Configuring Topic and Focus in Russian

Configuring Topic and Focus in Russian

Author: Tracy Holloway King

Publisher: Center for the Study of Language and Information Publications

Published: 1995-05-26

Total Pages: 287

ISBN-13: 9781881526629

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

This work examines word order. More accurately, it is the ordering of constituents that is discussed since prepositional phrases and most noun phrases form syntactic constituents and the encoding of topic and focus in Russian. As has long been observed, word order in Russian encodes specific discourse information: with neutral intonation, topics precede discourse-neutral constituents which precede foci. King extends this idea to show that word order encodes different types of topic and focus in a principled manner.


The Syntax of Topic, Focus, and Contrast

The Syntax of Topic, Focus, and Contrast

Author: Ad Neeleman

Publisher: Walter de Gruyter

Published: 2012-12-06

Total Pages: 316

ISBN-13: 1614511454

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

This book addresses how core notions of information structure (topic, focus and contrast) are expressed in syntax. The authors propose that the syntactic effects of information structure come about as a result of mapping rules that are flexible enough to allow topics and foci to be expressed in a variety of positions, but strict enough to capture certain cross-linguistic generalisations about their distribution. In particular, the papers argue that only contrastive topics and contrastive foci undergo movement and that this is because such movement has the function of marking the scope of contrast. Several predications are derived from this proposal: such as that a focus cannot move across a topic – whether the latter is in situ or not. Syntactic and semantic evidence in support of this proposal is presented from a wide range of languages (including Dutch, English, Japanese, Korean and Russian) and theoretical consequences explored. The first chapter not only outlines its theoretical aims, but also provides an introduction to information structure. As a consequence, the book is accessible to advanced students as well as professional linguists.


Expecting the Unexpected

Expecting the Unexpected

Author: Horst J. Simon

Publisher: Walter de Gruyter

Published: 2011

Total Pages: 461

ISBN-13: 3110219085

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

In this article, the distribution of rare features among the world's languages is investigated based on the data from the World Atlas of Language Structures (Haspelmath et al. 2005). A Rarity Index for a language is defined, resulting in a listing of the world's languages by mean rarity. Further, a Group Rarity Index is defined to be able to measure average rarity of genealogical or areal groups. One of the most exceptional geographical areas turns out to be northwestern Europe. A closer investigation of the characteristics that make this area exceptional concludes this article.


The Syntax of Russian

The Syntax of Russian

Author: John F. Bailyn

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2012

Total Pages: 393

ISBN-13: 0521885744

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

An essential guide to Russian syntax, which examines major syntactic structures and grammatical puzzles of the language.


Topic-Focus Articulation, Tripartite Structures, and Semantic Content

Topic-Focus Articulation, Tripartite Structures, and Semantic Content

Author: Eva Hajicová

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

Published: 2013-03-09

Total Pages: 146

ISBN-13: 9401590125

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

1. 1 OBJECTIVES The main objective of this joint work is to bring together some ideas that have played central roles in two disparate theoretical traditions in order to con tribute to a better understanding of the relationship between focus and the syn tactic and semantic structure of sentences. Within the Prague School tradition and the branch of its contemporary development represented by Hajicova and Sgall (HS in the sequel), topic-focus articulation has long been a central object of study, and it has long been a tenet of Prague school linguistics that topic-focus structure has systematic relevance to meaning. Within the formal semantics tradition represented by Partee (BHP in the sequel), focus has much more recently become an area of concerted investigation, but a number of the semantic phenomena to which focus is relevant have been extensively investi gated and given explicit compositional semantic-analyses. The emergence of 'tripartite structures' (see Chapter 2) in formal semantics and the partial simi larities that can be readily observed between some aspects of tripartite structures and some aspects of Praguian topic-focus articulation have led us to expect that a closer investigation of the similarities and differences in these different theoretical constructs would be a rewarding undertaking with mutual benefits for the further development of our respective theories and potential benefit for the study of semantic effects of focus in other theories as well.


Lexical and Syntactical Constructions and the Construction of Meaning

Lexical and Syntactical Constructions and the Construction of Meaning

Author: Marjolyn Verspoor

Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing

Published: 1997-01-01

Total Pages: 473

ISBN-13: 9027236542

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The basic tenet of cognitive linguistics is that every linguistic expression is a construal relation. The first section of this volume focuses on issues of such construal and presentation of information, including figure-ground relations, image-schematic structures, and the role of syntactic constructions in information structure.In sections two and three papers are presented on cross-categorial polysemy between lexical and grammatical uses of a morpheme, and between different grammatical senses, and on the relationship between earlier lexical senses and later grammatical ones.The final section of the volume brings together studies which shed further light on transitivity and argument structure. The study of transitivity necessarily entails exploration of the relationship between syntactic constructions and the pragmatics and semantics conveyed by such constructions.As a whole, this collection of papers gives new evidence on the complexity and motivation of the mapping between linguistic form and function and offers a wealth of new directions for research on the construction of meaning at every level of the sentence.


