Configuring Topic and Focus in Russian

Configuring Topic and Focus in Russian PDF Author: Tracy Holloway King
Publisher: Center for the Study of Language and Information Publications
ISBN: 9781881526629
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 287

Get Book

Book Description
This work examines word order. More accurately, it is the ordering of constituents that is discussed since prepositional phrases and most noun phrases form syntactic constituents and the encoding of topic and focus in Russian. As has long been observed, word order in Russian encodes specific discourse information: with neutral intonation, topics precede discourse-neutral constituents which precede foci. King extends this idea to show that word order encodes different types of topic and focus in a principled manner.

Configuring Topic and Focus in Russian

Configuring Topic and Focus in Russian PDF Author: Tracy Holloway King
Publisher: Center for the Study of Language and Information Publications
ISBN: 9781881526629
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 287

Get Book

Book Description
This work examines word order. More accurately, it is the ordering of constituents that is discussed since prepositional phrases and most noun phrases form syntactic constituents and the encoding of topic and focus in Russian. As has long been observed, word order in Russian encodes specific discourse information: with neutral intonation, topics precede discourse-neutral constituents which precede foci. King extends this idea to show that word order encodes different types of topic and focus in a principled manner.

Expecting the Unexpected

Expecting the Unexpected PDF Author: Horst J. Simon
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter
ISBN: 3110219085
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 461

Get Book

Book Description
In this article, the distribution of rare features among the world's languages is investigated based on the data from the World Atlas of Language Structures (Haspelmath et al. 2005). A Rarity Index for a language is defined, resulting in a listing of the world's languages by mean rarity. Further, a Group Rarity Index is defined to be able to measure average rarity of genealogical or areal groups. One of the most exceptional geographical areas turns out to be northwestern Europe. A closer investigation of the characteristics that make this area exceptional concludes this article.

Configuring Topic and Focus in Russian

Configuring Topic and Focus in Russian PDF Author: Tracy Holloway King
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Russian language
Languages : en
Pages : 566

Get Book

Book Description


The Syntax of Topic, Focus, and Contrast

The Syntax of Topic, Focus, and Contrast PDF Author: Ad Neeleman
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter
ISBN: 1614511454
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 316

Get Book

Book Description
This book addresses how core notions of information structure (topic, focus and contrast) are expressed in syntax. The authors propose that the syntactic effects of information structure come about as a result of mapping rules that are flexible enough to allow topics and foci to be expressed in a variety of positions, but strict enough to capture certain cross-linguistic generalisations about their distribution. In particular, the papers argue that only contrastive topics and contrastive foci undergo movement and that this is because such movement has the function of marking the scope of contrast. Several predications are derived from this proposal: such as that a focus cannot move across a topic – whether the latter is in situ or not. Syntactic and semantic evidence in support of this proposal is presented from a wide range of languages (including Dutch, English, Japanese, Korean and Russian) and theoretical consequences explored. The first chapter not only outlines its theoretical aims, but also provides an introduction to information structure. As a consequence, the book is accessible to advanced students as well as professional linguists.

Topic-Focus Articulation, Tripartite Structures, and Semantic Content

Topic-Focus Articulation, Tripartite Structures, and Semantic Content PDF Author: Eva Hajicová
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 9401590125
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 146

Get Book

Book Description
1. 1 OBJECTIVES The main objective of this joint work is to bring together some ideas that have played central roles in two disparate theoretical traditions in order to con tribute to a better understanding of the relationship between focus and the syn tactic and semantic structure of sentences. Within the Prague School tradition and the branch of its contemporary development represented by Hajicova and Sgall (HS in the sequel), topic-focus articulation has long been a central object of study, and it has long been a tenet of Prague school linguistics that topic-focus structure has systematic relevance to meaning. Within the formal semantics tradition represented by Partee (BHP in the sequel), focus has much more recently become an area of concerted investigation, but a number of the semantic phenomena to which focus is relevant have been extensively investi gated and given explicit compositional semantic-analyses. The emergence of 'tripartite structures' (see Chapter 2) in formal semantics and the partial simi larities that can be readily observed between some aspects of tripartite structures and some aspects of Praguian topic-focus articulation have led us to expect that a closer investigation of the similarities and differences in these different theoretical constructs would be a rewarding undertaking with mutual benefits for the further development of our respective theories and potential benefit for the study of semantic effects of focus in other theories as well.

Die slavischen Sprachen / The Slavic Languages. Halbband 1

Die slavischen Sprachen / The Slavic Languages. Halbband 1 PDF Author: Sebastian Kempgen
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter
ISBN: 3110214474
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 1195

Get Book

Book Description
No detailed description available for "SLAVISCHE SPRACHEN (BERGER U.A.) HSK 32.1 E-BOOK".

Language Typology and Language Universals 2.Teilband

Language Typology and Language Universals 2.Teilband PDF Author: Martin Haspelmath
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter
ISBN: 3110194260
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 1013

Get Book

Book Description
This handbook provides a comprehensive and thorough survey of our current insights into the diversity and unity found across the 6000 languages of this planet. The 125 articles include inter alia chapters on the patterns and limits of variation manifested by analogous structures, constructions and linguistic devices across languages (e.g. word order, tense and aspect, inflection, color terms and syllable structure). Other chapters cover the history, methodology and the theory of typology, as well as the relationship between language typology and other disciplines. The authors of the individual sections and chapters are for the most part internationally known experts on the relevant topics. The vast majority of the articles are written in English, some in French or German. The handbook is not only intended for the expert in the fields of typology and language universals, but for all of those interested in linguistics. It is specifically addressed to all those who specialize in individual languages, providing basic orientation for their analysis and placing each language within the space of what is possible and common in the languages of the world.

The Syntax of Russian

The Syntax of Russian PDF Author: John F. Bailyn
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 0521885744
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 393

Get Book

Book Description
An essential guide to Russian syntax, which examines major syntactic structures and grammatical puzzles of the language.

Russian as a Heritage Language

Russian as a Heritage Language PDF Author: Olesya Kisselev
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1040003842
Category : Foreign Language Study
Languages : en
Pages : 287

Get Book

Book Description
Russian as a Heritage Language: From Research to Classroom Applications brings together linguistically and pedagogically oriented research traditions in a comprehensive review of current Russian heritage language (HL) studies. Divided into three parts, the collection offers a variety of frameworks and approaches spanning research on HL speakers’ linguistic and pragmatic competence, literacy development, and sociocultural characteristics of Russian in diaspora. Presenting a wide range of new empirical findings, the volume explores topics at the forefront of HL studies, from assessment of HL learners’ linguistic competence and language attitudes to research on communities and institutional affordances impacting HL acquisition and maintenance. Each chapter connects current research with specific classroom applications, presenting Russian as a global language in various sociopolitical and majority-language contexts. Combining methodological rigor with theoretical insights across diverse areas of language study, Russian as a Heritage Language advances the field of HL pedagogy and serves as essential reading for HL educators and researchers as well as for linguists studying bilingualism.

The Structure of Complex Predicates in Urdu

The Structure of Complex Predicates in Urdu PDF Author: Miriam Butt
Publisher: Center for the Study of Language (CSLI)
ISBN: 9781881526582
Category : Foreign Language Study
Languages : en
Pages : 270

Get Book

Book Description
This book takes a detailed look at two differing complex predicates in the South Asian language Urdu. The Urdu permissive in particular brings into focus the problem of the syntax-semantics mismatch. An examination of the syntactic properties of this complex predicate shows that it is formed by the combination of two semantic heads, but that this combination is not mirrored in the syntax in terms of any kind of syntactic or lexical incorporation.