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The goal of this note is to offer a critical review of the contrastive analysis hypothesis within the field of second language acquisition. The notions of interlanguage, universal grammar and mental grammar are discussed. Transfer is redefined as the output of underlying rules in the grammar of a second language. Through Jackendoff’s notion of a mental grammar we reconcile the contribution of structural and generative grammar to the understanding of the phenomenon of transfer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Chomsky and his followers routinely introduce linguistic minimalism as a «program», in the sense that it merely provides some guidelines for the elaboration of grammatical theories proper. According to this orthodox interpretation, these theories can be attributed factual content, that is, content open to empirical refutation, but the program as such is immune to this type of rebuttal. This article discusses this vision of the minimalist «program» and proposes a reconceptualization of both minimalism and generativism in its different phases of development. According to this proposal, the minimalist thesis has factual content and minimalism, although it can be trivially described as programmatic, has an inescapably theoretical character. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides an insight on the centrality of two main paradigms of the current linguistic theory in the field of Spanish as a second/foreign language acquisition, and its operative role in teaching. Generative Grammar (GG) as well as Cognitive Grammar (CG) are mentalist models, however, its postulates on the connection between human cognition and non-native linguistic knowledge are, in many cases, opposite; therefore, these models imply different conceptions of a pedagogical grammar. Throughout the paper, it is taken into consideration the way in which they are antagonistic, but also how they can be complementary. Even though GC has been more popular in classroom teaching, current GG may have a relevant impact on the curriculum, as well as on the instruction, by presenting a greater predictive capacity to identify the learner’s difficulties in processing certain linguistic structures. Finally, other key notions on linguistic knowledge, processability, and input, regarding didactic intervention, are also provided. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The object of this article is twofold: on the first hand, to give an account of the enormous and growing number of derivatives formed from Anglicisms in present-day European Spanish; and secondly, to examine the different derivational patterns found as well as the morphophonological, morphological and semantic variations involved in them. The article also tackles the lexicographic treatment followed in dictionaries when dealing with compound anglicisms. The data have been mainly drawn from the Spanish daily press of the last few decades and they are mostly part of those collected in the Gran diccionario de anglicismos, gda (2017) and in the recent Diccionario de anglicismos del deporte, dad (2021). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides a general summary of some of the current issues in the field of Generative Grammar, the study of the human Faculty of Language. We review some key ideas this approach to language has put forward and pursued, focusing on the basic properties of language and its interactions with other systems. We also point at some of the possibilities that a biological approach to language offers to build bridges between Linguistics and other scientific disciplines. Throughout the paper we take into consideration the advantages that incorporating some of these ideas would have in Secondary Education, -not only for the potentially intrinsic value of linguistic knowledge, but also for the impact of this approach on more general skills like observing, describing and comparing data, reasoning, providing arguments and counterarguments, formulating generalizations, analyzing, summarizing or inferring. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Reflecting critically on the criteria that have led grammars of different theoretical approaches to distinguish types of subordinate sentences is one of the general objectives of this article. Traditionally, subordinate clauses have been classified as nominal, adjective or relative and adverbial or circumstantial clauses. Current theorical approaches in the framework of Generative Grammar (Hernánz, 2002; Bosque and G. Rexach, 2009; Brucart and Gallego, 2009) have emphasized that notional classifications give rise to unconstrained interpretations and unstable classifications. Moreover, Delbecque and Lamiroy (1999) distinguish degrees of abstraction in nominal category, which allow them to describe certain properties of nominal subordination. In this article, we start with the analysis of two types of nominal clauses: argument and appositive clauses, subordinated to abstract nouns (Leonetti, 1999). From the different grammatical status of these constructions and the differences in their use, which can be claimed, according to this author, as formal criteria for their characterization, I will investigate if these criteria can be applied to the recognition of other types of subordinate clauses in Spanish. Leonetti (1999) and Rodríguez Espiñeira (2003) postulate that it is necessary to identify the lexical nature of the abstract noun and the latter adds the discursive context as a relevant instance for the distinction between argumental or appositive functions. The explicitation of these recognition and analysis criteria is essential for the implementation of a didactic proposal at any level of education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In generative grammar it is generally assumed that argument prepositional phrases (PPs) can have two syntactic functions: argument and complement. Contrary to this assumption, I propose a unified syntactic treatment for all argument PPs, which, I suggest, is more appropriate to account for the main problems they pose. Focusing on Spanish, I will try to explain how the meaning of prepositional verbs is compositionally built by means of a lexical mechanism of coercion. My claim is based on Pustejovsky's Generative Lexicon theory, a sophisticated lexicist and generative model of combination of words. