The evolution of case grammar

The evolution of case grammar PDF Author: Remi van Trijp
Publisher: Language Science Press
ISBN: 394623433X
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 254

Get Book Here

Book Description
There are few linguistic phenomena that have seduced linguists so skillfully as grammatical case has done. Ever since Panini (4th Century BC), case has claimed a central role in linguistic theory and continues to do so today. However, despite centuries worth of research, case has yet to reveal its most important secrets. This book offers breakthrough explanations for the understanding of case through agent-based experiments in cultural language evolution. The experiments demonstrate that case systems may emerge because they have a selective advantage for communication: they reduce the cognitive effort that listeners need for semantic interpretation, while at the same time limiting the cognitive resources required for doing so.

The evolution of case grammar

The evolution of case grammar PDF Author: Remi van Trijp
Publisher: Language Science Press
ISBN: 394623433X
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 254

Get Book Here

Book Description
There are few linguistic phenomena that have seduced linguists so skillfully as grammatical case has done. Ever since Panini (4th Century BC), case has claimed a central role in linguistic theory and continues to do so today. However, despite centuries worth of research, case has yet to reveal its most important secrets. This book offers breakthrough explanations for the understanding of case through agent-based experiments in cultural language evolution. The experiments demonstrate that case systems may emerge because they have a selective advantage for communication: they reduce the cognitive effort that listeners need for semantic interpretation, while at the same time limiting the cognitive resources required for doing so.

The Evolution of Case Grammar

The Evolution of Case Grammar PDF Author: Remi van Trijp
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781013286322
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 250

Get Book Here

Book Description
"There are few linguistic phenomena that have seduced linguists so skillfully as grammatical case has done. Ever since Panini (4th Century BC), case has claimed a central role in linguistic theory and continues to do so today. However, despite centuries worth of research, case has yet to reveal its most important secrets. This book offers breakthrough explanations for the understanding of case through agent-based experiments in cultural language evolution. The experiments demonstrate that case systems may emerge because they have a selective advantage for communication: they reduce the cognitive effort that listeners need for semantic interpretation, while at the same time limiting the cognitive resources required for doing so." This work was published by Saint Philip Street Press pursuant to a Creative Commons license permitting commercial use. All rights not granted by the work's license are retained by the author or authors.

The Evolution of Case Grammar

The Evolution of Case Grammar PDF Author: Remi Van Trijp
Publisher:
ISBN: 9783944675848
Category : Case grammar
Languages : en
Pages : 252

Get Book Here

Book Description
There are few linguistic phenomena that have seduced linguists so skillfully as grammatical case has done. Ever since Panini (4th Century BC), case has claimed a central role in linguistic theory and continues to do so today. However, despite centuries worth of research, case has yet to reveal its most important secrets. This book offers breakthrough explanations for the understanding of case through agent-based experiments in cultural language evolution. The experiments demonstrate that case systems may emerge because they have a selective advantage for communication: they reduce the cognitive effort that listeners need for semantic interpretation, while at the same time limiting the cognitive resources required for doing so.

Case Grammar

Case Grammar PDF Author: Walter Anthony Cook
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 240

Get Book Here

Book Description
The case grammar model is essentially a description of predicates and the arguments required by the meaning of those predicates in the semantic description of sentences. By probing into semantic structures, case systems can relate one surface structure to many semantic structures and one semantic structure to many surface structures. It is in the area of explaining paraphrase and ambiguity that the model is able to establish relationships which cannot be established on the basis of syntax alone. Yet these semantic realities have important syntactic correlates and help to reveal regularities not otherwise apparent. This volume contains thirteen papers, published between 1970 and 1978, which trace the development of the case grammar matrix model, its relation to tagmemics, generative semantics, and interpretive semantics, and its application to such areas as the analysis of literature and stylistics -- Page 4 of cover.

The Evolution of Grammar

The Evolution of Grammar PDF Author: Joan Bybee
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 0226086658
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 420

Get Book Here

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.

Generative Grammar

Generative Grammar PDF Author: Robert Freidin
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134322119
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 395

Get Book Here

Book Description
This book represents a substantial contribution to the field of linguistics in drawing together the author's most significant work on the theory of generative grammar.

