Author: Marcel den Dikken Publisher: Cambridge University Press ISBN: 1107354587 Category : Language Arts & Disciplines Languages : en Pages : 1412
Book Description
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.
Author: Kees Hengeveld Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG ISBN: 3110517426 Category : Language Arts & Disciplines Languages : en Pages : 308
Book Description
This book brings together a series of contributions to the study of grammaticalization of tense, aspect, and modality from a functional perspective. All contributions share the aim to uncover the functional motivations behind the processes of grammaticalization under discussion, but they do so from different points of view.
Author: Lotte Hogeweg Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing ISBN: 9027288933 Category : Language Arts & Disciplines Languages : en Pages : 418
Book Description
In recent years, we have witnessed, on the one hand, an increased interest in cross-linguistic data in formal semantic studies, and, on the other hand, an increased concern for semantic issues in language typology. However, only few studies combine semantic and typological research for a particular semantic domain (such as the papers in Bach et al. (1995) on quantification and Smith (1997) on aspect). This book brings together formal semanticists with a cross-linguistic perspective and/or those working on lesser-known languages, and typologists interested in semantic theory, to discuss semantic variation in the specific domain of Tense, Aspect, and Mood/Modality.
Author: Robert I. Binnick Publisher: Oxford University Press ISBN: 0195381971 Category : Computers Languages : en Pages : 1128
Book Description
This Handbook is a comprehensive, authoritative, and accessible guide to the topics and theories that current form the front line of research into tense, aspect, and related areas.
Author: Joan Bybee Publisher: University of Chicago Press ISBN: 0226086658 Category : Language Arts & Disciplines Languages : en Pages : 420
Book Description
Joan Bybee and her colleagues present a new theory of the evolution of grammar that links structure and meaning in a way that directly challenges most contemporary versions of generative grammar. This study focuses on the use and meaning of grammatical markers of tense, aspect, and modality and identifies a universal set of grammatical categories. The authors demonstrate that the semantic content of these categories evolves gradually and that this process of evolution is strikingly similar across unrelated languages. Through a survey of seventy-six languages in twenty-five different phyla, the authors show that the same paths of change occur universally and that movement along these paths is in one direction only. This analysis reveals that lexical substance evolves into grammatical substance through various mechanisms of change, such as metaphorical extension and the conventionalization of implicature. Grammaticization is always accompanied by an increase in frequency of the grammatical marker, providing clear evidence that language use is a major factor in the evolution of synchronic language states. The Evolution of Grammar has important implications for the development of language and for the study of cognitive processes in general.
Author: Dalila Ayoun Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing Company ISBN: 9027263906 Category : Language Arts & Disciplines Languages : en Pages : 376
Book Description
After an introductory chapter that provides an overview to theoretical issues in tense, aspect, modality and evidentiality, this volume presents a variety of original contributions that are firmly empirically-grounded based on elicited or corpus data, while adopting different theoretical frameworks. Thus, some chapters rely on large diachronic corpora and provide new qualitative insight on the evolution of TAM systems through quantitative methods, while others carry out a collostructional analysis of past-tensed verbs using inferential statistics to explore the lexical grammar of verbs. A common goal is to uncover semantic regularities and variation in the TAM systems of the languages under study by taking a close look at context. Such a fine-grained approach contributes to our understanding of the TAM systems from a typological perspective. The focus on well-known Indo-European languages (e.g. French, German, English, Spanish) and also on less commonly studied languages (e.g. Hungarian, Estonian, Avar, Andi, Tagalog) provides a valuable cross-linguistic perspective.
Author: Felix K. Ameka Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing ISBN: 9027291381 Category : Language Arts & Disciplines Languages : en Pages : 351
Book Description
This book explores the thesis that in the Kwa languages of West Africa, aspect and modality are more central to the grammar of the verb than tense. Where tense marking has emerged it is invariably in the expression of the future, and therefore concerned with the impending actualization or potentiality of an event, hence with modality, rather than the purely temporal sequencing associated with tense. The primary grammatical contrasts are perfective versus imperfective. The main languages discussed are Akan, Dangme, Ewe, Ga and Tuwuli while Nzema-Ahanta, Likpe and Eastern Gbe are also mentioned. Knowledge about these languages has deepened considerably during the past decade or so and ideas about their structure have changed. The volume therefore presents novel analyses of grammatical forms like the so-called S-Aux-O-V-Other or “future” constructions, and provides empirical data for theorizing about aspect and modality. It should be of considerable interest to Africanist linguists, typologists, and creolists interested in substrate issues.
Author: Adeline Patard Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing ISBN: 9027223831 Category : Language Arts & Disciplines Languages : en Pages : 331
Book Description
This volume addresses problems of semantics regarding the analysis of tense and aspect (TA) markers in a variety of languages, including Arabic, Croatian, English, French, German, Russian, Thai, and Turkish. Its main interest goes out to epistemic uses of such markers, whereby epistemic modality is understood as indicating a degree of compatibility between the modal world and the factual world (Declerck). All contributions, moreover, tackle these problems from a more or less cognitive point of view, with some of them insisting on the need to provide a unifying explanation for all usage types, temporal and non-temporal, and all of them accepting the premise that the semantics of TA categories essentially refers to subjective, rather than objective, concerns. The volume also represents one of the first attempts to gather accounts of TA marking (in various languages) that are explicitly set within the framework of Cognitive Grammar. Ultimately, this volume aims to contribute to establishing an awareness that modal meaning elements are directly relevant to the analysis of the grammar of time.
Author: Joanna Blaszczak Publisher: University of Chicago Press ISBN: 022636352X Category : Language Arts & Disciplines Languages : en Pages : 457
Book Description
What is a linguistic category and what kinds of categories do the labels subjunctive, imperative, future, aspect, and modality refer to? The current literature assumes a straightforward mapping between grammatical category and semantic function, and descriptions of well-studied languages cultivate a sense of predictability in patterns. However, as the editors and contributors of "Mood, Aspect, Modality Revisited" show, this predictability and stability vanish once lesser known patterns and languages are studied. While it is feasible to retain certain distinctions among tense, aspect, and mood (TAM) in analysis of specific issues in specific languages, ongoing formal and experimental research seems to indicate that these traditional grammatical distinctions may ultimately be illusionary. "Mood, Aspect, Modality Revisited" seeks more general or fundamental grammatical structures that can encompass the breadth of related concepts traditionally placed in the TAM categories."
Author: Laura Baranzini Publisher: Cahiers Chronos ISBN: 9789004465855 Category : Language Arts & Disciplines Languages : en Pages : 0
Book Description
"If there's a domain in linguistics which complexity calls for ever further research, it's clearly that of tense, aspect, modality and evidentiality, often referred to as 'TAME'. The reason for which these domains of investigation have been connected so tightly as to deserve a common label is that their actual intertwining is so dense that one can hardly measure their effects purely individually, without regard to the other notions of the spectrum. On the other hand, despite their imbrications, tense, aspect, modality and evidentiality remain - needless to say - separate theoretical entities. The papers gathered in this volume cover a range of issues and a variety of methods that help delineate, each in its way, new perspectives on this broad domain"--
Author: Marcel den Dikken
Author: Kees Hengeveld
Author: Lotte Hogeweg
Author: Robert I. Binnick
Author: Joan Bybee
Author: Dalila Ayoun
Author: Felix K. Ameka
Author: Adeline Patard
Author: Joanna Blaszczak
Author: Laura Baranzini