Publications

Abstract

There is a growing awareness among theoretical linguists and philosophers of language that the linguistic definition of lexical meanings, which must be learned when one learns a language, underdetermines not only full utterance interpretation but also sentence meaning. The missing information must be provided by cognition – that is, either general encyclopedic or specific situational knowledge. This fact crucially shows the basic insufficiency of current standard model-theoretic semantics as a paradigm for the analysis and description of linguistic meaning.

Abstract

The lexical conditions, also known as satisfaction conditions, of a predicate P are the conditions that must be satisfied by the term referents of P for P applied to these term referents to yield a true sentence. In view of presupposition theory it makes sense to distinguish two categories of lexical conditions, the preconditions that must be satisfied for the sentence to be usable in any given discourse, and the update conditions which must be satisfied for the sentence to yield truth.

Abstract

The widely prevailing view that standard bivalent logic is the only possible sound logical system, imposed by metaphysical necessity, has been shattered by the development of multivalent logics during the 20th century. It is now clear that standard bivalent logic is merely the minimal representative of a wide variety of viable logics with any number of truth values. These viable logics can be subdivided into families. In this article, the Kleene family and the PPCn family are subjected to special examination, as they appear to be most relevant for the study of the logical properties of human language.

Abstract

The task is designed to elicit vocabulary for simple sounds. The primary goal is to establish how people describe sound and what resources the language provides generally for encoding this domain. More specifically: (1) whether there is dedicated vocabulary for encoding simple sound contrasts and (2) how much consistency there is within a community in descriptions. This develops on materials used in The language of sound

Abstract

Incremental sentence generation imposes special constraints on the representation of the grammar and the design of the formulator (the module which is responsible for constructing the syntactic and morphological structure). In the model of natural speech production presented here, a formalism called Segment Grammar is used for the representation of linguistic knowledge. We give a definition of this formalism and present a formulator design which relies on it. Next, we present an object- oriented implementation of Segment Grammar. Finally, we compare Segment Grammar with other formalisms.

Abstract

The Papuan languages of the central Solomon Islands are a negatively defined areal grouping: They are those four or possibly five languages in the central Solomon Islands that do not belong to the Austronesian family. Bilua (Vella Lavella), Touo (Rendova), Lavukaleve (Russell Islands), Savosavo (Savo Island) and possibly Kazukuru (New Georgia) have been identified as non-Austronesian since the early 20th century. However, their affiliations both to each other and to other languages still remain a mystery. Heterogeneous and until recently largely undescribed, they present an interesting departure from what is known both of Austronesian languages in the region and of the Papuan languages of the mainland of New Guinea.

Abstract

In this chapter, I review my EEG research on comprehending sentences in context from a pragmatics-oriented perspective. The review is organized around four questions: (1) When and how do extra-sentential factors such as the prior text, identity of the speaker, or value system of the comprehender affect the incremental sentence interpretation processes indexed by the so-called N400 component of the ERP? (2) When and how do people identify the referents for expressions such as “he” or “the review”, and how do referential processes interact with sense and syntax? (3) How directly pragmatic are the interpretation-relevant ERP effects reported here? (4) Do readers and listeners anticipate upcoming information? One important claim developed in the chapter is that the well-known N400 component, although often associated with ‘semantic integration’, only indirectly reflects the sense-making involved in structure-sensitive dynamic composition of the type studied in semantics and pragmatics. According to the multiple-cause intensified retrieval (MIR) account -- essentially an extension of the memory retrieval account proposed by Kutas and colleagues -- the amplitude of the word-elicited N400 reflects the computational resources used in retrieving the relatively invariant coded meaning stored in semantic long-term memory for, and made available by, the word at hand. Such retrieval becomes more resource-intensive when the coded meanings cued by this word do not match with expectations raised by the relevant interpretive context, but also when certain other relevance signals, such as strong affective connotation or a marked delivery, indicate the need for deeper processing. The most important consequence of this account is that pragmatic modulations of the N400 come about not because the N400 at hand directly reflects a rich compositional-semantic and/or Gricean analysis to make sense of the word’s coded meaning in this particular context, but simply because the semantic and pragmatic implications of the preceding words have already been computed, and now define a less or more helpful interpretive background within which to retrieve coded meaning for the critical word.

Abstract

The linguistic category of irrealis does not show stable semantics across languages. This makes it difficult to formulate general statements about this category, and it has led some researchers to reject irrealis as a cross-linguistically valid category. In this paper we look at the semantics of the irrealis category of Yurakaré, an unclassified language spoken in central Bolivia, and compare it to irrealis semantics of a number of other languages. Languages differ with respect to the subcategories they subsume under the heading of irrealis. The variable subcategories are future tense, imperatives, negatives, and habitual aspect. We argue that the cross-linguistic variation is not random, and can be stated in terms of an implicational scale.

