The Transitivity Hypothesis - Investigation on the importance of transitivity in grammar and discourse
The Transitivity Hypothesis - Investigation on the importance of transitivity in grammar and discourse

Author: Conny Schibisch

Publisher: GRIN Verlag

Published: 2007-01-15

Total Pages: 30

ISBN-13: 3638592537

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Seminar paper from the year 2006 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies - Linguistics, grade: 1,3, University of Dusseldorf "Heinrich Heine" (Department of English Language and Linguistics), course: Seminar: English Functional Syntax, language: English, abstract: As a learner of languages in general and of English in particular, sooner or later one comes across transitive and intransitive verbs. For most of the learners this only means that there are these verbs, which take a direct object (transitive) and those, which do not (intransitive). (1) Susan left. (2) He is writing something. When comparing example (1) and (2), the average student of EFL 1 would claim the second one to be transitive, while the first one would be described as intransitive. For learners at school this explanation might be sufficient, but as a linguist the notion of Transitivity goes far beyond the simple declaration of verbs to be object-taking or not. In this paper special interest will focus on the notion of Transitivity. The observations are based on a study made by Paul J. Hopper and Sandra A. Thompson 2 published in 1980, which focuses on the importance of Transitivity in grammar and discourse 3 . The first part of the paper presented here will explain the notion of Transitivity according to the results of the study by Hopper/Thompson. The second part will draw attention to the universality of Transitivity. The question arises in how far Transitivity is essential to language. Why does the speaker of a language use Transitivity within a speech and how does he do so? Therefore, the main focus of the third part will lie on the pragmatic function of Transitivity, which means the importance of it as a discourse determiner. Especially the role of Transitivity in Foregrounding in discourse will be looked at. The writer of this paper tries to find own examples, if possible, but when it comes to universality and the corpus investigation, only examples of the original study can guarantee the verification of the theory. [...]

Clause Combining in Grammar and Discourse
Clause Combining in Grammar and Discourse

Author: John Haiman

Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing

Published: 1988-01-01

Total Pages: 457

ISBN-13: 9027228930

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Traditionally the study of syntax is restricted to the study of what goes on within the boundaries of the prosodic sentence. Although the nature of clause combining within a prosodic sentence has always been a central concern of traditional syntax (in GG, e.g. it underlies important research on deletion and anaphora), work within a discourse analysis framework has hardly been done. Analyses like this are given in the present volume.

Prototypical Transitivity
Prototypical Transitivity

Author: Åshild Næss

Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing

Published: 2007-07-13

Total Pages: 255

ISBN-13: 9027292213

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This book presents a functional analysis of a notion which has gained considerable importance in cognitive and functional linguistics over the last couple of decades, namely 'prototypical transitivity'. It discusses what prototypical transitivity is, why it should exist, and how it should be defined, as well as how this definition can be employed in the analysis of a number of phenomena of language, such as case-marking, experiencer constructions, and so-called ambitransitives. Also discussed is how a prototype analysis relates to other approaches to transitivity, such as that based on markedness. The basic claim is that transitivity is iconic: a construction with two distinct, independent arguments is prototypically used to refer to an event with two distinct, independent participants. From this principle, a unified account of the properties typically associated with transitivity can be derived, and an explanation for why these properties tend to correlate across languages can be given.

Subjectivity in Grammar and Discourse
Subjectivity in Grammar and Discourse

Author: Sh?ichi Iwasaki

Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing

Published: 1993-01-01

Total Pages: 164

ISBN-13: 9027226121

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This book investigates the notion of subjectivity from a pragmatic point of view. There have been attempts to reduce the notion of the speaker or subjectivity as a syntactic category, or to seek an explanation for it in semantic terms. However, in order to understand the vast range of subjectivity phenomena, it is more fruitful to examine how the attributes and the experience of the real speaker affect language. The volume provides a theoretical/methodological basis for the study of various aspects of language and discourse and applies these specifically to Japanese spoken discourse, for which the data are added in an appendix.

The Empirical Stance
The Empirical Stance

Author: Bas C. van Fraassen

Publisher: Yale University Press

Published: 2008-10-01

Total Pages: 302

ISBN-13: 0300127960

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What is empiricism and what could it be? Bas C. van Fraassen, one of the world’s foremost contributors to philosophical logic and the philosophy of science, here undertakes a fresh consideration of these questions and offers a program for renewal of the empiricist tradition. The empiricist tradition is not and could not be defined by common doctrines, but embodies a certain stance in philosophy, van Fraassen says. This stance is displayed first of all in a searing, recurrent critique of metaphysics, and second in a focus on experience that requires a voluntarist view of belief and opinion. Van Fraassen focuses on the philosophical problems of scientific and conceptual revolutions and on the not unrelated ruptures between religious and secular ways of seeing or conceiving of ourselves. He explores what it is to be or not be secular and points the way toward a new relationship between secularism and science within philosophy.

Changing Valency
Changing Valency

Author: Robert M. W. Dixon

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2000-02-10

Total Pages: 433

ISBN-13: 0521660394

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Distinguished scholars examine the phenomena of passives and causatives in languages from around the world.

Grounding in Chinese Written Narrative Discourse
Grounding in Chinese Written Narrative Discourse

Author: Wendan Li

Publisher: BRILL

Published: 2018-02-19

Total Pages: 293

ISBN-13: 9004360883

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In Grounding in Chinese Written Narrative Discourse Wendan Li offers a comprehensive and innovative account of how Mandarin Chinese, as a language without extensive morphological marking, highlights (or foregrounds) major events of a narrative and demotes (or backgrounds) other supporting descriptions. Qualitative and quantitative methods in the analysis and examinations of authentic written text provide extensive evidence to demonstrate that various types of morpho-syntactic devices are used in a wide range of structural units in Chinese to mark the distinction between foregrounding and backgrounding. The analysis paves the way for future studies to systematically approach grounding-related issues. The typological viewpoint adopted in the chapters serves well readers from both the Chinese tradition and other languages in discourse analysis.

Verbal Hygiene
Verbal Hygiene

Author: Deborah Cameron

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2005-06-28

Total Pages: 288

ISBN-13: 1134960646

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In this book, Cameron explores popular attitudes towards language and examines the practices by which people attempt to regulate its use. She also argues that popular discourse about language values serves a function for those engaged in it.