Modern Grammars of Case

Modern Grammars of Case PDF Author: John M. Anderson
Publisher: OUP Oxford
ISBN: 0191538051
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 474

Get Book Here

Book Description
This book addresses fundamental issues in linguistic theory, including the relation between formal and cognitive approaches, the autonomy of syntax, the content of universal grammar, and the value of generative and functional approaches to grammar. It focuses on the grammar of case relations, signalled by morphological case, prepositions, and word order. Part I offers a critical history of modern grammars of case, focussing on the last four decades and setting this in the context of earlier, including ancient, developments. The subjects considered include the evolution of ideas concerning deep structure and semantic and grammatical relations, and arguments for the maintenance of the traditional central position of case in the grammar. In parts II and III Professor Anderson examines the category of case and central unresolved issues in the grammar of case. The latter include questions relating to the idea of an ontologically-based grammar, particularly the degree to which syntactic categories and relationships are grounded in meaning, and the notion of linguistic creativity. This involves a consideration of the way in which cases may be identified and whether their distribution is determined through semantics. The book sheds new light on the interactions between meaning and grammar and on the structure and development of lexical and grammatical systems. The argument and its far-reaching consequences will be of wide interest to linguists, philosophers and others seeking to understand the workings of language.

Competition and Variation in Natural Languages

Competition and Variation in Natural Languages PDF Author: Mengistu Amberber
Publisher: Elsevier
ISBN: 0080459773
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 375

Get Book Here

Book Description
This volume combines different perspectives on case-marking: (1) typological and descriptive approaches of various types and instances of case-marking in the languages of the world as well as comparison with languages that express similar types of relations without morphological case-marking; (2) formal analyses in different theoretical frameworks of the syntactic, semantic, and morphological properties of case-marking; (3) a historical approach of case-marking; (4) a psycholinguistic approach of case-marking. Although there are a number of publications on case related issues, there is no volume such as the present one, which exclusively looks at case marking, competition and variation from a cross-linguistic perspective and within the context of different contemporary theoretical approaches to the study of language. In addition to chapters with broad conceptual orientation, the volume offers detailed empirical studies of case in a number of diverse languages including: Amharic, Basque, Dutch, Hindi, Japanese, Kuuk Thaayorre, Malagasy and Yurakaré. The volume will be of interest to researchers and advanced students in the cognitive sciences, general linguistics, typology, historical linguistics, formal linguistics, and psycholinguistics. The book will interest scholars working within the context of formal syntactic and semantic theories as it provides insight into the properties of case from a cross-linguistic perspective. The book also will be of interest to cognitive scientists interested in the relationship between meaning and grammar, in particular, and the human mind's capacity in the mapping of meaning onto grammar, in general.

On Understanding Grammar

On Understanding Grammar PDF Author: Talmy Givón
Publisher: Academic Press
ISBN: 1483259935
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 396

Get Book Here

Book Description
On Understanding Grammar covers the interdependencies among the various aspects of linguistics and the human language. This eight-chapter text considers some pertinent topics in linguistics, such as discourse-pragmatics, diachronic syntax, topology, creology, method, and ontology. Chapter 1 describes the notions of fact, theory, and explanation, particularly about how these notions manifest themselves in actual practice. Chapter 2 redefines syntax in terms of communicative function and discourse-pragmatics, and about the relation between the function of grammatical devices and their formal properties. Chapter 3 deals with discourse-pragmatics and how it transcends the narrow bounds of deductive logic, as well as the function and ontology of negation in language, and how those relate to the fundamental information-theoretic principle of figure versus ground. Chapter 4 explores the two major aspects of case systems, namely, the semantic role and pragmatic function, and how the two interact in determining the typological characteristics of grammars. Chapter 5 examines the relation between discourse and syntax based on diachronic, ontogenetic, phylogenetic viewpoints. Chapter 6 tackles the relation between synchronic grammar and diachronic change, while Chapter 7 describes the relationship between human language and its phylogenetic evolution. Chapter 8 is about language and ontology, as well as the relation between cognition and the universe. This book will prove useful to linguistics and language researchers.

The Oxford Handbook of Case

The Oxford Handbook of Case PDF Author: Andrej Malchukov
Publisher: OUP Oxford
ISBN: 9780199695713
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 0

Get Book Here

Book Description
This Handbook provides a comprehensive account of current research on case and the morphological and syntactic phenomena associated with it. Scholars from all over the world provide overviews of current theoretical, typological, diachronic, and psycholinguistic research and assess cross-linguistic work on case and case-systems.