Grammatical systems without language borders

Grammatical systems without language borders PDF Author: Heike Wiese
Publisher: BoD – Books on Demand
ISBN: 398554087X
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 110

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Book Description
Current research in grammatical analysis and sociolinguistics points to two core characteristics of language that seem incommensurable at first sight: (1) research on linguistic structure indicates internal organisation and coherence, and the workings and interactions of distinct grammatical systems, but (2) sociolinguistic research suggests that language borders and bound “languages” are counterfactual social constructs that cannot capture the diversity and fluidity of actual language use. This seems to constitute something like a “quantum-linguistic” paradox: language systems aren’t real (they are just ideological constructions), but at the same time, they are a reflection of actual structure. This book shows how this paradox can be resolved through an architecture that allows for grammatical systems without presupposing language borders: this architecture puts communicative situations, rather than languages, at the core of linguistic systematicity, while named languages are captured as optional sociolinguistic indices. The approach builds on insights from “free-range” language, a metaphor for language in settings that are less confined by monoglossic ideologies. The author looks at four different kinds of settings: urban markets, heritage language settings, multiethnic adolescent peer-groups, and digital social media. Central lessons to be learned from such free-range language settings are: (1) communicative situations support linguistic differentiation and can thus be the basis for fluid registers; (2) grammatical systematicity is grounded in communicative situations and does not require bound languages and linguistic borders; (3) named “languages” can emerge as social indices signalling belonging, but this is an optional, not a necessary development.

Grammatical systems without language borders

Grammatical systems without language borders PDF Author: Heike Wiese
Publisher: BoD – Books on Demand
ISBN: 398554087X
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 110

Get Book Here

Book Description
Current research in grammatical analysis and sociolinguistics points to two core characteristics of language that seem incommensurable at first sight: (1) research on linguistic structure indicates internal organisation and coherence, and the workings and interactions of distinct grammatical systems, but (2) sociolinguistic research suggests that language borders and bound “languages” are counterfactual social constructs that cannot capture the diversity and fluidity of actual language use. This seems to constitute something like a “quantum-linguistic” paradox: language systems aren’t real (they are just ideological constructions), but at the same time, they are a reflection of actual structure. This book shows how this paradox can be resolved through an architecture that allows for grammatical systems without presupposing language borders: this architecture puts communicative situations, rather than languages, at the core of linguistic systematicity, while named languages are captured as optional sociolinguistic indices. The approach builds on insights from “free-range” language, a metaphor for language in settings that are less confined by monoglossic ideologies. The author looks at four different kinds of settings: urban markets, heritage language settings, multiethnic adolescent peer-groups, and digital social media. Central lessons to be learned from such free-range language settings are: (1) communicative situations support linguistic differentiation and can thus be the basis for fluid registers; (2) grammatical systematicity is grounded in communicative situations and does not require bound languages and linguistic borders; (3) named “languages” can emerge as social indices signalling belonging, but this is an optional, not a necessary development.

The Development of the Grammatical System in Early Second Language Acquisition

The Development of the Grammatical System in Early Second Language Acquisition PDF Author: Anke Lenzing
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
ISBN: 9027271690
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 302

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Book Description
Shortlisted for the Christopher Brumfit Award in Applied Linguistics.The Development of the Grammatical System in Early Second Language Acquisition focuses on the acquisition process of early L2 learners. It is based on the following key hypothesis: the initial mental grammatical system of L2 learners is constrained semantically, syntactically and mnemonically. This hypothesis is formalised as the Multiple Constraints Hypothesis. The empirical test of the Multiple Constraints Hypothesis is based on a large database including cross-sectional and longitudinal data from square-one ESL beginners. The study demonstrates that the postulated constraints are relaxed successively as learning progresses. The book is intended for postgraduate students as well as SLA researchers.

Measuring Grammatical Complexity

Measuring Grammatical Complexity PDF Author: Frederick J. Newmeyer
Publisher: OUP Oxford
ISBN: 0191508446
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 387

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Book Description
This book examines the question of whether languages can differ in grammatical complexity and, if so, how relative complexity differences might be measured. The volume differs from others devoted to the question of complexity in language in that the authors all approach the problem from the point of view of formal grammatical theory, psycholinguistics, or neurolinguistics. Chapters investigate a number of key issues in grammatical complexity, taking phonological, morphological, syntactic, and semantic considerations into account. These include what is often called the 'trade-off problem', namely whether complexity in one grammatical component is necessarily balanced by simplicity in another; and the question of interpretive complexity, that is, whether and how one might measure the difficulty for the hearer in assigning meaning to an utterance and how such complexity might be factored in to an overall complexity assessment. Measuring Grammatical Complexity brings together a number of distinguished scholars in the field, and will be of interest to linguists of all theoretical stripes from advanced undergraduate level upwards, particularly those working in the areas of morphosyntax, psycholinguistics, neurolinguistics, and cognitive linguistics.

