Agreement from a Diachronic Perspective

Agreement from a Diachronic Perspective PDF

Author: Jürg Fleischer

Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG

Published: 2015-06-16

Total Pages: 363

ISBN-13: 311040009X

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The contents of the present volume will enhance our understanding of the diachrony of agreement systems and provide a useful starting point for future studies on this both fascinating and intricate field of research.

Agreement from a Diachronic Perspective

Agreement from a Diachronic Perspective PDF

Author: Jürg Fleischer

Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG

Published: 2015-06-16

Total Pages: 364

ISBN-13: 3110399962

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The contents of the present volume will enhance our understanding of the diachrony of agreement systems and provide a useful starting point for future studies on this both fascinating and intricate field of research.

Indo-Aryan Ergativity in Typological and Diachronic Perspective

Indo-Aryan Ergativity in Typological and Diachronic Perspective PDF

Author: Eystein Dahl

Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing Company

Published: 2016-06-14

Total Pages: 267

ISBN-13: 9027267162

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This volume presents a state-of-the-art survey of synchronic and diachronic dimensions of Ergativity in the Indo-Aryan language family. It contains an introduction drawing on the most important recent typological and theoretical contributions to this field, plus seven papers about the origin, development and distribution of ergative alignment in ancient and modern Indo-Aryan languages written by well-established expert authors. The articles provide detailed explorations of language-specific synchronic systems or patterns of change, and large-scale studies of the distribution of ergative morphosyntax across the Indo-Aryan languages. The papers have a typological-functional approach and are based on thorough fieldwork experience and/or philological investigation. As the Indo-Aryan language family has played a paramount role in recent theories of Ergativity and of alignment typology and change, this volume is highly relevant to experts working on these languages and to scholars interested in grammatical relations and it will figure in all future debates in these fields

Diachrony of differential argument marking

Diachrony of differential argument marking PDF

Author: Ilja A. Seržant

Publisher: Language Science Press

Published: 2018

Total Pages: 563

ISBN-13: 3961100853

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While there are languages that code a particular grammatical role (e.g. subject or direct object) in one and the same way across the board, many more languages code the same grammatical roles differentially. The variables which condition the differential argument marking (or DAM) pertain to various properties of the NP (such as animacy or definiteness) or to event semantics or various properties of the clause. While the main line of current research on DAM is mainly synchronic the volume tackles the diachronic perspective. The tenet is that the emergence and the development of differential marking systems provide a different kind of evidence for the understanding of the phenomenon. The present volume consists of 18 chapters and primarily brings together diachronic case studies on particular languages or language groups including e.g. Finno-Ugric, Sino-Tibetan and Japonic languages. The volume also includes a position paper, which provides an overview of the typology of different subtypes of DAM systems, a chapter on computer simulation of the emergence of DAM and a chapter devoted to the cross-linguistic effects of referential hierarchies on DAM.

A Dictionary of Human Geography

A Dictionary of Human Geography PDF

Author: Noel Castree

Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA

Published: 2013-04-25

Total Pages: 594

ISBN-13: 0199599866

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This new dictionary provides over 2,000 clear and concise entries on human geography, covering basic terms and concepts as well as biographies, organisations, and major periods and schools. Authoritative and accessible, this is a must-have for every student of human geography, as well as for professionals and interested members of the public.

Past Participle Agreement

Past Participle Agreement PDF

Author: Jorge Vega Vilanova

Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing Company

Published: 2020-12-15

Total Pages: 258

ISBN-13: 902726046X

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In this book, the traditional definition of ‘grammaticalization’ is challenged in the light of current developments in grammar theory. The main innovation of this approach is the focus on the feature composition of lexical items. From this perspective, the loss of past participle agreement in Catalan is analyzed on the basis of newly collected data as a consequence of the grammaticalization of formal features. The emergence of syntactic formal features through grammaticalization is understood as a last-resort repair mechanism for pragmatically costly derivations. Further far-reaching implications of this proposal under discussion are: the interplay between (re-)parametrization, economy, cyclicity, and grammaticalization; the characterization of free variation under a modified version of the Interface Hypothesis; and the precedence of syntactic over morphological change. This book is not only of interest to specialists in Romance languages but also to anyone working on diachronic linguistics.