Abstract

The seemingly effortless switching between languages and the merging of two languages into a coherent utterance is a hallmark of bilingual language processing, and reveals the flexibility of human speech and skilled cognitive control. That skill appears to be available not only to speakers when they produce language-switched utterances, but also to listeners and readers when presented with mixed language information. In this chapter, we review electrophysiological studies in which Event-Related Potentials (ERPs) are derived from recordings of brain activity to examine the neurocognitive aspects of comprehending and producing mixed language. Topics we discuss include the time course of brain activity associated with language switching between single stimuli and language switching of words embedded in a meaningful sentence context. The majority of ERP studies report that switching between languages incurs neurocognitive costs, but –more interestingly- ERP patterns differ as a function of L2 proficiency and the amount of daily experience with language switching, the direction of switching (switching into L2 is typically associated with higher switching costs than switching into L1), the type of language switching task, and the predictability of the language switch. Finally, we outline some future directions for this relatively new approach to the study of language switching.

Abstract

In this paper, we will give a unified account of the cross-linguistic variation in the encoding of adjectives in predicative and attributive constructions. Languages may differ in the encoding strategy of adjectives in the predicative domain (Stassen 1997), and sometimes change this strategy in the attributive domain (Verkerk 2007). We will show that the interaction of two principles, that of faithfulness to the semantic class of a lexical root and that of faithfulness to discourse functions, can account for all attested variation in the encoding of adjectives.

Abstract

The primary goal of psycholinguistic research is to understand the architectures and mechanisms that underlie human language comprehension and production. This entails an understanding of how linguistic knowledge is represented and organized in the brain and a theory of how that knowledge is accessed when we use language. Research has traditionally emphasized purely linguistic aspects of on-line comprehension, such as the influence of lexical, syntactic, semantic and discourse constraints, and their tim -course. It has become increasingly clear, however, that nonlinguistic information, such as the visual environment, are also actively exploited by situated language comprehenders.

Abstract

This contribution emphasizes the role of multimedia data not only for archiving languages but also for creating opportunities for innovative analyses. In the case at hand, video material was collected as part of the documentation of Akhoe Haiom, a Khoisan language spoken in northern Namibia. The multimedia documentation project brought together linguistic and anthropological work to highlight connections between specialized domains, namely kinship terminology, interrogatives and reciprocals. These connections would have gone unnoticed or undocumented in more conventional modes of language description. It is suggested that such an approach may be particularly appropriate for the documentation of endangered languages since it directs the focus of attention away from isolated traits of languages towards more complex practices of communication that are also frequently threatened with extinction.

Abstract

Here we review evidence from cognitive neuroscience for a tight relation between language and action in the brain. We focus on two types of relation between language and action. First, we investigate whether the perception of speech and speech sounds leads to activation of parts of the cortical motor system also involved in speech production. Second, we evaluate whether understanding action-related language involves the activation of parts of the motor system. We conclude that whereas there is considerable evidence that understanding language can involve parts of our motor cortex, this relation is best thought of as inherently flexible. As we explain, the exact nature of the input as well as the intention with which language is perceived influences whether and how motor cortex plays a role in language processing.

Abstract

Although sign language-using communities exist in all areas of the world, few sign languages have been documented in detail. Sign languages occur in a variety of sociocultural contexts, ranging from sign languages used in closed village communities to officially recognized national sign languages. They may be grouped into language families on historical grounds or may participate in various language contact situations. Systematic cross-linguistic comparison reveals both significant structural similarities and important typological differences between sign languages. Focusing on information from non-Western countries, this article provides an overview of the sign languages of the world.

Abstract

The lexicons of many sign languages hold large proportions of “frozen” forms, viz. signs that are generally considered to have been formed productively (as classifier predicates), but that have diachronically undergone processes of lexicalisation. Nederlandse Gebarentaal (Sign Language of the Netherlands; henceforth: NGT) also has many of these signs (Van der Kooij 2002, Zwitserlood 2003). In contrast to the general view on “frozen” forms, a few researchers claim that these signs may be formed according to productive sign formation rules, notably Brennan (1990) for BSL, and Meir (2001, 2002) for ISL. Following these claims, I suggest an analysis of “frozen” NGT signs as morphologically complex, using the framework of Distributed Morphology. The signs in question are derived in a similar way as classifier predicates; hence their similar form (but diverging characteristics). I will indicate how and why the structure and use of classifier predicates and “frozen” forms differ. Although my analysis focuses on NGT, it may also be applicable to other sign languages.