Properties of Grammars [6]. Ineluctably, there are numerous borrowings made during a course, and the authors would like to acknowledge their debt to J. Pitrat for his lectures given in the Centre de Linguistique Quantitative mentioned above, and to M. Nivat for his work in connection 2 and transduction.

Download or read book Event Arguments Foundations and Applications written by Claudia Maienborn and published by Walter de Gruyter. This book was released on 2011-12-22 with total page 377 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Since entering the stage, Davidsonian event arguments have taken on a central role in linguistic theorizing. Recent years have seen a continuous extension of possible applications for them, not only in semantics but also in syntax. At the same time questions concerning the ontological status of events have received renewed attention. This collection of articles provides new evidence for the virtually ubiquitous presence of event arguments in linguistic structure and sheds new light on their nature. The volume is organized into four sections: Events - states - causation; Event nominals; Events in composition; Measuring events.

Download or read book The Polysynthesis Parameter written by Mark C. Baker and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 1996 with total page 581 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book investigates in detail the grammar of polysynthetic languages--those with very complex verbal morphology. Baker argues that polysynthesis is more than an accidental collection of morphological processes; rather, it is a systematic way of representing predicate-argument relationships that is parallel to but distinct from the system used in languages like English. Having repercussions for many areas of syntax and related aspects of morphology and semantics, this argument results in a comprehensive picture of the grammar of polysynthetic languages. Baker draws on examples from Mohawk and certain languages of the American Southwest, Mesoamerica, Australia, and Siberia.

Download or read book Information Structure and Reference Tracking in Complex Sentences written by Rik van Gijn and published by John Benjamins Publishing Company. This book was released on 2014-03-15 with total page 417 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume is dedicated to exploring the crossroads where complex sentences and information management – more specifically information structure and reference tracking – come together. Complex sentences are a highly relevant but understudied domain for studying notions of IS and RT. On the one hand, a complex sentence can be studied as a mini-unit of discourse consisting of two or more elements describing events, situations, or processes, with its own internal information-structural and referential organization. On the other hand, complex sentences can be studied as parts of larger discourse structures, such as narratives or conversations, in terms of how their information-structural characteristics relate to this wider context. The book offers new perspectives for the study of the interaction between complex sentences and information management, and moreover adds typological breadth by focusing on lesser studied languages from several parts of the world.