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Languages have several grammatical means of expressing the relation between speaker and addressee, including speech-style particles, politeness pronouns, allocutive marking, and honorifics. Despite the similarity in the meaning they convey, these politeness markers fall into two distributional classes: some ('content-oriented markers of politeness') can occur in complement clauses, while others ('utterance-oriented markers of politeness') are restricted to matrix contexts. Focusing on speech-style markers in Korean and second-person pronouns in Romance languages (especially Italian), we develop a dynamic pragmatics model of the distinct kind of meaning that they encode and provide an analysis that accounts for their distributional differences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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В статье рассматриваются инфинитивные конструкции с частицей ЖЕ. Анализ показывает, что существует три различных частицы ЖЕ: дискурсивная частица ЖЕ, которая напоминает собеседнику об уже известной информации, ЖЕ2, которая указывает на кореферентность двух субъектов, и противительная частица ЖЕ3, которая указывает на противопоставление двух субъектов. В инфинитивных конструкциях с частицей ЖЕ строго закреплен порядок слов. Все конструкции рассматриваются отдельно и в сопоставлении с аналогичной конструкцией без ЖЕ. В результате выделяются конструкции, в которых семан- тика сводится к сумме базовой конструкции плюс значение ЖЕ, и конструкции, в которых семантика конструкции несводима к ее составляющим. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the concept of causality as a linguistic phenomenon, usually defined in terms of the relation of two events, states or situations where one of them causes and /or represents a result, an effect or concession of the other. Causality can be expressed by using particles and prepositions. These particles and prepositions -- separable and inseparable -- have different or secondary meanings besides the major one. These meanings can be interpreted according to the context in which they occur. This paper attempts to scrutinize the primary meaning and the secondary meaning of causal meaning of some particles and prepositions. Specifically, the coexistence of many possible meanings for some particles and prepositions is examined in certain selected Qur'anic verses highlighting some semantic aspects that have an impact on identifying causal meaning. The paper concludes that Arabic particles and prepositions have a very important function and are useful in sustaining those aspects elements related to semantic aspects in the translation of the Quran through a discussion of the alternative and semantic variations of particles and prepositions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: In this work, we give a new semantics to the notion of additivity as embodied by several discourse markers and particles in French: et, de plus and d’ailleurs. The common property of these different elements is the notion of independence of their arguments. We show that existing accounts of additive particles fail to do full justice to this notion of independence, and we propose a new semantics for and that captures this notion in a Bayesian fashion. We then evaluate the applicability of this analysis to de plus and d’ailleurs and show that, unlike et, these elements are strongly argumentative: they make an explicit reference to an external issue that is disputed in the current conversation. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: This paper discusses the semantics of the connective but. Two trends of analyses are compared: ones based on a notion of formal contrast and others that are inferential. First, the formal contrast approaches are evaluated with respect to a certain number of problematic examples. I argue that they encounter insurmountable issues, and that an inferential account is needed. However, the way the inference required in those latter accounts is drawn needs to be defined in a restricted way. I propose to use the probabilistic interpretation of the notion of argumentation to carry this out. It is argued that to be interpreted, but needs an argumentative goal that is debated by its conjuncts. In the absence of an explicit goal or one that can be deduced by world-knowledge, the goal must be abduced from the content of the but conjuncts alone by taking their information structure into account. My proposal for but is then shown to interact with that of other particles: too, only and yet. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: The German particle noch (‘still’) has an additive reading which differs significantly in meaning and use from the standard German additive particle auch (‘also’/‘too’). In the paper, a semantic and pragmatic analysis will be presented focusing on three core characteristics distinguishing additive noch from auch: (i) alignment with discourse time, (ii) association with deaccented focus, and (iii) continuation of the question-under-discussion. The analysis will be based on the notion of focus alternatives and make use of a question-based discourse model. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The Mandarin Chinese modal particle de has several interesting aspects to explore in formal semantics. Its interpretations include ability, disposition, and opportunity modalities. The three uses are all universal quantifiers. This paper focuses primarily on the ability use. This use has an agentivity requirement on the de subject. The semantics for ability de given in this paper makes reference to an enhanced Belief-Desire-Intention agent model and nicely captures the agentivity requirement. Ability de is incompatible with a past-denoting temporal phrase, except when the temporal phrase associates with certain focus sensitive elements or otherwise receives focus intonation. I argue that the general incompatibility of ability de with a past-denoting temporal phrase stems from the semantic requirement that the topic time of an ability de sentence should coincide with or follow the evaluation time of de, which is the utterance time by default. On the other hand, there are temporal shifters which can backward-shift the evaluation time to the topic time and as such, salvage otherwise ungrammatical ability de sentences that contain a past-denoting temporal phrase. The paper also discusses, albeit to a lesser extent, the disposition and opportunity uses of de. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article characterizes direct modification structure in Japanese language. It describes Japanese as a language that utilizes indirect modification for adnominal adjectives based on the observation that adjectival ordering is free. Classes of attributive modifiers in Japanese language are highlighted.

