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The hypothesis that all languages are equally complex often invokes a trade-off principle, according to which if a language is more complex in one particular domain, it will be simpler in another different domain. In this paper, we use data from WALS to test the existence of a trade-off between two specific domains: morphology and syntax. Contrary to widespread views, we did not find a negative correlation between these two language domains, but in fact a positive correlation. At the same time, this positive correlation seems to be driven by some language families, and it disappears when one considers purely morphological and purely syntactic features only. We discuss these findings in relation to ongoing research about language complexity, and in particular, the effects of factors external to language on linguistic structure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we present data from an elicitation study and a corpus study that support the observation that the Yucatec Maya progressive aspect auxiliary táan is replaced by the habitual auxiliary k in sentences with contrastively focused fronted objects. Focus has been extensively studied in Yucatec, yet the incompatibility of object fronting and progressive aspect in Yucatec Maya remains understudied. Both our experimental results and our corpus study point in the direction that this incompatibility may very well be categorical. Theoretically, we take a progressive reading to be derived from an imperfectivity operator in combination with a singular operator, and we propose that this singular operator implicates the negation of event plurality, leading to an exhaustive interpretation which ranks below corrective focus on a contrastive focus scale. This means that, in a sentence with object focus fronting, the use of the marked auxiliary táan (as opposed to the more general k) would trigger two contrastive foci, which would be an unlikely and probably dispreferred speech act. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present paper explores descriptions of natural landscapes excerpted from two travel books, namely, The Old Patagonian Express: By Train through the Americas, by Paul Theroux, and Eastward to Tartary: Travels in the Balkans, the Middle East and the Caucasus, by Robert D. Kaplan. The paper aims at analyzing how certain linguistic choices in a given stretch of text conspire to construe the ambience of descriptive passages of natural landscapes in travel writing. This will be carried out by combining insights from Conceptual Metaphor Theory (CMT) and Frame Semantics (FS). I will be focusing on the ambience of the natural depictions, that is, the sense of the natural world evoked in the reader's mind by the language of the text. This will be dealt with by examining the lexical choices made by both authors, paying special attention to the adjectives. The excerpts under investigation have been selected since the descriptive language in them evokes frames and conceptual domains, which, in turn, yield a series of metaphors. These metaphors summarize the tone of the travel books, that is, the authorial texture and, especially, the ideological stance of the authors. Paul Theroux displays a more empathetic approach to the surrounding nature and its people, whereas Robert D. Kaplan adopts a more distant, analytical stance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of CIRCULO de Linguistica Aplicada a la Comunicacion is the property of Universidad Complutense de Madrid and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Studies about Language / Kalbu Studijos is the property of Studies about Language / Kalbu Studijos and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Google Translate is a machine translation service that is frequently and actively utilized worldwide. Sorani Kurdish, otherwise known as Central Kurdish, was officially added to Google Translate in May 2022. At the outset of the launch of Sorani Kurdish translation services, it is crucial to evaluate the quality of the translation and pave the way for improvements, if necessary. Taking into consideration both linguistic and cultural aspects, this paper aims to critically assess the accuracy of English-Sorani Kurdish translations produced by Google Translate. For this purpose, the paper has adopted a textual analysis approach based on the notion of equivalence to critically analyze samples of translations generated by Google Translate. The results suggest that Google Translate is largely accurate at morphological and syntactic levels but improvements are needed to overcome the minor deficiencies detected in rendering future perfect and perfect progressive tenses, third conditional sentences and passive tenses (especially in the case of progressive and perfect progressive tenses). With regard to the semantic level, Google Translate has proved accurate in processing non-equivalence terms and polysemous words, but it has assumed an utter failure in translating idioms and proverbs. With regard to the cultural level, in over third-fourths of instances, Google Translate renders English cultural terms into Sorani Kurdish accurately, whereas in nearly one-fourth of instances, it offers inappropriate translation. As far as English into Sorani Kurdish translation is concerned, Google Translate can be deemed effective as a supportive translation tool but it is far from being perfect, and continuous improvements will be needed to respond to the errors and deficiencies unearthed in this study. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the use of surprise frames in judicial opinions of the HKSAR. Specifically, it examines the semantic variation of surprise frames and the discourse purposes for which they are used. In doing so, it explores the underlying interactivity of surprise frames by distinguishing between performative expressions of surprise (those that emanate from the current author's reflection) and descriptive expressions (those that report on another's sense of surprise). Recognising that legal discourse scholars often neglect lower courts, the paper contrasts opinions from three levels of court in the HKSAR. Genre and court-specific patterns emerge: a key similarity is that all three courts, performatively and descriptively, most often use the TYPICALITY frame. Key differences include a significantly greater use of the TYPICALITY frame by the appeal courts in relation to the trial courts; more qualitatively oriented analysis shows that the use of surprise frames maps onto the common law standard of review, i.e., the appeal