Crosslinguistic Perspectives on Argument Structure

Crosslinguistic Perspectives on Argument Structure PDF

Author: Melissa Bowerman

Publisher: Taylor & Francis

Published: 2008

Total Pages: 380

ISBN-13: 0805841946

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This book offers a unique interdisciplinary perspective on argument structure and its role in language acquisition. The volume is the outcome of an integrated research project and comprises chapters by both specialists in first language acquisition and field linguists working on a variety of lesser-known languages. Drawing on a broad range of crosslinguistic data, Crosslinguistic Perspectives on Argument Structure integrates important contemporary issues in linguistics and language acquisition.

Crosslinguistic Perspectives on Argument Structure

Crosslinguistic Perspectives on Argument Structure PDF

Author: Melissa Bowerman

Publisher: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates

Published: 2014-05-28

Total Pages: 379

ISBN-13: 9780203826218

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This book offers a unique interdisciplinary perspective on argument structure and its role in language acquisition. Drawing on a broad range of crosslinguistic data, this volume shows that languages are much more diverse in their argument structure properties than has been realized. The volume is the outcome of an integrated research project and comprises chapters by both specialists in first language acquisition and field linguists working on a variety of lesser-known languages. The research draws on original fieldwork and on adult data, child data, or both from seventeen languages from eleven different language families. Some chapters offer typological perspectives, examining the basic structures of a given language with language-learnability issues in mind. Other chapters investigate specific problems of language acquisition in one or more languages. Taken as a whole, the volume illustrates how detailed work on crosslinguistic variation is critical to the development of insightful theories of language acquisition. Crosslinguistic Perspectives on Argument Structure integrates important contemporary issues in linguistics and language acquisition.

Argument Structure and Syntactic Relations

Argument Structure and Syntactic Relations PDF

Author: Maia Duguine

Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing

Published: 2010-07-14

Total Pages: 356

ISBN-13: 9027288135

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The topic of this collection is argument structure. The fourteen chapters in this book are divided into four parts: Semantic and Syntactic Properties of Event Structure; A Cartographic View on Argument Structure; Syntactic Heads Involved in Argument Structure; and Argument Structure in Language Acquisition. Rigorous theoretical analyses are combined with empirical work on specific aspects of argument structure. The book brings together authors working in different linguistic fields (semantics, syntax, and language acquisition), who explore new findings as well as more established data, but then from new theoretical perspectives. The contributions propose cartographic views of argument structure, as opposed to minimalistic proposals of a binary template model for argument structure, in order to optimally account for various syntactic and semantic facts, as well as data derived from wider cross-linguistic perspectives.

Complex Predicates

Complex Predicates PDF

Author: Mengistu Amberber

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2010-04-22

Total Pages: 331

ISBN-13: 1139487485

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Complex predicates are multipredicational, but monoclausal structures. They have proven problematic for linguistic theory, particularly for proposed distinctions between the lexicon, morphology, and syntax. This volume focuses on the mapping from morphosyntactic structures to event structure, and in particular the constraints on possible mappings. The volume showcases the 'coverb construction', a complex predicate construction which, though widespread, has received little attention in the literature. The coverb construction contrasts with more familiar serial verb constructions. The coverb construction generally maps only to event structures like those of monomorphemic verbs, whereas serial verb constructions map to a range of event structures differing from those of monomorphemic verbs. The volume coverage is truly cross-linguistic, including languages from Australia, Papua New Guinea, Southeast Asia, the Indian subcontinent, East Africa and North America. The volume establishes a new arena of research in event structure, syntax, and cross-linguistic typology.

Argument Structure

Argument Structure PDF

Author: Eric J. Reuland

Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing

Published: 2007-11-28

Total Pages: 266

ISBN-13: 9027291268

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Recent developments in the generative tradition have created new interest in matters of argument structure and argument projection, giving prominence to the discussion on the role of lexical entries. Particularly, the more traditional lexicalist view that encodes argument structure information on lexical entries is now challenged by a syntactic view under which all properties of argument structure are taken up by syntactic structure. In the light of these new developments, the contributions in this volume provide detailed empirical investigations of argument structure phenomena in a wide range of languages. The contributions vary in their response to the theoretical questions and address issues that range from the role of specific functional heads and the relation of argument projection with syntactic processes, to the position of argument structure within a broader clausal architecture and the argument structure properties of less studied categories.

