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Dialects of the Yiddish Language

  • 1st Edition
  • June 28, 2014
  • D. Katz
  • English
  • eBook
    9 7 8 - 1 - 4 8 3 2 - 9 9 5 0 - 1
Modern research on dialects of the Yiddish language focuses in many instances upon Western Yiddish and the application of Yiddish dialectology to the study of older Yiddish and non-Yiddish monuments. The Second Oxford Winter Symposium on Yiddish Language and Literature reflects this trend and this collection of papers from the conference explores a wide range of contemporary research in the field.

Sociolinguistic Metatheory

  • 1st Edition
  • June 28, 2014
  • E. Figueroa
  • English
  • eBook
    9 7 8 - 1 - 4 8 3 2 - 9 6 0 9 - 8
Linguistics is a discipline with ever expanding boundaries and interests. Despite the narrow definition of linguistics which dominates academia, sub-fields continue to flourish and ways of doing linguistics continue to expand. As ways to do linguistics increase, and as approaches to linguistics accumulate over time, it becomes increasingly necessary for students of linguistics to have ways of understanding and comparing developments in linguistics.Sociolinguistic Metatheory is a book which explains foundational developments in linguistics by taking the past three decades of developments in sociolinguistics and relating them to contemporaneous developments in received linguistics. Sociolinguistic Metatheory takes the reader through the basic philosophical questions which drive linguistic research. It looks in detail at three models of sociolinguistics - Dell Hymes and the Ethnography of Communication, William Labov and Sociolinguistic Realism, and John Gumperz and Interactional Sociolinguistics - and focuses on such questions as: Where is language located? How is an utterance-based approach to linguistics different from a sentence-based approach? How do metatheoretical paradigm assumptions such as realism or relativism affect the development of linguistic theory? What interesting developments in linguistic theory and analysis have sociolinguistics provided?

Linguistic Theory in America

  • 2nd Edition
  • June 28, 2014
  • Frederick J. Newmeyer
  • English
  • eBook
    9 7 8 - 1 - 4 8 3 2 - 9 5 4 3 - 5
Linguistic Theory in America, Second Edition focuses on the origin and development of the theory of transformational generative grammar. The book first elaborates on the state of American linguistics in the mid-1950s, the Chomskyan revolution, and the movement from syntactic structures to the aspects of the theory of syntax. Discussions focus on the incorporation of semantics into the model, revisions in the syntactic component, generative phonology, impact of generative grammar on other fields, syntactic structures, and structural linguistics. The text then takes a look at the rise of generative semantics and linguistic wars. Topics include late generative semantics, collapse and legacy of generative semantics, steps to generative semantics, and emerging opposition to generative semantics. The manuscript elaborates on the extended standard theory and approaches to syntax, including generalized phrase structure grammar, constraints on transformational rules, and constraints on surface structure and base rules. The text is a dependable source of data for researchers interested in the theory of transformational generative grammar.

Current Issues in Mathematical Linguistics

  • 1st Edition
  • Volume 56
  • June 28, 2014
  • C. Martín-Vide
  • English
  • eBook
    9 7 8 - 1 - 4 8 3 2 - 9 4 7 2 - 8
The present volume contains some selected topics of current interest around the world in the mathematical analysis of natural language. The book is divided into four sections:- analytical algebraic models- models from the theory of formal grammars and automata, with interest mainly in syntax- model-theoretic concepts in semantics or pragmatics, and- a final section containing some applications in computational linguistics.The varied perspectives illustrated in the book confirm that Mathematical Linguistics has finally introduced scientific methods into a previously fuzzy field, through the use of mathematical reasoning. The text will contribute to a fruitful convergence between linguists, mathematicians, logicians, computer scientists, cognitive scientists and others interested in the formal treatment of natural language and the research of its properties.

Saussure's Third Course of Lectures on General Linguistics (1910-1911)

  • 1st Edition
  • May 23, 2014
  • R. Harris + 1 more
  • English
  • eBook
    9 7 8 - 1 - 4 8 3 2 - 9 7 5 3 - 8
The notes taken by Saussure's student Emile Constantin were not available to the editors of the published Cours de linguistique générale (1916), and came to light only after the second world war. They have never been published in their entirety.The third and last course of lectures, of which Constantin kept this very full record, is generally considered to represent a more advanced version of Saussure's teaching than the earlier two. It is clear that Constantin's notebooks offer a text which differs in a number of significant respects from the Cours published by Saussure's original editors, and bring forward ideas which do not emerge in the 1916 publication. They constitute unique evidence concerning the final stages of Saussure's thinking about language.This edition of the notes is accompanied by an introduction and a full English translation of the text. There has been no attempt made by Komatsu and Harris, to turn the English into readable prose. Constantin's notes, even as revised by their author, retain the infelicities, repetitions, abruptness - occasionally incoherences - that betray the circumstances of their origin.The volume constitutes an important landmark in the history of modern linguistics and provides essential documentation for all scholars and libraries specializing in the subject.

