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This book presents an innovative theory of syntactic categories and the lexical classes they define. It revives the traditional idea that these are to be distinguished notionally (semantically). The author proposes a notation based on semantic features which accounts for the syntactic behaviour of classes. The book also presents a case for considering this classification SH again in rather traditional vein SH to be basic to determining the syntactic structure of sentences.
This book offers a systematic account of syntactic categories - the building blocks of sentences and the units of grammatical analysis - and explains their place in different theories of language. It sets out and clarifies the conflicting definitions of competing frameworks which frequently make it hard or impossible to compare grammars. Gisa Rauh describes the history and nature of traditional and contemporary accounts and definitions of grammatical categories. She explains their properties and use in generative, cognitive, and functional theories, and considers their function in language typology. She distinguishes between the cognitive functions of categories that relate to traditional parts of speech and serve to structure a language's lexicon; and those which determine the syntactic behaviour of the linguistic items they specify. Professor Rauh illustrates her account with a wide range of examples. Her clear and balanced exposition will be welcomed by students and scholars in all branches of linguistics as well as by those in related subjects such as computational science and the philosophy of language.
Proposes a novel theory of parts of speech, bringing together the latest research and discoveries.
The subject of 'contrast' in phonology is one of the most central concepts in linguistics and is of key importance to linguists working across many languages. This book offers a fascinating account of both the logic and history of contrast in phonology.
In studying discourse, the problem for the linguist is to find a fruitful level of analysis. Carlota Smith offers a new approach with this study of discourse passages, units of several sentences or more. She introduces the key idea of the 'Discourse Mode', identifying five modes: Narrative, Description, Report, Information, Argument. These are realized at the level of the passage, and cut across genre lines. Smith shows that the modes, intuitively recognizable as distinct, have linguistic correlates that differentiate them. She analyzes the properties that distinguish each mode, focusing on grammatical rather than lexical information. The book also examines linguistically based features that appear in passages of all five modes: topic and focus, variation in syntactic structure, and subjectivity, or point of view. Operating at the interface of syntax, semantics, and pragmatics, the book will appeal to researchers and graduate students in linguistics, stylistics and rhetoric.
Using detailed analyses of cross-generational case studies, Smith explains the acquisition of language phonology by children.
The Domain of Syntax explores the consequences for syntax of assuming that language is grounded in cognition and perception. He considers whether this permits a lexicalist approach to syntax that would allow it to dispense not only with structural mutations but with universal grammar itself.
To paraphrase, of the making of syntactic categories there is no end. For any theory of syntax, questions arise about its classificatory scheme: what are the categories? What properties do they have? How do they relate to each other? Eleven essays address these questions by inquiring whether there is a clear distinction between lexical and functional categories, how syntactic categories relate to semantic categories, the relation between syntactic and morphological information, as well as other inquiries. Above all the essays highlight the centrality of questions about syntactic categories for a number of different theoretical frameworks. It discusses a broad range of questions about syntactic categories and presents a number of theoretical frameworks.
Matthew Chen's study, first published in 2000, offers a most comprehensive analysis of the rich and complex patterns of tone used in Chinese languages. Chinese has a wide repertoire of tones which undergo often surprising changes when they are connected in speech flow. The term tone sandhi refers to this tonal alternation. Chen examines tone sandhi phenomena in detail across a variety of Chinese dialects. He explores a range of important theoretical issues such as the nature of tonal representation, the relation of tone to accent, the prosodic domain of sandhi rules, and the interface between syntax and phonology. His book is the culmination of a ten-year research project and offers a wealth of empirical data not previously accessible to linguists. Extensive references and a bibliography on tone sandhi complete this invaluable resource which will be welcomed as a standard reference on Chinese tone.
This book presents a comprehensive study of how children acquire complex sentences. Drawing on observational data from English-speaking children aged 2 to 5, Holger Diessel investigates the acquisition of infinitival and participial complement clauses, finite complement clauses, finite and nonfinite relative clauses, adverbial clauses, and coordinate clauses. His investigation shows that the development of complex sentences originates from simple non-embedded sentences and that two different developmental pathways can be distinguished: complex sentences including complement and relative clauses evolve from simple sentences that are gradually expanded to multiple-clause constructions, and complex sentences including adverbial and coordinate clauses develop from simple sentences that are integrated in a specific biclausal unit. He argues that the acquisition process is determined by a variety of factors: the frequency of the various complex sentences in the ambient language, the semantic and syntactic complexity of the emerging constructions, the communicative functions of complex sentences, and the social-cognitive development of the child.