courts largely use surprise frames to focus on legal issues. In contrast, the trial courts focus on facts and evidence. The article concludes with a discussion of the implications of the main findings for researchers and professionals. • Surprise frames in the majority opinions of 119 HKSAR court cases analysed. • Three levels of court are analysed. • A distinction is made between performative and descriptive frames. • All courts used the TYPICALITY frame most frequently. • Appeal courts focus on legal issues, trial courts on facts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The goal of this paper is to offer a unified account of Place as a central theoretical notion across different disciplines. We show that while psychology, geography and other sciences have been converging to a unified view of this notion, linguistics still offers a fragmented perspective. Consequently, place names lack a full-fledged analysis that connects this category to the psychological concept of place. We propose to overcome this impasse by introducing a multi-modal Discourse Representation Theory (DRT) account of place as a conceptual construct and place concepts as specific instances of this construct. We show that current variants of DRT permit us to model place names and their senses, i.e., the meaning(s) that individuals associate with Sydney. We then model non-linguistic place concepts, i.e., the mental representation(s) that individuals can have of the city carrying this name. We present a model of the relation between linguistic meaning and conceptual content via the notion of anchoring relations applied to place. We pair this formal treatment with a morpho-syntactic account of place names building on current generative syntax treatments of proper names. Once we have a morpho-syntactic and semantic model of place names, we use a frame semantics treatment to account for lexical relations among place names. We test the overarching model on a set of recalcitrant problems afflicting current linguistic and multi-disciplinary treatments of place. These are the grammatical complexity and lexical content of place names, place concepts and their networks, and inter-subjective, communicative models of place in discourse. By solving these problems, our account integrates several frameworks (DRT, conceptual analysis, generative syntax, frame semantics) and connects several disciplines (linguistics, psychology, geographic information science, communication models) via a novel, multi-modal account of place. We conclude by discussing the theoretical and empirical import of these results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper addresses the question of structural change in relative clauses in heritage speakers of two varieties of Venetan, a northern Italo-Romance language. It will be shown that appositive and restrictive relative clauses are not structurally distinguished in Brazilian Venetan, while they display different structural properties in Italian Venetan. It will be proposed that the phenomenon described in the paper does not depend on transfer from another language and it is not exclusively a matter of processing. The approach presented here aims to account for structural change in syntactic terms, without resorting to extra-linguistic factors. Heritage grammars are autonomous systems and follow predictable paths of language variation, as such, variation may take place at an interface level and at a syntactic level alike. This does not exclude possible influences from the dominant language, which, however, do not need to be taken as the only triggers of change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present paper examines Bashkir and Kalmyk construction formed from transitive verbs by means of causative suffixes1. We refer to these constructions to "constructions with a morphological causative". The paper also references other Altaic languages (Mishar Tatar, Nanai, Tuvinian, Khakas). The main focus of the paper is on the valence-increasing behavior of causatives. Primary attention is drawn to the case marking of the Causee since Altaic languages allow several options for that. The paper describes in detail the existing alternation and reviews prior explanations of this phenomenon. It then couches the explanation for the alternation within the framework of Role and Reference Grammar. The analysis identifies that Altaic constructions in question are somehow peculiar compared to general trends. After discussing the advantages and drawbacks of various theoretical interpretations of this peculiarity, we conclude that it is best to link two different causative constructions to two different logical structures. We also suggest constructional schemata for Kalmyk and Bashkir to include in the Linking Algorithm. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the prosodic patterns of complex DP structures in Xitsonga by looking at penultimate lengthening in DPs with marked and unmarked word orders of different types. We discuss the underlying syntactic structures and prosodic realizations of Xitsonga DPs. We are particularly interested in the way in which recursion applies in the Xitsonga DP, where it surfaces in DPs with multiple modifiers of the same or different categories that appear in fronted (i.e., pre-nominal) positions. We propose that in Xitsonga nominal constituents move to a left-periphery-like position within the DP domain and that this position matches to a focus-marked phonological phrase. This type of phonological phrase is forced to remain in the phonology even if the one-word phrase violates the Binarity constraint. We argue that the penultimate lengthening effects found in Xitsonga with the reordering of DP internal elements are best analyzed as showing sensitivity to this focus-marked phonological phrase. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines switch reference (SR) in A'ingae, an understudied isolate language from Amazonian Ecuador. We present a theoretically informed survey of SR, identifying three distinct uses of switch reference: in clause chaining, adverbial clauses, and so-called 'bridging' clause linkage. We describe the syntactic and semantic properties of each use in detail, the first such description for A'ingae, showing that the three constructions differ in important ways. While leaving a full syntactic analysis to future work, we argue that these disparate properties preclude a syntactic account that unifies these three constructions to the exclusion of other environments without SR. Conversely, while a full semantic account is also left to future work, we suggest that a unified semantic account in terms of discourse coherence principles appears more promising. In particular, we propose that switch reference in A'ingae occurs in all and only the constructions that are semantically restricted to non-structuring coordinating coherence relations in the sense of Segmented Discourse Representation Theory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Punctuation, of paramount significance in written discourse analysis, is a highly developed system which modifies linguistic forms on phonological, morphological, syntactic and semantic strata in written texts. Nevertheless, until recently, it has not received ample attention due to remaining in the shade of prosody or grammatical relations. In the last few decades, strikingly, it has been established that a genuine conception of the written language is impracticable if punctuation is not taken into consideration. Meanwhile, cross-linguistic studies have been recommended by some scholars (e.g. Little, 1986; Krahn, 2014); thus, though some studies have been conducted comparing the English punctuation system with that of other languages, there is a dearth of studies exploring this crucial aspect of written discourse in English and Kurdish. Therefore, drawing on Krahn's new paradigm (2014) which treats punctuation as an independent linguistic feature of the written modality, the present paper aims to cross-examine the punctuation system in both languages in a quest for outlining any similarities and differences that the two languages uncover in this area. More specifically, the study seeks to answer these questions: 1) How are the punctuation marks different or similar in English and Kurdish? 2) Does the punctuation system exhibit the same level of complexity in both languages? 3) Are all the punctuation marks manifested in English realised in Kurdish either and vice versa? The paper is purely based on a qualitative research approach. The results show that the two languages bear significant similarities and differences in the manifestation and employment of punctuation symbols. Yet, the punctuation system in English is more complex than Kurdish. Punctuation in the static and dynamic axes instantiates an area of considerable divergence between the two languages-though some similarities are predominant. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Machine reading comprehension (MRC) is a task in natural language comprehension. It assesses machine reading comprehension based on text reading and answering questions. Traditional attention methods typically focus on one of syntax or semantics, or integrate syntax and semantics through a manual method, leaving the model unable to fully utilize syntax and semantics for MRC tasks. In order to better understand syntactic and semantic information and improve machine reading comprehension, our study uses syntactic and semantic attention to conduct text modeling for tasks. Based on the BERT model of Transformer encoder, we separate a text into two branches: syntax part and semantics part. In syntactic component, an attention model with explicit syntactic constraints is linked with a self-attention model of context. In semantics component, after the framework semantic parsing, the lexical unit attention model is utilized to process the text in the semantic part. Finally, the vectors of the two branches converge into a new vector. And it can make answer predictions based on different types of data. Thus, a syntactic and semantic attention-guided machine reading comprehension (SSAG-Net) is formed. To test the model's validity, we ran it through two MRC tasks on SQuAD 2.0 and MCTest, and the SSAG-Net model outperformed the baseline model in both. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Etudes Romanes de Brno is the property of Masaryk University, Faculty of Arts and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The goal of this paper is to offer a cross-linguistic analysis of the most commonly occurring additive focus adverbs used in Italian, French and English - namely anche, aussi and also - on the basis of a corpus of written texts. The corpus used in this paper consists of comparable online news in Italian, French and English amounting to approximately 750000 words. In line with previous findings, our results show that there are important quantitative and qualitative differences between It. anche, Fr. aussi and E. also. These items differ not only in their overall frequency of use but also in the specific syntactic configurations in which they occur when they associate with the Subject of a canonical sentence. These differences are partly enhanced by the fact that this paper concentrates on a non-prototypical configuration, i. e. on the cases in which the canonical Subject coincides with a new entity while the Predicate is maintained. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Domínios de Lingu@gem is the property of Dominios de Lingu@gem and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This paper provides a syntactic analysis of two types of compounds in Greek: synthetic and phrasal compounds derived from agentive nominalizations of verbal strings containing an internal argument of the verb. The analysis is couched within a 'morphology as syntax' account and uses independently motivated syntactic tools to show that both types of compounds are derived in syntax proper without any need for a separate morphological component. The differences in the syntactic properties of the two types of compounds are explained with reference to the 'size' or 'complexity' of the projected internal arguments, which can be either 'roots', in the case of synthetic compounds, or unquantized nominals projected as NumPs, which require special licensing conditions in the case of phrasal compounds. Differences in prosodic and semantic interpretation are also explained with reference to phase theory and the type/number of phase domains within the structure of the two types of compounds. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The 'mathematical language' Automath, conceived by N.G. de Bruijn in 1968, was the first theorem prover actually working and was used for checking many specimina of mathematical content. Its goals and syntactic ideas inspired Th. Coquand and G. Huet to develop the calculus of constructions, CC ([1]), which was one of the first widely used interactive theorem provers and forms the basis for the widely used Coq system ([2]). The original syntax of Automath ([3, 4]) is not easy to grasp. Yet, it is essentially based on a derivation system that is similar to the Calculus of Constructions ('CC'). The relation between the Automath syntax and CC has not yet been sufficiently described, although there are many references in the type theory community to Automath. In this paper we focus on the backgrounds and on some uncommon aspects of the syntax of Automath. We expose the fundamental aspects of a 'generic' Automath system, encapsulating the most common versions of Automath. We present this generic Automath system in a modern syntactic frame. The obtained system makes use of λD, a direct extension of CC with definitions described in [5]. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Interrogatives are conventionally associated with the act of requesting information. Several researches have been carried out on the syntax of standard Yorùbá (SY) and its dialects but with little attention paid to the syntax of interrogatives in CY dialects and the comparative analysis of interrogatives in the standard dialect and Central Yorùbá (CY) dialects especially under the confines of the latest theoretical requirements. This paper therefore, investigated the syntax of interrogatives in SY and the CY dialects with a view to comparing how they both form their interrogatives. Data were sourced using primary and secondary methods. These were subjected to syntactic analysis within the theoretical framework of the Minimalist Program (MP). Interrogative features setting CY dialects apart from SY were identified: CY dialect operate yèsí/ìsí "who" in the place of ta used by SY (to question human referents). Focus markers are also optionally dropped in CY dialects unlike their SY counterpart. Also, CY dialects use the question noun (QN) kí for both non-human referents Kí lo rí "What did you see?" and maner Kí o ṣe gbọ́ "How did you hear?". Among the similarities identified is that both CY dialects and SY do not observe Attract the Closest Principle (ACP) when they stack QNs in their constituent interrogatives. Therefore, many of the items that in SY take their sources from its dialects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Natural Semantic Metalanguage (NSM) approach to language studies has been applied to languages such as English, French, Russian, Malay, Spanish, Italian, Arabic, Japanese, Chinese, and Korean. The indigenous languages in Africa that have gained scholarly attention in NSM studies are Ewe, Fulfulde, Amharic, Likpe, Wolof, Giryama, and Igala. Akan, the most widely spoken language in Ghana, has not been explored. This paper explores the extent to which the translation equivalents of the set of semantic primes are expressible in Akan, with special reference to the Asante Twi dialect. Sentences or sentence fragments that exemplify the allowable grammatical contexts of the NSM primes were used as data. The claim in NSM research is that semantic primes are universal or near-universal meanings that can be expressed as lexical units or morphemes in every language. We found that in Akan, almost all the lexical equivalents correspond in a straightforward manner with the English primes and their syntactic frames. However, the semantic prime MOMENT seems problematic to posit and thus, needs further investigation. The set of NSM semantic primes in the Asante dialect of Akan can serve as a valuable tool for descriptive linguists, especially semanticists, to analyze Akan culture-specific meanings and test their semantic equivalence with the corresponding vocabulary in English and other languages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a joint project of the Humboldt Chair of Digital Humanities at the University of Leipzig, the Perseus Digital Library at Tufts University, and the Harvard Center for Hellenic Studies to produce a new open series of Greek and Latin fragmentary authors. Such authors are lost and their works are preserved only thorugh quotations and text reuses by later texts. The project is undertaking two tasks: 1) the digitization of paper editions of fragmentary works linking them to the source texts from which the fragments have been excerpted; 2) the production of born-digital editions of fragmentary works. The ultimate goals are the creation of open, linked, machine-actionable texts for the study and advancement of the Classical textual fragmentary heritage and the development of a collaborative environment for crowdsourced annotations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Borealis: An International Journal of Hispanic Linguistics is the property of Nordic Council for Reindeer Husbandry Research and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Journal of Estonian & Finno-Ugric Linguistics / Eesti ja Soome-ugri Keeleteaduse Ajakiri is the property of University of Tartu Press and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The paper starts from the assumption that organizational culture can be defined as the type of behavior, mainly considered in interactional terms, which is deemed acceptable by the employees (Hofstede 45). By analyzing frames, footing and their changes, the paper aims to compare the culture in two companies-a joint company (Romanian Belgium where English is used as the language of communication) and a Romanian one. The data used for the analysis come from two face-to-face meetings in these two companies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Examination of the Czech Language is a milestone on the path to gaining permanent residence in the Czech Republic for many non-EU residents. In this paper, the Language Examination is regarded in its formal, contentual, and contextual aspects from an experience-based perspective. In the beginning, the topic of administration and language methodology regarding crucial points in preparation and processing of the Exam is emphasized. The requirements of Czech and European language policy (from which the Examination is derived) are mentioned, and specific attention is paid to the oral section of the Exam as assessing the most significant language skill - speaking. In a later section, the set of the statistical data of the Exam and its results are analyzed where research findings amplify these data. The results show some unfavorable outcomes among a highly variable success rate. Testing and evaluation of the Exam are framed in the linguistic and socio-cultural context, and the potential of the Exam specifically for the integration of the Vietnamese applicants behind the monitored data and processes is illustrated. The lack of systematic language learning was detected as the main limitation of integration and overall perception of the importance of the exam among these foreign