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article we present a study carried out between 2009 and 2011 in Moreno, a province of Buenos Aires, Argentina. One of the objectives was to obtain information about the lexical knowledge of secondary and higher education students in order to analyze it from a generative perspective. Some results of the research affirm that lexical knowledge is weak when it concerns clitic pronouns, but it is manifested with precision when branching is used. Knowledge about the meaning of the elements that integrate lexical forms tends to enable phonological and semantic associations, as well as morphological-syntactic associations, to a lesser degree. The level of hypothesizing about the meaning of unknown lexical forms, in many cases operates by phonological association with known forms, and to a lesser degree, with the speaker's knowledge of the meaning of lexical elements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present paper aims to evaluate the adequacy of two types of analysis of appositive constructions: the symmetric and asymmetric analysis. Grounded in contemporary generative grammar, it is shown that the symmetric analysis requires taking several assumptions about the nature of syntax. Thus, an asymmetric analysis is presented based on an underlying symmetric relation between both parts of the apposition. This proposal neutralizes the conceptual problems of a symmetric approach and, at the same time, permits to explain (i) the predicative nature of explicative appositions, (ii) its speaker-oriented character, (iii) the adjacency condition between both parts of appositive constructions, (iv) the presence of adverbs between both parts of the apposition, and (v) the difference on scope relations between quantifiers on both parts of the apposition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Relatively little research has been devoted to the role that Lexical Conceptual Structure plays in the semantics of Spanish. The present study analyzes the lexical entry of the se pronoun, covering its average and reflexive functions, as well as the verbs with which it is associated (e.g. quebrarse). Within the generative framework, the article proposes a model of lexical representation where both Lexical Conceptual Structure and the mechanism of percolation play a critical role in the derivation and interpretation of Spanish verbs with se. In addition, the article explores that the advantages the proposed model has over other models of lexical representation. Finally, a method is proposed which facilitates the teaching and learning of this pronoun in our Spanish courses, at any level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Normally, European languages are considered to express evidentiality only by lexical means, while numerous non-Indo-European languages present specific grammatical items which function as evidential markers. In recent years, numerous studies have pointed out the existence of evidential markers in various Indo-European languages, included Spanish. This article intends to be another contribution to the study of evidentiality in Spanish. My claim is that generalizations expressed with the particle se, on the one hand, and generalizing constructions with uno, 2nd person singular and 3rd person plural, on the other hand, contrast with each other in terms of evidentiality. While the latter constructions express a generalization based on the speaker’s personal experience, the se-construction refers to established rules or hearsay. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article studies the lexical formations in -ivo found in the 15th-century Castilian version of Bartholomaeus Anglicus' De proprietatibus rerum, translated by Vicente de Burgos. The article includes a side-by-side analysis of the occurrence and frequency of forms such as 'agregativo' or 'odorativo' and 'creativo' or 'nutritivo' in other texts and dictionaries (ADMYTE and CORDE corpora) and in the Latin version of the text that already register this lexical formations. The articles re-examines the concept of 'Latinism' and 'Neolatinism' applied to these forms, and, based on the translation, posits that they are preserved due to the Latinizing attitude of the author, seen in the lexicon, syntax, and textual construction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the present revision, it will be argued that two prestigious but incompatible linguistic theories (the generative and the systemic-functional) have been able to disconfirm and confirm some particular hypotheses from the basis of different pieces of empirical evidence. The particular confirmations of one theory or the other, are never conclusive, among other things, because there are apparently crucial experiences whose effects seem to favor (or contradict) one of the two theories considered. Both the generative and the systemic-functional theory are (like the rest of scientific theories) under-determined by the available evidence, however, this fact has not been an unavoidable obstacle for their development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Generative and systemic-functional theories may be conceived as scientific theories: they have confirmed hypotheses, they provide explanations, and based on these explanations, they make predictions. Nevertheless, both theories use incompatible assumptions about the same object: language. After analyzing the problem of confirmations and explanations in linguistics, this incompatibility will be treated in terms of "a principle of complementarity": Language is, simultaneously, a "faculty of the mind" and a "product of culture," but both aspects (the "mental" and the "cultural") cannot be captured by any single theory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Two mature and renowned linguistic theories --the generative and the functional-- hold incompatible hypotheses. In spite of that, both have made successful confirmations. Given that in science there are no crucial refutations, incompatibility does not pose an insurmountable problem to the development of linguistics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article proposes to demonstrate that the Colonial grammars of Mapuche (Mapudungu(n) contain valuable information with respect to the way the original ethnia called itself, in the XVII and XVIII centuries, and inclusive even at the beginning of the XIX. Antecedents about the name of the native Soil (home country, nation) and its language are provided. Denominations still remain in the collective memory of the People of the Land, which can be verified by investigating communities in what is known as Araucanía. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]