Download or read book Microparametric Syntax and Dialect Variation written by James R. Black and published by John Benjamins Publishing. This book was released on 1996 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Richard Kayne's introduction to this volume stresses that comparative work on the syntax of very closely related languages and dialects is a research tool promising to provide both a broad understanding of parameters at their finest-grained and an approach to the question of the minimal units of syntactic variation. The 11 articles in this collection demonstrate the use of this tool in analyzing microparametric variation, principally with reference to Chomsky's Minimalist program, in a variety of languages. Topics include se/si constructions, hypothetical infinitives and adverbial quantifiers in French and other Romance languages; that-trace variation, Scandinavian possessive constructions, reflexives and subject-verb agreement in Icelandic & Faroese, and verb clusters in continental West Germanic dialects; anaphoric agreement in Labrador Inuttut; negative particle questions in Chinese; imperative inversion in Belfast English; and the second person singular interrogative in the traditional vernacular of Bolton.
Download or read book Microparametric Syntax and Dialect Variation Ed by J R Black V Motapanyane written by 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 Micro syntactic Variation in North American English written by Raffaella Zanuttini and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2014 with total page 377 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Comparative work on linguistic varieties that are overall very similar can help us determine where and how exactly grammatical systems differ from one another, and how they change over time. This book explores a range of data on unfamiliar constructions across regional and social dialects, thereby shedding light on the varieties under examination and on the properties of English syntax more generally.
Download or read book The Limits of Syntactic Variation written by Theresa Biberauer and published by John Benjamins Publishing. This book was released on 2008-09-17 with total page 531 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 The Cambridge Handbook of Generative Syntax written by Marcel den Dikken and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2013-07-25 with total page 1412 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Syntax – the study of sentence structure – has been at the centre of generative linguistics from its inception and has developed rapidly and in various directions. The Cambridge Handbook of Generative Syntax provides a historical context for what is happening in the field of generative syntax today, a survey of the various generative approaches to syntactic structure available in the literature and an overview of the state of the art in the principal modules of the theory and the interfaces with semantics, phonology, information structure and sentence processing, as well as linguistic variation and language acquisition. This indispensable resource for advanced students, professional linguists (generative and non-generative alike) and scholars in related fields of inquiry presents a comprehensive survey of the field of generative syntactic research in all its variety, written by leading experts and providing a proper sense of the range of syntactic theories calling themselves generative.
Download or read book Dialect Variation and the Theory of Grammar written by Paola Benincá and published by Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG. This book was released on 2019-10-08 with total page 144 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: No detailed description available for "Dialect Variation and the Theory of Grammar".
Download or read book Variation in Datives written by Beatriz Fernandez and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2013 with total page 346 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Variation in Datives collects new research on the nature of syntactic micro-variation in datives. The papers in this volume examine different aspects of internal variation in dative marking, such as agreement and case alternations, distribution of adpositional structures and dative case-marking, the different structural positions of dative arguments and their semantic contribution, and patterns of syncretism in the clitic and/or agreement system. Interest in these topics has grown significantly in the past 20 years. Variation in Datives makes a significant contribution to our understanding of language variation, as it adds the micro-comparative perspective to the general discussion and includes 10 new articles on a wide range of European languages, including Greek, Basque, Icelandic, and Serbo-Croatian. Variation in Datives will appeal to scholars and advanced students of syntax, linguistic variation, and especially syntactic micro-variation.
Download or read book Parameters and Universals written by Richard S. Kayne and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2000-09-28 with total page 384 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is a collection of previously published essays on comparative syntax by the distinguished linguist Richard Kayne. The papers cover issues of comparative syntax as they are applied to French, Italian, and other Romance languages and dialects, together forming a strongly cohesive set that will be valuable to both scholars and students.