residents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Novice Geography researchers need to be acquainted with the rhetorical move structure and organization of scientific research article abstracts (RAAs); yet there is a lack of studies investigating the linguistic realizations involved and their connections to the rhetorical move structure in Geography RAAs. This paper conducted a multidimensional analysis to explore phrase frames/collocations and move length and their connection to the rhetorical move structure and sequence in 190 Geography RAAs from journals indexed in the Web of Science Master Journal List. The move structure was investigated employing Hyland’s (2004) move scheme, Introduction-Purpose-Method-Product-Conclusion. The results revealed that Geography RAAs have a five-move structure, consisting of three “essential” moves whose functions are to present Purpose, Methods and Results, and two “conventional” moves, whose functions are to present Introduction and Conclusion. The findings of the multidimensional analyses indicated that the moves that occurred most frequently in Geography RAAs (Purpose, Methods and Results) occupied most text space and included more phrase frames. The findings indicate the importance of combining investigations of the rhetorical move structure in a particular genre with an exploration of the linguistic realizations in each move as this may provide both researchers and English for Academic Purposes (EAP) tutors with valuable resources for understanding the rhetorical and linguistic characteristics of specific RAA types. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Cuadernos de Lingüística de el Colegio de México is the property of El Colegio de Mexico AC and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This paper presents an approach used for automated generations of software constraints. In this model, the SBVR (Semantics of Business Vocabulary and Rules) based semi-formal representation is obtained from the syntactic and semantic analysis of a NL (Natural Language) (such as English) sentence. A SBVR representation is easy to translate to other formal languages as SBVR is based on higher-order logic like other formal languages such as OCL (Object Constraint Language). The proposed model endows with a systematic and powerful system of incorporating NL knowledge on the formal languages. A prototype is constructed in Java (an Eclipse plug-in) as a proof of the concept. The performance was tested for a few sample texts taken from existing research thesis reports and books. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Linguistica is the property of Linguistica and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Framing is the least well-developed central concept of prospect theory. Framing is both fundamental to prospect theory and remarkably underdeveloped in the prospect theory literature. This paper focuses on the many subtypes and variations of framing: thematic vs. evaluative; successful vs. failed; productive vs. counterproductive; purposeful, structural and interactive framing; counterframing; loss frames vs. gain frames; revolving framing vs. sequential framing; framing by a third party; and framing vs. priming. The bulk of the paper provides an analysis of framing and framing effects in foreign policy settings with an emphasis on U.S. foreign policy. We highlight framing effects during the Cold War, the Persian Gulf War, the current "war on terrorism", and other IR/foreign policy settings. Our examination highlights the extent to which presidents and other significant world leaders use framing to shape policy debates and national security choices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a case study on German compounds which have -stoff ('stuff /material/matter') as their head. The basic claim is that the head noun narrows down the range of interpretations by introducing a pragmatic scaffold which we pin down as a conceptual script. We obtained a data set by querying a large corpus selecting 4,026 nominal Stoff-compound lemmas. Using the 100 most frequent compounds as our development set, we observed 72 substance-denoting, five fabric-denoting and 11 knowledge-denoting compounds (corresponding to the basic meanings of Stoff in isolation according to standard dictionaries). From the observation that substance compounds (e.g. Farbstoff 'colouring agent'; Impfstoff 'vaccine') cluster around two events, synthesis and application, we induce a script consisting of these two event frames connecting three kinds of states. A Stoff-compound may thus be expected to denote an entity which is either the starting material of a synthesis (Rohstoff 'raw material'), an addendum in synthesis (Süßstoff 'sweetening agent'), the product of synthesis and, at the same time, an occasion for application (Kunststoff 'synthetic material'), or the instrument of application (Sprengstoff 'explosive'). As for fabric compounds (e.g. Seidenstoff 'silk fabric'), we argue that fabrication is a special kind of synthesis. Knowledge compounds (e.g. Lesestoff 'reading material') arguably result from a metaphoric transfer to the immaterial domain, with the two events acquisition (counterpart of synthesis) and contribution (counterpart of application). In this article, we test the obtained model against two test sets comprising 50 compounds with medium and low frequencies, respectively. Since it turns out that almost all test items successfully integrate into the script, our study provides support for pragmatic theories of compounding, according to which the interpretation of a compound is crucially guided by stereotype knowledge associated with the given compound's constituents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the advent of becoming a modem nation, it is typical that achievement will be measured through power rankings and material fulfilment. One of the most important elements that most people forget is that the true meaning of happiness will define a strong soul in confronting greater challenges in life. Happiness is an area that is mostly subjective. However, that is the major centre of discussion in Disnman's play, It Is Not A Suicide. In this play, the main character is going through a traumatic experience whereby Adam is trying to redefine the meaning of happiness using his own interpretations. This paper focuses on Dinsman's absurd theatre style which is prominent in this play. His experiments had successfully highlighted a situation that portrays the weaknesses of humans when the concept of happiness had been misperceived. The confusions become the central thrust of the entire play, where meaning of life is questioned. The painful situation portrayed in the play reflects that humans live in a superficial, empty and meaningless life. The issues raised by the playwright had called for a special attention that the Malay Muslim perception of the concept of happiness should be realigned according to the Islamic teachings specifically. Hence, it becomes an important aspect that should be discussed at the fundamental level. For the purpose of this paper, the discussion will be carried out through the lens of Naquib Al-Attas' Concept of Happiness. It is hoped that this paper will highlight some solutions that would help to guide many in understanding the importance of finding the true meaning of happiness in order to gain a well-balanced life in this present world and the hereafter. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper attempts to identify factors underlying apparent correlations between the level of descriptivity in verbs of self-agentive locomotion and the range of syntactic constructions in which these verbs may occur. While it has become clear that event structure theories provide a partial account of the connections between verbal semantics and syntactic behaviour, Boas's account (2006, 2008), deriving from the theory elaborated by Snell-Hornby (1983), would seem to be on the right track in offering a more fne-grained analysis of verbal lexical semantic structure. What remains to be answered is which elements of a verb's meaning are syntactically relevant and what underlies their sensitivity to syntax. The paper argues that an account of a verb's syntactic applicability must appeal to the interaction between the verb's lexical semantic structure and the causal structuration of a situation as encoded in a given construction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Borealis: An International Journal of Hispanic Linguistics is the property of Nordic Council for Reindeer Husbandry Research and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Borealis: An International Journal of Hispanic Linguistics is the property of Nordic Council for Reindeer Husbandry Research and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Studies about Language / Kalbu Studijos is the property of Studies about Language / Kalbu Studijos and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The rebranding of reggaetón towards Latin urban has been criticized for tokenizing Afro-Caribbean linguistic and cultural practices as symbolic resources recruitable by non-Caribbean artists/executives in the interest of profit. Consumers are particularly critical of an audible phonological homogeneity in the performances of ethnonationally distinct mainstream performers, framed as a form of linguistic minstrelsy popularly termed a 'Caribbean Blaccent' that facilitates capitalization on the genre's popularity by tapping into the covert prestige of distinctive phonological elements of Insular Caribbean Spanish otherwise stigmatized. This work pairs acoustic analysis with quantitative statistical modeling to compare the use of lenited coronal sibilant allophones popularly considered indexical of Hispano-Caribbean origins in the spoken and sung speech of four of the genre's top-charting female performers. A general pattern of style-shifting from interview to sung speech wherein sibilance is favored in the former and phonetic zeros in the latter is revealed. Moreover, a statistically significant increased incidence of [-] across time shows the most recent records to uniformly deploy near-categorical reduction independent of artists' sociocultural and linguistic backgrounds. The results support the enregisterment of practices popularized by the genre's San Juan-based pioneers as a stylistic resource—a reggaetón voice—for engaging the images of vernacularity sustaining and driving the contemporary, mainstream popularity of música urbana. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Weakly supervised temporal language grounding (TLG) aims to locate events in untrimmed videos based on natural language queries without temporal annotations, necessitating a deep understanding of semantic context across both video and text modalities. Existing methods often focus on simple correlations between query phrases and isolated video segments, neglecting the event-oriented semantic coherence and consistency required for accurate temporal grounding. This can lead to misleading results due to partial frame correlations. To address these limitations, we propose the Event-oriented State Alignment Network (ESAN), which constructs "start–event–end" semantic state sets for both textual and video data. ESAN employs relative entropy for cross-modal alignment through knowledge distillation from pre-trained large models, thereby enhancing semantic coherence within each modality and ensuring consistency across modalities. Our approach leverages vision–language models to extract static frame semantics and large language models to capture dynamic semantic changes, facilitating a more comprehensive understanding of events. Experiments conducted on two benchmark datasets demonstrate that ESAN significantly outperforms existing methods. By reducing false high correlations and improving the overall performance, our method effectively addresses the challenges posed by previous approaches. These advancements highlight the potential of ESAN to improve the precision and reliability of temporal language grounding tasks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper addresses the classification of morphemes in a generative framework. Referring to existing theoretical models of generative morphosyntax (e.g. Distributed Morphology), it demonstrates that a traditional long-standing taxonomic distinction reflects formal, i.e. structural (and derivational) distinctions. Using the well-known examples of the English multi-functional nominalizer -ing and some parallel data in Czech, the study reinterprets morphological taxonomy in terms of three levels, namely the (i) lexical, (ii) syntactic and (iii) post-syntactic insertion of grammatical formatives. It shows that the level of insertion in a syntactic derivation results in predictable (and attested) diagnostics for the multi-morpheme exponents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we analyze the prefabricated construction quand on X, Y ('when one X, Y') in a corpus constituted out of queries in the CLAPI database (clapi.univ-lyon2.fr). The construction comes out in different formats, most frequently as quand on X, on X, where the pronoun is repeated in