Word Order Universals

  • 1st Edition
  • May 19, 2014
  • John A Hawkins
  • English
  • eBook
    9 7 8 - 1 - 4 8 3 2 - 9 6 6 0 - 9
Word Order Universals is a detailed account of word order universals and their role in theories of historical change. The starting point is the Greenberg data set, which is comprised of a sample of 142 languages for certain limited co-occurrences of basic word orders, and a 30-language sample for more detailed information. In the Language Index, the 142 have been expanded to some 350 languages. Using the original Greenberg samples and the Expanded Sample, an alternative set of descriptive word order statements is provided. Comprised of eight chapters, this book begins with an introduction to the theory of word order universals, encompassing topics such as word order variation across languages and theories of universal grammar. The reader is then introduced to the work of Joseph Greenberg and Theo Vennemann on word order universals; implicational universals in Greenberg's data and the Expanded Sample; and the predictions made by implicational and distributional universals for word order change. Reformulated universals for historical reconstruction are also discussed, along with some laws of reconstruction derived from synchronic universals. The final chapter is devoted to the Expanded Sample, with particular reference to its quantities as well as its typological and genetic classification. This monograph will be a useful resource for specialists in grammar and linguistics.

The Emergence of Symbols

  • 1st Edition
  • May 10, 2014
  • Elizabeth Bates
  • E. A. Hammel
  • English
  • eBook
    9 7 8 - 1 - 4 8 3 2 - 6 7 3 0 - 2
The Emergence of Symbols: Cognition and Communication in Infancy provides information pertinent to the nature and origin of symbols, the interdependence of language and thought, and the parallels between phylogeny and ontogeny. This book clarifies some of the conceptual and methodological issues involved in the search for prerequisites to language. Organized into seven chapters, this book begins with an overview of the distinction between homology and analogy in the study of linguistic and nonlinguistic developments. This text then explains the conceptual and operational definitions for such controversial terms as intention, convention, and symbolic behavior. Other chapters consider the limits and advantages of the correlational method as applied in the research. This book discusses as well the structure and content of early symbol use, both in language and in play. The final chapter examines the processes that underlie imitation and tool use, as they contribute to the child's analysis of his culture. This book is a valuable resource for neural biologists, psychologists, and social scientists.

Philosophy of Linguistics

  • 1st Edition
  • January 14, 2012
  • Dov M. Gabbay + 5 more
  • English
  • Hardback
    9 7 8 - 0 - 4 4 4 - 5 1 7 4 7 - 0
  • eBook
    9 7 8 - 0 - 0 8 - 0 9 3 0 8 7 - 9
Philosophy of Linguistics investigates the foundational concepts and methods of linguistics, the scientific study of human language. This groundbreaking collection, the most thorough treatment of the philosophy of linguistics ever published, brings together philosophers, scientists and historians to map out both the foundational assumptions set during the second half of the last century and the unfolding shifts in perspective in which more functionalist perspectives are explored. The opening chapter lays out the philosophical background in preparation for the papers that follow, which demonstrate the shift in the perspective of linguistics study through discussions of syntax, semantics, phonology and cognitive science more generally. The volume serves as a detailed introduction for those new to the field as well as a rich source of new insights and potential research agendas for those already engaged with the philosophy of linguistics. Part of the Handbook of the Philosophy of Science series edited by: Dov M. Gabbay, King's College, London, UK;Paul Thagard, University of Waterloo, Canada; and John Woods, University of British Columbia, Canada.

Concise Encyclopedia of Languages of the World

  • 1st Edition
  • April 6, 2010
  • Keith Brown + 1 more
  • English
  • eBook
    9 7 8 - 0 - 0 8 - 0 8 7 7 7 5 - 4
Concise Encyclopedia of Languages of the World is an authoritative single-volume reference resource comprehensively describing the major languages and language families of the world. It will provide full descriptions of the phonology, semantics, morphology, and syntax of the world’s major languages, giving insights into their structure, history and development, sounds, meaning, structure, and language family, thereby both highlighting their diversity for comparative study, and contextualizing them according to their genetic relationships and regional distribution.Based on the highly acclaimed and award-winning Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics, this volume will provide an edited collection of almost 400 articles throughout which a representative subset of the world's major languages are unfolded and explained in up-to-date terminology and authoritative interpretation, by the leading scholars in linguistics. In highlighting the diversity of the world’s languages — from the thriving to the endangered and extinct — this work will be the first point of call to any language expert interested in this huge area. No other single volume will match the extent of language coverage or the authority of the contributors of Concise Encyclopedia of Languages of the World.

Abstracts and Abstracting

  • 1st Edition
  • March 15, 2010
  • Tibor Koltay
  • English
  • eBook
    9 7 8 - 1 - 7 8 0 6 3 - 0 3 2 - 8
Despite their changing role, abstracts remain useful in the digital world. Highly beneficial to information professionals and researchers who work and publish in different fields, this book summarizes the most important and up-to-date theory of abstracting, as well as giving advice and examples for the practice of writing different kinds of abstracts. The book discusses the length, the functions and basic structure of abstracts, outlining a new approach to informative and indicative abstracts. The abstractors’ personality, their linguistic and non-linguistic knowledge and skills are also discussed with special attention.