New Perspectives on Argument Structure in Functional Grammar

New Perspectives on Argument Structure in Functional Grammar PDF

Author: Ricardo Mairal Usón

Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG

Published: 2015-04-28

Total Pages: 372

ISBN-13: 3110895870

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The present monograph deals with lexical representation and linking within the framework of Functional Grammar. The notion of predicate frame as originally proposed in 1978 and subsequent refinements of the theory are challenged in that a new format of representing argument taking properties is formulated. This new format opens new lines of research towards the design of a new linking algorithm in Functional Grammar.

Ten Lectures on Language, Cognition, and Language Acquisition

Ten Lectures on Language, Cognition, and Language Acquisition PDF

Author: Melissa Bowerman

Publisher: BRILL

Published: 2018-07-17

Total Pages: 249

ISBN-13: 9004362827

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Melissa Bowerman’s lectures present a lucid detailed account of her research on how children build up a semantics for domains such as space in their first language, and the roles played by adult speech, typology, and cross-linguistic variation.

Preferred Argument Structure

Preferred Argument Structure PDF

Author: John W. Du Bois

Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing

Published: 2003-01-01

Total Pages: 480

ISBN-13: 9789027226242

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Preferred Argument Structure offers a profound insight into the relationship between language use and grammatical structure. In his original publication on Preferred Argument Structure, Du Bois (1987) demonstrated the power of this perspective by using it to explain the origins of ergativity and ergative marking systems. Since this work, the general applicability of Preferred Argument Structure has been demonstrated in studies of language after language. In this collection, the authors move beyond verifying Preferred Argument Structure as a property of a given language. They use the methodology to reveal more subtle aspects of the patterns, for example, to look across languages, diachronically or synchronically, to examine particular grammatical relations, and to examine special populations or particular genres. This volume will appeal to linguists interested in the relationship of pragmatics and grammar generally, in the typology of grammatical relations, and in explanations derived from data- and corpus-based approaches to analysis.

Logical Structure and Linguistic Structure

Logical Structure and Linguistic Structure PDF

Author: C-T James Huang

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

Published: 2012-12-06

Total Pages: 308

ISBN-13: 9401134723

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In comparative syntax a general approach has been pursued over the past decade predicated on the notion that Universal Grammar allows of open parameters, and that part of the job of linguistic theory is to specify what values these parameters may have, and how they may be set, given primary linguistic data, to determine the grammars of particu lar languages. The papers presented in this volume are also concerned with language variation understood in this way. Their goals, however, do not strictly fall under the rubric of comparative syntax, but form part of what is more properly thought of as a comparative semantics. Semantics, in its broadest sense, is concerned with how linguistic structures are associated with their truth-conditions. A comparative semantics, therefore, is concerned with whether this association can vary from language to language, and if so, what is the cause of this variation. Taking comparative semantics in this way places certain inherent limitations on the search for the sources of variability. This is because the semantic notion of truth is universal, and does not vary from language to language: Sentences either do or do not accurately characterize what they purport to describe. ! The source of semantic variability, therefore, must be somehow located in the way a language is structured.

Argument Structure and Grammatical Relations

Argument Structure and Grammatical Relations PDF

Author: Pirkko Suihkonen

Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing

Published: 2012-07-18

Total Pages: 424

ISBN-13: 9027274711

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This book is a collection of articles dealing with various aspects of grammatical relations and argument structure in the languages of Europe and North and Central Asia (LENCA). Topics covered with respect to individual languages are: split-intransitivity (Basque), causativization (Agul), transitives and causatives (Korean and Japanese), aspectual domain and quantification (Finnish and Udmurt), head-marking principles (Athabaskan languages), and pragmatics (Eastern Khanty and Xibe). Typology of argument-structure properties of ‘give’ (LENCA), typology of agreement systems, asymmetry in argument structure, typology of the Amdo Sprachbund, spatial realtors (Northeastern Turkic), core argument patterns (languages of Northern California), and typology of grammatical relations (LENCA) are the topics of articles based on cross-linguistic data. The broad empirical sweep and the fine-tuned theoretical analysis highlight the central role of argument structure and grammatical relations with respect to a plethora of linguistic phenomena.