the second part of the construction (quand on vieillit on y voit de moins en moins). But it may also take the form quand on X, y, the second part (y) can either include the pronoun je, tu, il etc. ("quand on est acculé euh j`trouve qù c'est quand même pas normal"), sometimes ça, or it can be introduced by c'est or il y a ("quand on est volontaire oui c'est bien"). Because of these numerous variations of the construction we considered the combination of a (macro)syntactic approach with a pragmatic and interactional analysis as particularly interesting. One of our aims in this paper is thus to relate a syntactic analysis of spoken French to the analysis of French spoken in interaction. Therefore we study syntactic features in their sequential context and in relation to their interactional functions. Insofar and by the description of this single construction we propose a way to combine the analysis of grammar and interaction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Stylistics is the application of theoretical ideas and analytical techniques drawn from Linguistics and Socio-Linguistics to the study of literary text. The study of style in literature can be referred as a figurative language, use of dialects, grammatical choices as an indicator of style, meter, and rhythm. It can be further described as the study of literature as a mode of communication. The modern Literary Stylistics draws upon the area and adds to it the interpretive goals of modern Literary Criticism. In both cases, the use of linguistic methodology has allowed stylistics to move beyond earlier normative and prescriptive descriptions of correct styles to a fuller analysis of language itself and the purposes to which the language is put. The aim of the paper is not only to describe the formal features of the texts for the own sake, but in order to show the functional significance for the interpretation of the text. This paper discusses the fictions of Bapsi Sidhwa. It deals about the use of poetical terms in the novels, Lexical analysis, Structure of the novel, cohesion and coherence in the novels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present paper discusses the occurrence, structure, and complexity of the postmodifier in the Nigerian English noun phrase (NP) showing tendencies for structural simplification. It also compares its findings with patterns in British, Ghanaian, Singaporean, Honk Kong varieties. The paper shows how variables representing syntactic function, register, and weight shed light on specific contexts where we might or might not find (1) NP with or without a postmodifier (2) a clausal or phrasal postmodifier, and (3) a simple or a complex postmodifier. In addition, the paper shows that the extent of variation among different varieties of English is dependent on variables crucial to the construction choices being investigated. For instance, in (1), a postmodifier is realised while no postmodifier is realised in (2). (1) My car which I just bought last week has been stolen, and (2) My car has been stolen.The NP in (1) is structurally complex because it realises the clausal type of post modifier, 'which I just bought last week'. Meanwhile in (2), the NP (the car) lacks a postmodifier. In other words, the occurrence viz-a-viz non-occurrence of a postmodifier contributes to the overall structural and semantic complexity of the entire noun phrases, irrespective of the syntactic positions of the NP. Quantitative analyses of 8897 NPs indicate that in Nigerian NPs, a postmodifier is more unlikely to occur (61%) than not (39%). Further analyses show that prepositional phrase (57%), rather than clause (32%) or adjective (9%) or adverbials (2%), is the most preferred structural postmodifier type. It is also shown that realised postmodifiers are more likely to be structured in two-to-four words (51%) than four-words above. As for the predictive strength of variables studied, syntactic function is found to edge register in asserting influence and explaining different scenarios and contexts where we might or might not find a postmodifier, together with its structural type and weight. In other words, register, which is reputed as a significant indicator of structural variation (Biber, 2007; De Haan, 1993; Schilk and Schaub, 2016) is outweighed by syntactic function. The study further attests that significant structural simplification is largely present in the postmodifier structure of the Nigerian English noun phrase. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Catalan Journal of Linguistics is the property of Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The aim of the present paper is to test the claim that contact simplifies language (cf. Kusters, 2008) by comparing the domain of relative clause formation in British English, a L1 variety, and Indian English, a L2 variety. According to Hawkins (1999), the processing cost of relativizing a noun phrase increases down the Accessibility Hierarchy (Subject > Direct Object> Indirect Object > Oblique > Genitive> Object of Comparison) proposed by Keenan and Comrie (1977). Subject relative clauses are thus easier to process than direct object relatives, and so on. The results of a corpus study of the British and Indian components of the International Corpus of English show that the Accessibility Hierarchy has an indirect effect on the production of relative clauses in British English and Indian English: whereas the distribution of relative clauses with respect to the hierarchy is very similar in both varieties, the number of complex relatives, i.e., with coordination or further embedding, decreases in the lower positions in Indian English. These results thus suggest that language contact plays a significant role in relative clause use and accounts for certain differences between L1 and L2 varieties of English in this grammatical domain. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Syntactic awareness is the ability to monitor and manipulate word order within sentences. It is unclear whether children with dyslexia have syntactic awareness problems, as there are mixed results in the literature. Dyslexia is typically classified with very poor word and nonword reading and phonological processing problems are often observed in this population. It is conceivable that a phonological deficit could strain memory when performing oral syntactic awareness tasks. Here we examine if syntactic awareness problems are observed in children with dyslexia once phonological processing and memory skills are controlled. Methods: Real and nonword reading efficiency tests determined reading level. Children with dyslexia (n = 25) were compared to typically developing children (n = 24) matched for age (M = 8;8) and nonverbal abilities. Syntactic awareness was measured with an oral word order correction task (e.g., Is baking Lisa and her son in his room sleeps). Tests of phonological awareness, phonological memory, and verbal working memory were also administered and served as controls. Results: The dyslexic group performed worse than typically developing readers on syntactic awareness and this group difference persisted once phonological memory and verbal working memory were controlled. However, after controlling for phonological awareness skills, there were no group differences on the syntactic awareness test. Discussion: The results suggest that phonological awareness problems in particular might be responsible for syntactic awareness difficulties in dyslexia and future studies should control for this. The results are discussed within theoretical frameworks on the nature of oral language deficits in dyslexia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This study investigates the interplay between strategic goals and calculative practices, specifically Customer Profitability Analysis (CPA). Drawing on practice-based theories, the research aims to understand how managers strategize with CPA, including the balancing of financial and strategic objectives and the interplay of institutionalized practices with individual practitioners' actions. Design: The study uses a qualitative, revelatory, and exploratory case study approach at the sub-organizational level in a manufacturing company. The researchers compare CPA practices across six departments, guided by a phenomenological research design. Data collection methods include informal conversations, qualitative observations, written documentation, numerical evidence from the accounting system, and interviews. Findings: The study offers four novel findings to the field. First, it highlights how managers employ procedural and interactive strategizing to reframe CPA practices. The sophistication of CPA practices increases with unevenly distributed customer volume, high customer-specific, controllable overhead, customer-to-customer interaction, and service complexity. Conversely, the sophistication of cost-focused CPA practices tends to decrease with diverse strategic goals. Additionally, CPA become more effective through the utilization of non-financial information, employee empowerment, localization, and strategic alignment. Second, CPA can be adapted through integrative strategizing where managers avoid using it as a financial benchmark for strategic initiatives. Third, accountants actively seek intermediary roles to incorporate arguments from strategy and marketing to balance strategic objectives–contrary to their portrayal as myopic guardians of profitability. Fourth, the localization of CPA practices to front-line employees compensates for a lack of sophisticated CPA practices. Future research: Future research should, investigate the adaptation of calculative practices in different cultures, and industries. Exploring additional contextual factors such as uncertainty, management characteristics, and linguistic framing of practices would be beneficial. Examining the interactions in utilizing CPA practices between front-line staff and customers would shed light on their effectiveness. Lastly, investigating the role of consultants in diffusing such practices would offer valuable perspectives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes the resource- and system-building efforts of an eight-week Johns Hopkins University Human Language Technology Center of Excellence Summer Camp for Applied Language Exploration (SCALE-2009) on Semantically-Informed Machine Translation (SIMT). We describe a new modality/negation (MN) annotation scheme, the creation of a (publicly available) MN lexicon, and two automated MN taggers that we built using the annotation scheme and lexicon. Our annotation scheme isolates three components of modality and negation: a trigger (a word that conveys modality or negation), a target (an action associated with modality or negation) and a holder (an experiencer of modality). We describe how our MN lexicon was semi-automatically produced and we demonstrate that a structure-based MN tagger results in precision around 86% (depending on genre) for tagging of a standard LDC data set. We apply our MN annotation scheme to statistical machine translation using a syntactic framework that supports the inclusion of semantic annotations. Syntactic tags enriched with semantic annotations are assigned to parse trees in the target-language training texts through a process of tree grafting. While the focus of our work is modality and negation, the tree grafting procedure is general and supports other types of semantic information.We exploit this capability by including named entities, produced by a pre-existing tagger, in addition to the MN elements produced by the taggers described in this paper. The resulting system significantly outperformed [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we present our attempts to design and implement a large-coverage computational grammar for the Persian language based on the Generalized Phrase Structured Grammar (GPSG) model. This grammatical model was developed for continuous speech recognition (CSR) applications, but is suitable for other applications that need the syntactic analysis of Persian. In this work, we investigate various syntactic structures relevant to the modern Persian language, and then describe these structures according to a phrase structure model. Noun (N), Verb (V), Adjective (ADJ), Adverb (ADV), and Preposition (P) are considered basic syntactic categories, and X-bar theory is used to define Noun phrases, Verb phrases, Adjective phrases, Adverbial phrases, and Prepositional phrases. However, we have to extend Noun phrase levels in X-bar theory to four levels due to certain complexities in the structure of Noun phrases in the Persian language. A set of 120 grammatical rules for describing different phrase structures of Persian is extracted, and a few instances of the rules are presented in this paper. These rules cover the major syntactic structures of the modern Persian language. For evaluation, the obtained grammatical model is utilized in a bottom-up chart parser for parsing 100 Persian sentences. Our grammatical model can take 89 sentences into account. Incorporating this grammar in a Persian CSR system leads to a 31% reduction in word error rate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]