Crosslinguistic Studies on Noun Phrase Structure and Reference

Crosslinguistic Studies on Noun Phrase Structure and Reference

Author: Patricia Cabredo Hofherr

Publisher: BRILL

Published: 2013-11-29

Total Pages: 413

ISBN-13: 9004261443

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Crosslinguistic Studies on Noun Phrase Structure and Reference contains 11 studies on the grammar of noun phrases. Part One explores NP-structure and the impact of information structure, countability and number marking on interpretation, using data from Russian, Armenian, Hebrew, Brazilian Portuguese, Karitiana, Turkish, English, Catalan and Danish. Part Two examines language specific definiteness marking strategies in spoken and signed languages—differentiated definiteness marking in Germanic, double definiteness in Greek, adnominal demonstratives in Japanese, ‘weak’ definiteness in Martiniké and the special referring options made avilable by signing. Part Three examines the second-language acquisition of genericity in English, Spanish and Brazilian Portuguese. This volume will be of interest to researchers and students in syntax, formal semantics, and language acquisition. Contributors include: Željko Bošković, Patricia Cabredo Hofherr, Edit Doron, Nomi Erteschik Shir, Brigitte Garcia, Elaine Grolla, Tania Ionin, Loïc Jean-Louis, Makoto Kaneko, Marika Lekakou, Silvina Montrul, Ana Müller, Asya Pereltsvaig, Marie-Anne Sallandre, Helade Santos, Serkan Şener, Rebekka Studler, Kriszta Szendröi, Anne Zribi-Hertz.


Die Slavischen Sprachen / The Slavic Languages. Halbband 1

Die Slavischen Sprachen / The Slavic Languages. Halbband 1

Author: Sebastian Kempgen

Publisher: Walter de Gruyter

Published: 2009

Total Pages: 1195

ISBN-13: 3110156601

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

This series of HANDBOOKS OF LINGUISTICS AND COMMUNICATION SCIENCE is designed to illuminate a field which not only includes general linguistics and the study of linguistics as applied to specific languages, but also covers those more recent areas which have developed from the increasing body of research into the manifold forms of communicative action and interaction. For "classic" linguistics there appears to be a need for a review of the state of the art which will provide a reference base for the rapid advances in research undertaken from a variety of theoretical standpoints, while in the more recent branches of communication science the handbooks will give researchers both an verview and orientation. To attain these objectives, the series will aim for a standard comparable to that of the leading handbooks in other disciplines, and to this end will strive for comprehensiveness, theoretical explicitness, reliable documentation of data and findings, and up-to-date methodology. The editors, both of the series and of the individual volumes, and the individual contributors, are committed to this aim. The languages of publication are English, German, and French. The main aim of the series is to provide an appropriate account of the state of the art in the various areas of linguistics and communication science covered by each of the various handbooks; however no inflexible pre-set limits will be imposed on the scope of each volume. The series is open-ended, and can thus take account of further developments in the field. This conception, coupled with the necessity of allowing adequate time for each volume to be prepared with the necessary care, means that there is no set time-table for the publication of the whole series. Each volume will be a self-contained work, complete in itself. The order in which the handbooks are published does not imply any rank ordering, but is determined by the way in which the series is organized; the editor of the whole series enlist a competent editor for each individual volume. Once the principal editor for a volume has been found, he or she then has a completely free hand in the choice of co-editors and contributors. The editors plan each volume independently of the others, being governed only by general formal principles. The series editor only intervene where questions of delineation between individual volumes are concerned. It is felt that this (modus operandi) is best suited to achieving the objectives of the series, namely to give a competent account of the present state of knowledge and of the perception of the problems in the area covered by each volume.


The Oxford Handbook of Comparative Syntax

The Oxford Handbook of Comparative Syntax

Author: Guglielmo Cinque

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2008-10-16

Total Pages: 990

ISBN-13: 0195136519

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Its twenty-one commissioned chapters serve two functions: they provide a general and theoretical introduction to comparative syntax, its methodology, and its relation to other domains of linguistic inquiry; and they also provide a systematic selection of the best comparative work being done today on those language groups and families where substantial progress has been achieved." "This volume will be an essential resource for scholars and students in formal linguistics."--Jacket.