Publications

Displaying 1 - 52 of 52
  • Ahrenholz, B., Bredel, U., Klein, W., Rost-Roth, M., & Skiba, R. (Eds.). (2008). Empirische Forschung und Theoriebildung: Beiträge aus Soziolinguistik, Gesprochene-Sprache- und Zweitspracherwerbsforschung: Festschrift für Norbert Dittmar. Frankfurt am Main: Lang.
  • Ameka, F. K., & Kropp Dakubu, M. E. (Eds.). (2008). Aspect and modality in Kwa Languages. Amsterdam: Benjamins.

    Abstract

    This book explores the thesis that in the Kwa languages of West Africa, aspect and modality are more central to the grammar of the verb than tense. Where tense marking has emerged it is invariably in the expression of the future, and therefore concerned with the impending actualization or potentiality of an event, hence with modality, rather than the purely temporal sequencing associated with tense. The primary grammatical contrasts are perfective versus imperfective. The main languages discussed are Akan, Dangme, Ewe, Ga and Tuwuli while Nzema-Ahanta, Likpe and Eastern Gbe are also mentioned. Knowledge about these languages has deepened considerably during the past decade or so and ideas about their structure have changed. The volume therefore presents novel analyses of grammatical forms like the so-called S-Aux-O-V-Other or “future” constructions, and provides empirical data for theorizing about aspect and modality. It should be of considerable interest to Africanist linguists, typologists, and creolists interested in substrate issues.
  • Andics, A. (2013). Who is talking? Behavioural and neural evidence for norm-based coding in voice identity learning. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
  • Bauer, B. L. M. (1995). The emergence and development of SVO patterning in Latin and French. Diachronic and psycholinguistic perspectives. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Abstract

    This book examines Latin word order, its historical origins in Proto-Indo-European and the shift in ordering patterns that took place in syntax and morphology in the history of Latin and (early) French (OV or left branching giving way to VO or right branching). Subsequently, analysis of the acquisition of ordering patterns shows that the archaic structuration—when complex—is acquired with difficulty. Diachronic and psycholinguistic analysis therefore demonstrates that the order of grammatical structures in Modern French, for example, is the result of a long-lasting development that psycholinguistic data can account for.
  • Becker, A., & Klein, W. (2008). Recht verstehen: Wie Laien, Juristen und Versicherungsagenten die "Riester-Rente" interpretieren. Berlin: Akademie Verlag.
  • Becker, A., Dittmar, N., Gutmann, M., Klein, W., Rieck, B.-O., Senft, G., Senft, I., Steckner, W., & Thielecke, E. (1978). The unguided learning of German by Spanish and Italian workers: Symposium on the Sociological Analysis of Education and Training Programmes for Migrant Workers and their Families. Paris: UNESCO Documentations and Publications.
  • Bowerman, M., & Brown, P. (Eds.). (2008). Crosslinguistic perspectives on argument structure: Implications for learnability. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.

    Abstract

    This book offers an interdisciplinary perspective on verb argument structure and its role in language acquisition. Much contemporary work in linguistics and psychology assumes that argument structure is strongly constrained by a set of universal principles, and that these principles are innate, providing children with certain “bootstrapping” strategies that help them home in on basic aspects of the syntax and lexicon of their language. Drawing on a broad range of crosslinguistic data, this volume shows that languages are much more diverse in their argument structure properties than has been realized. This diversity raises challenges for many existing proposals about language acquisition, affects the range of solutions that can be considered plausible, and highlights new acquisition puzzles that until now have passed unnoticed. The volume is the outcome of an integrated research project and comprises chapters by both specialists in first language acquisition and field linguists working on a variety of lesser-known languages. The research draws on original fieldwork and on adult data, child data, or both from thirteen languages from nine different language families. Some chapters offer typological perspectives, examining the basic structures of a given language with language-learnability issues in mind. Other chapters investigate specific problems of language acquisition in one or more languages. Taken as a whole, the volume illustrates how detailed work on crosslinguistic variation is critical to the development of insightful theories of language acquisition.
  • Chen, J. (2008). The acquisition of verb compounding in Mandarin Chinese. PhD Thesis, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Amsterdam.