The article discusses the use of particles in the Transylvanian Saxon dialect of the German language, spoken in the Transylvania region of Romania, as evidenced in the dictionary "Siebenbürgisch-Sächsisches Wörterbuch" (SSWB). The author discusses linguistic influences on this dialect, including the influence of Frankish, Hungarian, and Romanian etymology, as well as the etymology and historical semantic development of various adverbs, conjunctions, prepositions, and interjections. She also examines differences between spoken and written versions of the dialect.

The present paper deals with the origin of the Latvian indefinite pronoun kaût kas 'something'. It is generally recognized that kaût kas is related to the conditional concessive conjunction kaût 'even if, although', but the semantic pathway that made such a derivation possible has not been reconstructed so far in a satisfactory way. In this paper, a detailed investigation of the etymology of kaût kas is conducted, with particular attention to the syntactic structures that may have played a role in forming an indefinite pronoun from a conditional concessive conjunction. It can be argued that the evolution suggested above reflects a cross-linguistically widespread pattern, according to which indefinite pronouns may be derived from 'scalar particles' (even, at least). The derivation of a scalar particle (even, at least) from a conditional concessive conjunction (even if) is, on the other hand, an areal phenomenon limited to the Baltic area. We may thus assume a two-level evolution: (1) even if > even, at least (areal pattern); (2) even, at least someone > anyone > someone (typological pattern). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pronominal-particle subordinate clauses of broad manner The article deals with the semantic classification of the pronominal-particle subordinate clauses of broad manner, which are becoming more frequent in the contemporary Czech as a consequence of its intellectualization. This type of subordinate clause is incorporated into the head clause especially due to secondary prepositions and multiverbation units, which determine the pronoun ten (takový) in the head clause. This pronoun anticipates subordinate clauses introduced by the connecting particles že, aby, zda, jestli, -li, ať. The center of the system of the investigated type of subordinate clauses is formed by clauses indicating manner, extent or degree, means, accompanying circumstances, while the outer edge of the center is formed by clauses of effect. Subordinate clauses of restriction and respect and some other kinds of subordinate clauses are close to the periphery of the system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study analyses the semantic component of English phrasal verbs, that is, lexicalized combinations of a verb and a particle which function semantically and syntactically as a single unit, but to varying degrees. More specifically the investigation focuses on how these structures have developed non-compositional readings over time, given that such meanings were not available in the early stages of the language. In the light of data from the Helsinki Corpus, ARCHER 1 and the Corpus of Late Modern English Texts Extended Version, different types of semantic change are described, changes by which means phrasal verbs have developed non-transparent meanings, including several forms of metaphorization, the addition of aspectual/aktionsart particles, specialization, reduction, creation of brand new combinations and changes in the real world. After this, the question of whether phrasal verbs have undergone a process of idiomatization is discussed. The main conclusion is that if idiomatization is understood as a semantic process which occurs within lexicalization and/or grammaticalization and causes the obscuration of meanings of combinations, then it can be maintained that phrasal verbs have undergone idiomatization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The need for a conceptually unifying data model for the representation of geographic phenomena is widely understood. Although some successes have been reported, progress has been slow, especially at the conceptual and logical levels of abstraction. Drawing on and combining existing successes, this article suggests the object-field model with uncertainty and semantics at the conceptual and logical levels of abstraction. The logical level has been formalised in the Unified Modelling Language (UML) class diagram. It is shown that the concepts required to better represent geographic phenomena can be derived from a single foundation that is termed the Elementary_geoParticle with associated uncertainty and semantics by means of aggregation. The town centre phenomenon is used as an application of the conceptual framework being proposed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper considers the meaning and use of the English particle man. It is shown that the particle does quite different things when it appears in sentence-initial and sentence-final position; the first use involves expression of an emotional attitude as well as, on a particular intonation, intensification; this use is analyzed using a semantics for degree predicates along with a separate dimension for the expressive aspect. Further restrictions on modification with the