Download or read book Syntactic Variation written by Roberta D'Alessandro and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2012-07-19 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book was first published in 2010. The study of Romance languages can tell us a great deal about sentence structure and its variation in general. Focusing on the dialects of Italy - including the islands of Sardinia and Sicily - the authors explore three thematic areas: the nominal domain, the verbal domain and the left periphery of the clause. The book gives fresh attention to the dialects, arguing that they offer an unprecedented degree of variation (not found, for example, in Germanic languages). Analysing a host of data, the authors show how the dialects can be used as a test-bed for investigating and challenging received ideas about language structure and change. Coherent and wide-ranging, this is a vital resource for those working in syntactic theory, historical linguistics and Romance languages.
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 Continuity and Change in Grammar written by Anne Breitbarth and published by John Benjamins Publishing. This book was released on 2010 with total page 369 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: One of the principal challenges of historical linguistics is to explain the "causes" of language change. Any such explanation, however, must also address the actuation problem: why is it that changes occurring in a given language at a certain time cannot be reliably predicted to recur in other languages, under apparently similar conditions? The sixteen contributions to the present volume each aim to elucidate various aspects of this problem, including: What processes can be identified as the drivers of change? How central are syntax-external (phonological, lexical or contact-based) factors in triggering syntactic change? And how can all of these factors be reconciled with the actuation problem? Exploring data from a wide range of languages from both a formal and a functional perspective, this book promises to be of interest to advanced students and researchers in historical linguistics, syntax and their intersection."
Download or read book Contemporary Approaches to Romance Linguistics written by Julie Auger and published by John Benjamins Publishing. This book was released on 2004-10-20 with total page 414 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This collection of twenty articles, selected from the 33rd annual Linguistic Symposium on Romance Languages held at Indiana University in 2003, presents current theoretical approaches to a variety of issues in Romance linguistics. Invited speakers Luigi Burzio and José Ignacio Hualde contribute papers on the paradigmatics and syntagmatics of Italian verbal inflection and comparative/diachronic Romance intonation, respectively. The other papers, whose authors include both well-known researchers and younger scholars, represent such areas as French syntax (both synchronic and diachronic), second language acquisition (Spanish & English), Spanish intonation, phonology, syntax, and semantics, Italian semantics, Romanian morphology and syntax, Catalan phonology and morphology, and Galician phonology (two papers). The volume is rounded out by three explicitly comparative studies, one on proto-Romance phonology, one on microvariation in Romance syntax, and a third addressing syntactic microvariation among varieties of French and French-based creoles. Frameworks represented include Optimality Theory, Minimalism, and Construction Grammar.
Download or read book Theories and Methods written by Peter Auer and published by Walter de Gruyter. This book was released on 2009-12-22 with total page 910 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The dimensions of time and space fundamentally cause and shape the variability of all human language. To reduce investigation of this insight to manageable proportions, researchers have traditionally concentrated on the “deepest” dialects. But it is increasingly apparent that, although most people still speak with a distinct regional coloring, the new mobility of speakers in recently industrialized and postindustrial societies and the efflorescence of communication technologies cannot be ignored. This has given rise to a reconsideration of the relationship between geographical place and cultural space, and the fundamental link between language and a spatially bounded territory. Language and Space: An International Handbook of Linguistic Variation seeks to take full account of these developments in a comprehensive, theoretically rich way. The introductory volume examines the concept of space and linguistic approaches to it, the structure and dynamics of language spaces, and relevant research methods. A second volume offers the first thorough exploration of the interplay between linguistic investigation and cartography, and subsequent volumes uniformly document the state of research into the spatial dimension of particular language groupings. Key features: comprehensive coverage of the field in terms of theory and methods the unique volume stands alone, since it neither is a handbook of dialectology or of areal linguistics, nor a handbook on language variation alone gathers together a great number of distinguished scholars and experts in the field
Download or read book Romance Syntax Semantics and L2 Acquisition written by Joaquim Camps and published by John Benjamins Publishing. This book was released on 2001-01-01 with total page 274 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume contains a selection of refereed and revised papers, originally presented at the 30th Linguistic Symposium on Romance Languages, representing the areas of syntax, semantics, their interfaces, and second language acquisition. The topics addressed include movement (both wh- and head-movement), control, issues of second language acquisition related to the Determiner Phrase, the effect of word order and syntactic simplification in second language acquisition, adverbials, syntactic constraints on access to lexical structure, a semantic characterization of the subjunctive in Spanish, and impersonal constructions and impersonal reflexive pronouns. The papers in this volume not only discuss issues related to most of the major Romance languages (French, Italian, Portuguese, Rumanian and Spanish) and a Portuguese Creole, but also include comparisons with languages from other families (Marathi, Bulgarian, Polish and Slovenian). This collection of papers illustrates the richness in the field of Romance linguistics and the value of cross-linguistic research and multi-modular approaches.