A Grammar of Kilmeri

A Grammar of Kilmeri PDF Author: Claudia Gerstner-Link
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG
ISBN: 1501506668
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 1024

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Book Description
This book is a description of Kilmeri, a language of Papua New Guinea, based on the author's fieldwork. The volume is dedicated to the detailed description of form and meaning and their interface, which is supported through extensive illustration by examples. The narrative structure of entire texts is accessible via a small collection of fully glossed personal and traditional stories included in the Online Supplement. The typological evaluation of selected properties of Kilmeri rounds out the description of the language.

The Language System of English

The Language System of English PDF Author: Vulf Plotkin
Publisher: Universal-Publishers
ISBN: 1581129939
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 115

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Book Description
A description of the English language as a dynamic system in the evolutionary process of radical typological restructuring, which has deeply affected its constituent subsystems - grammatical, lexical and phonic.

Grammatical Complexity and One-dimensional Dynamical Systems

Grammatical Complexity and One-dimensional Dynamical Systems PDF Author: Huimin Xie
Publisher: World Scientific
ISBN: 9810223986
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 290

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Book Description
A combinatorial method is developed in this book to explore the mysteries of chaos, which has became a topic of science since 1975. Using tools from theoretical computer science, formal languages and automata, the complexity of symbolic behaviors of dynamical systems is classified and analysed thoroughly. This book is mainly devoted to explanation of this method and apply it to one-dimensional dynamical systems, including the circle and interval maps, which are typical in exhibiting complex behavior through simple iterated calculations. The knowledge for reading it is self-contained in the book.

A Grammar of Coastal Marind

A Grammar of Coastal Marind PDF Author: Bruno Olsson
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG
ISBN: 3110747065
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 608

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Book Description
This grammar provides the first modern, comprehensive description of Coastal Marind. It is a Papuan language spoken by the coastal-dwelling Marind-Anim, formerly expansionistic head-hunters of the Southern New Guinea lowlands. Like the other languages of the poorly known Anim family, Coastal Marind features astonishingly complex verb morphology and a range of unusual phenomena, including indexing of up to four arguments on the verb, verbal marking of focus (the 'Orientation' system), engagement prefixes tracking the attention of the addressee, and a system of four genders realised by intricate agreement patterns. The structure of the language is examined in a detailed but accessible way, and its many complexities are brought to life by contextualised spontaneous data, drawn from a rich audio-visual corpus.

The Emergence of Functions in Language

The Emergence of Functions in Language PDF Author: Zygmunt Frajzyngier
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0192582569
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 288

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Book Description
This volume explores the question of why languages - even those spoken in the same geographical area by people who share similar social structures, occupations, and religious beliefs - differ in the meanings expressed by their grammatical systems. Zygmunt Frajzyngier and Marielle Butters outline a new methodology to explore these differences, and to discover the motivations behind the emergence of meanings. The motivations that they identify include: the communicative need triggered when the grammatical system inherently produces ambiguities; the principle of functional transparency; the opportunistic emergence of meaning, whereby unoccupied formal niches acquire a new function; metonymic emergence, whereby a property of an existing function receives a formal means of its own, thus creating a new function; and the emergence of functions through language contact. The book offers new analyses of a range of phenomena across different languages, such as benefactives and progressives in English, and point of view of the subject and goal orientation in Chadic languages. It also draws on a wealth of data from other languages including French, Spanish, Polish, Russian, and a variety of less familiar Sino-Russian idiolects.

Multimodality

Multimodality PDF Author: Janina Wildfeuer
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG
ISBN: 3110608057
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 357

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Book Description
Multimodality’s popularity as a semiotic approach has not resulted in a common voice yet. Its conceptual anchoring as well as its empirical applications often remain localized and disparate, and ideas of a theory of multimodality are heterogeneous and uncoordinated. For the field to move ahead, it must achieve a more mature status of reflection, mutual support, and interaction with regard to both past and future directions. The red thread across the disciplines reflected in this book is a common goal of capturing the mechanisms of synergetic knowledge construction and transmission using diverse forms of expressions, i.e., multimodality. The collection of chapters brought together in the book reflects both a diversity of disciplines and common interests and challenges, thereby establishing an excellent roadmap for the future. The contributions revisit and redefine theoretical concepts or empirical analyses, which are crucial to the study of multimodality from various perspectives, with a view towards evolving issues of multimodal analysis. With this, the book aims at repositioning the field as a well-grounded scientific discipline with significant implications for future communication research in many fields of study.

Agent Computing and Multi-Agent Systems

Agent Computing and Multi-Agent Systems PDF Author: Ramakoti Sadananada
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 3540367071
Category : Computers
Languages : en
Pages : 843

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Book Description
This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 9th Pacific Rim International Workshop on Multi-Agents, PRIMA 2006, held in Guilin, China, in August 2006. The book presents 39 revised full papers and 57 revised short papers together with 4 invited talks, addressing subjects from theoretical and methodological issues to applications. Topics include agent models, agent architectures, agent-oriented software engineering, semantic Web service, collaboration, coordination and negotiation, and more.