sentence-initial particle involving monotonicity and evidence are introduced and analyzed. The sentence-final use can be viewed as strengthening the action performed by the sentence. A formal semantics is given by making use of dynamic techniques and, in a sense, dynamically simulating the modification of certain speech acts. Some empirical and theoretical extensions of the analyses are proposed and some consequences discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The central goal of this article is to propose a systematic description of DIFFERENTAL FUNCTION MARKING (DM) in Korean, a language in which both subject and object markers may fail to be spelled out. Taking Aissen's theory of DM (Aissen 2003) as a starting point, we show that although its predictions seem mostly consistent with the statistical results of corpus-based research on Korean (and Japanese), this model does not accurately account for the Korean data. We argue that subject and object bareness (the lack of a functional particle) regularly correlates with interpretive effects that should be captured in terms of information structure (focus structure). Adapting Erteschik-Shir's (1997, 2007) framework to represent f(ocus)-structure, we argue that bare subjects and objects in Korean fall to be visible at this level. Consequently, they may be construed neither as active topics nor as foci, and thus must either be left out of f-structure or incorporated within larger f-structure constituents in order to be interpreted. We show that bare objects are never construed as topics or foci and always exhibit a form of semantic incorporation, while LEUL-marked objects always stand as f-structure constituents construed as focused at some level. Bare subjects, unlike NEUN-marked topical subjects and GA-marked subjects, can be construed neither as active topics nor as foci, and always occur in tense-deficient clauses construed as thetic and anchored to speech time. We argue that our assumptions correctly predict the results of corpus studies, and we suggest that as regards nominal arguments, F-STRUCTURE VISIBILITY might ultimately stand as the crucial interpretive correlate of FUNCTIONAL positions in syntax. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The linguistic system generalizes over rich conceptual structures and, at the same time, has to guarantee that the correct inferences can be drawn as to what the message is intended to convey. In this context the question needs to be answered whether entities not realized in grammar, i.e. implicit arguments, are a necessary part of the interpretation of the expression. In this paper it will be shown that this is not the case with particles (as in ‘stick s.th. on’), which do not realize a reference object as their prepositional pendants do (‘stick s.th. on s.th.’). The findings lead to the conclusion that any truth‐conditional description of implicit arguments should discard them as being conceptually inactive and information‐structurally irrelevant. As will be shown, it is only under specific contextual conditions that a construal of the corresponding argument is coerced. Only then the semantic representation needs to be adjusted, which can be characterized as an instance of lexical re‐analysis. Departing from theoretical evidence it will be shown that with particles no reference object is conceptually active on the basis of two reaction time studies with an object categorization task: It is only full prepositions that prime a potential reference object which is revealed by the reaction to conceptually congruous target line drawings presented just after both prepositions and particles. In this context, two additional aspects will be dealt with. First, the type of priming triggered by inherent sortal information (as in stick the label on the …) needs to be discussed. It will be shown that a semantic fit between the sortal restrictions activated by the preposition and a depicted object results in inhibitory effects. Second, there is evidence that certain grammatical information (such as gender) about an object expression does not enter the conceptual processing of a corresponding target object drawing, which is revealed by the fact that modifying grammatical information in the linguistic prime material proves to be irrelevant for the procedural effort the categorization task requires. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Discusses the influences suggested by formal and semantic correspondences in North Russian dialects and Finno-Ugric languages. Use of postpositive particles; Discussion on possessive impersonal constructions; Factors for the use of postpositive particles.

This article provides a detailed inquiry into the behavior of the modal participle "perhaps." In contrast to, for example, "can," which modalizes a prepositional meaning, "perhaps" determines a modal attitude. Both the modalized prepositional meaning and the modal attitude contain a modal operator in their semantic representations but, in general, they behave differently with respect to certain linguistic operators. Thus, negation refers to the modal operator in the case of modalized propositional meanings and to the propositional meaning in the case of modal attitudes. However, "perhaps" and "can" are similar in that they both can occur in question and they both can receive contrastive stress.