A Theory of Distributed Number

A Theory of Distributed Number PDF

Author: Myriam Dali

Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing Company

Published: 2021-08-15

Total Pages: 167

ISBN-13: 902725964X

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The objective of this book is to develop a deeper understanding of the form and interpretation of number. Using insights from Generative syntax and Distributed Morphology, we develop a theory of distributed number, arguing that number can be associated with several functional heads and that these projections exist depending on the features they specify. In doing so, we make a strong claim for a close mapping between the syntactic structure and the semantics in the noun phrase, since each node corresponds to a different interpretation of number. Despite some technical implementations, the book is accessible to linguists working outside any particular syntax-semantic framework, since we propose generalizations that are applicable in many, if not all, models of grammar. The book focuses on Arabic, but also discusses a number of languages including English, French, Ojibwe, Blackfoot, Hebrew, Japanese, Korean, Chinese, Turkish, Persian, and Western Armenian.

The lexeme in descriptive and theoretical morphology

The lexeme in descriptive and theoretical morphology PDF

Author: Olivier Bonami

Publisher: Language Science Press

Published:

Total Pages:

ISBN-13: 3961101108

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After being dominant during about a century since its invention by Baudouin de Courtenay at the end of the nineteenth century, morpheme is more and more replaced by lexeme in contemporary descriptive and theoretical morphology. The notion of a lexeme is usually associated with the work of P. H. Matthews (1972, 1974), who characterizes it as a lexical entity abstracting over individual inflected words. Over the last three decades, the lexeme has become a cornerstone of much work in both inflectional morphology and word formation (or, as it is increasingly been called, lexeme formation). The papers in the present volume take stock of the descriptive and theoretical usefulness of the lexeme, but also adress many of the challenges met by classical lexeme-based theories of morphology.

Typological Hierarchies in Synchrony and Diachrony

Typological Hierarchies in Synchrony and Diachrony PDF

Author: Sonia Cristofaro

Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing Company

Published: 2018-07-15

Total Pages: 442

ISBN-13: 9027264457

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Typological hierarchies are widely perceived as one of the most important results of research on language universals and linguistic diversity. Explanations for typological hierarchies, however, are usually based on the synchronic properties of the patterns described by individual hierarchies, not the actual diachronic processes that give rise to these patterns cross-linguistically. This book aims to explore in what ways the investigation of such processes can further our understanding of typological hierarchies. To this end, diachronic evidence about the origins of several phenomena described by typological hierarchies is discussed for several languages by a number of leading scholars in typology, historical linguistics, and language documentation. This evidence suggests a rethinking of possible explanations for typological hierarchies, as well as the very notion of typological universals in general. For this reason, the book will be of interest not only to the broad typological community, but also historical linguists, cognitive linguists, and psycholinguists.

Questioning Theoretical Primitives in Linguistic Inquiry

Questioning Theoretical Primitives in Linguistic Inquiry PDF

Author: Naomi L. Shin

Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing Company

Published: 2018-11-15

Total Pages: 301

ISBN-13: 9027263345

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Across the world, professional linguistic inquiry is in full bloom, largely as result of pioneering thinkers who helped rapidly modernize the study of human language in the last century. As the field continues to move forward, further solidifying its position as a conduit of insight into the human condition, it is essential to take stock of the theoretical primitives that have given linguistics its intellectual foundation. This volume does precisely that, inspecting the load-bearing components of the edifice upon which contemporary linguistics has been constructed. The volume’s authors – whose expertise spans the Generativist, Functionalist, and Variationist research traditions – remind us of the need to revisit the conceptual bedrock of the field, clarifying and assessing our primary theoretical moves, including those relating to such elemental components as the ‘linguistic sign’, ‘a language’, ‘structural relations’, ‘grammatical category’, ‘acquisition’, ‘bilingual’, ‘competence’, and ‘sociolinguistic variable’.