    Abstract

    Seeing someone breaking a stick into two, an English speaks typically describes with a verb break, but a Mandarin speaker has to say bai1-duan4 ‘bend-be.broken’, a verb
    compound composed of two free verbs with each verb encoding one aspect of the breaking event. Verb compounding represents a typical and productive way to describe
    events of motion (e.g., zou3-chu1 ‘walk-exit’), and state change (e.g., bai1-duan4 ‘bendbe.broken’), the most common types of events that children of all languages are exposed
    to from an early age. Since languages vary in how events are linguistically encoded and categorized, the development of verb compounding provides a window to investigate the
    acquisition of form and meaning mapping for highly productive but constrained constructions and the interaction between children’s linguistic development and cognitive
    development. The theoretical analysis of verb compounds has been one of the central issues in Chinese linguistics, but the acquisition of this grammatical system has never
    been systematically studied. This dissertation constitutes the first in-depth study of this topic. It analyzes speech data from two longitudinal corpora as well as the data collected from five experiments on production and comprehension of verb compounds from children in P. R. China. It provides a description of the developmental process and unravels the complex learning tasks from the perspective of language production, comprehension, event categorization, and the interface of semantics and syntax. In showing how first-language learners acquire the Mandarin-specific way of representing and encoding causal events and motion events, this study has significance both for studies of language acquisition and for studies of cognition and event construal.
  • Cutler, A., & Fay, D. A. (Eds.). (1978). [Annotated re-issue of R. Meringer and C. Mayer: Versprechen und Verlesen, 1895]. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
  • Deutsch, W., & Frauenfelder, U. (1985). Max-Planck-Institute for Psycholinguistics: Annual Report Nr.6 1985. Nijmegen: MPI for Psycholinguistics.
  • Dietrich, R., Klein, W., & Noyau, C. (1995). The acquisition of temporality in a second language. Amsterdam: Benjamins.
  • Dirksmeyer, T. (2008). Spatial deixis in Chintang: Aspects of a grammar of space. Master Thesis, Universität Leipzig, Leipzig.

    Abstract

    This thesis examines the semantic structures underlying the encoding of space in Chintang, a Kiranti (Sino-Tibetan) language of Nepal. It provides a short general introduction to the history of thinking and speaking about space as well as to the notions of deixis and transposition, and sketches a state-of-the-art theory for categorizing spatial semantics (Levinson 2003). Drawing on targeted elicitation with native speakers, the empirical part then relates linguistic items of Chintang to the theoretical framework, with a focus on the nominal domain. After an analysis of deictic, topological, intrinsic and absolute spatial relations and their reflections in the language, the investigation concludes by comparing sets of Chintang deictics to those found in neighbouring Belhare (Bickel 2001). Despite striking formal resemblances, the semantic differences found indicate that even across closely related languages, meaning does not generalize easily.
  • Dolscheid, S. (2013). High pitches and thick voices: The role of language in space-pitch associations. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
  • Enfield, N. J. (2013). Relationship thinking: Agency, enchrony, and human sociality. New York: Oxford University Press.
  • Ernestus, M. (2013). Halve woorden [Inaugural lecture]. Nijmegen: Radboud University.

    Abstract

    Rede uitgesproken bij de aanvaarding van het ambt van hoogleraar Psycholinguïstiek aan de Faculteit der Letteren van de Radboud Universiteit Nijmegen op vrijdag 18 januari 2013
  • Guarin, A., Haun, D. B. M., & Messner, D. (2013). Behavioral dimensions of international cooperation. Duisburg: Käte Hamburger Kolleg / Centre for Global Cooperation Research. doi:10.2139/ssrn.2361423.
  • Hanique, I. (2013). Mental representation and processing of reduced words in casual speech. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
  • Haun, D. B. M., & Wertenbruch, M. (2013). Forschungen und Entwicklungen zum Konzept der Ehre als Potential für Konflikte zwischen Kulturen bzw. als Hindernis für Integration. Wien: Österreichischen Integrationsfonds.
  • Hayano, K. (2013). Territories of knowledge in Japanese conversation. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.