Download or read book More than Nature Needs written by Derek Bickerton and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2014-01-13 with total page 296 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The human mind is an unlikely evolutionary adaptation. How did humans acquire cognitive capacities far more powerful than anything a hunting-and-gathering primate needed to survive? Alfred Russel Wallace, co-founder with Darwin of evolutionary theory, saw humans as "divine exceptions" to natural selection. Darwin thought use of language might have shaped our sophisticated brains, but his hypothesis remained an intriguing guess--until now. Combining state-of-the-art research with forty years of writing and thinking about language evolution, Derek Bickerton convincingly resolves a crucial problem that both biology and the cognitive sciences have hitherto ignored or evaded. What evolved first was neither language nor intelligence--merely normal animal communication plus displacement. That was enough to break restrictions on both thought and communication that bound all other animals. The brain self-organized to store and automatically process its new input, words. But words, which are inextricably linked to the concepts they represent, had to be accessible to consciousness. The inevitable consequence was a cognitive engine able to voluntarily merge both thoughts and words into meaningful combinations. Only in a third phase could language emerge, as humans began to tinker with a medium that, when used for communication, was adequate for speakers but suboptimal for hearers. Starting from humankind's remotest past, More than Nature Needs transcends nativist thesis and empiricist antithesis by presenting a revolutionary synthesis--one that instead of merely repeating "nature and nurture" clichés shows specifically and in a principled manner how and why the synthesis came about.
Download or read book New Approaches to Old Problems written by Steven N. Dworkin and published by John Benjamins Publishing. This book was released on 2000-11-13 with total page 251 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume contains revised versions of thirteen of the papers presented at the parasession, “New Solutions to Old Problems: Issues in Romance Historical Linguistics”, held as part of the 29th Linguistic Symposium on the Romance Languages (1999). These studies examine specific problems in Romance historical linguistics within the framework of new analytical approaches, many of which represent extensions into the diachronic realm of methodologies and theories originally formulated to explain aspects of synchronic phonology and syntax. Insights afforded by Principles and Parameters, the Minimalist Program, Optimality Theory, grammaticalization theory, and sociohistorical linguistics are used to elucidate such long-standing issues in traditional historical grammar as diphthongization in Hispano-Romance, syncope of intertonic vowels in Hispano- and Gallo-Romane, Romance lenition, the role of analogy in morphological change, word order, infinitival constructions, and the collocation of clitic object pronouns in Old French and Old Spanish.
Download or read book Textual Parameters in Older Languages written by Susan C. Herring and published by John Benjamins Publishing. This book was released on 2001-01-23 with total page 469 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Textual Parameters in Older Languages takes a contemporary approach to the inherent limitations of using older texts as data for linguistic analysis, drawing on methods of text analysis, pragmatics and sociolinguistics to supplement traditional historical and philological methods. The focus of the book is on the importance of controlling for textual parameters-defined by the editors as dimensions of variation associated with texts and their production, including text type, degree of poeticality, orality, and dialect-in the analysis of older language data. Failure to do so can result in invalid generalizations; recognizing the influence of textual parameters, conversely, raises a myriad of issues for the practice and theory of historical linguistics. The 12 essays in this collection apply this approach in analyses of anaphora, non-finite verbal forms, particles, punctuation, word order and other phenomena in a wide range of languages including Ancient Tamil, Sanskrit, Latin, Heian Japanese, Medieval Greek, Old French, Old Russian, Middle English, and Modern Danish. An in-depth introduction by the editors lays out the goals of the textual parameters approach, and considers the methodological and theoretical consequences of the evidence presented in the book as a whole.