    Abstract

    This thesis focuses on one aspect of interactional competence: competence to manage knowledge distribution in conversation. In order to be considered competent in everyday interaction, participants need not only to index one another's knowledge states but also to engage in dynamic negotiation of knowledge distribution. Adopting the methodology of conversation analysis, the thesis investigates how participants' orientations to knowledge distribution, 'epistemicity', are manifested. The thesis examines three interactional environments: assessment sequences, informing sequences and polar question-answer sequences. A systematic analysis reveals that interactants orient to different aspects of knowledge in different environments, employing different grammatical resources. When they assess an object, they are concerned about who possesses 'epistemic primacy'. Japanese final particles and the practices of intensification serve together to claim epistemic primacy and provide support for the claim. It is also reported that interactants are oriented to achieve 'epistemic congruence' − consensus regarding how knowledge is distributed among them. When one provides the other with new information, the exchange commonly develops into a four-turn sequence, instead of a minimal adjacency pair. It is shown that this sequence organization allows interactants to achieve a balance between territories of experience, affiliation and empathy. In polar question-answer sequences, how (un)expected or novel a given piece of information is becomes an issue. Answers are found to be formulated such that they adopt epistemic stances that are assertive enough to match the level of (un)certainty expressed by questioners. The thesis contributes to our understanding of how social interaction is organized. It becomes clear from the findings that a wide range of aspects of language use and interactional organization are dominated by interactants' orientations to epistemicity. Participants manage knowledge distribution in everyday interaction, which may be the most fundamental means of managing their social statuses and relations.

    Additional information

    full text via Radboud Repository
  • Hendriks, H., & McQueen, J. M. (1995). Max-Planck-Institute for Psycholinguistics: Annual Report Nr.16 1995. Nijmegen: MPI for Psycholinguistics.
  • Hofmeister, P., & Norcliffe, E. (Eds.). (2013). The core and the periphery: Data-driven perspectives on syntax inspired by Ivan A. Sag. Stanford, CA: CSLI publications.

    Abstract

    This book is a collection of papers inspired by the linguistics career of Ivan Sag, written to celebrate his many contributions to the field. Ivan has been a professor of linguistics at Stanford University since 1979, has been the directory of the Symbolic Systems program (2005-2009), has authored, co-authored, or edited fifteen volumes in linguistics, and has been at the forefront of non-transformational approaches to syntax. Reflecting the breath of Ivan's theoretical interests and approaches to linguistic problems, the papers here tackle a range of grammar-related issues using corpora, intuitions, and laboratory experiments. They are united by their use of and commitment to rich datasets and the shared perspective that the best theories of grammar attempt to account for the full diversity and complexity of language data.
  • Hoppenbrouwers, G., Seuren, P. A. M., & Weijters, A. (Eds.). (1985). Meaning and the lexicon. Dordrecht: Foris.
  • Indefrey, P., & Gullberg, M. (Eds.). (2008). Time to speak: Cognitive and neural prerequisites for time in language. Oxford: Blackwell.

    Abstract

    Time is a fundamental aspect of human cognition and action. All languages have developed rich means to express various facets of time, such as bare time spans, their position on the time line, or their duration. The articles in this volume give an overview of what we know about the neural and cognitive representations of time that speakers can draw on in language. Starting with an overview of the main devices used to encode time in natural language, such as lexical elements, tense and aspect, the research presented in this volume addresses the relationship between temporal language, culture, and thought, the relationship between verb aspect and mental simulations of events, the development of temporal concepts, time perception, the storage and retrieval of temporal information in autobiographical memory, and neural correlates of tense processing and sequence planning. The psychological and neurobiological findings presented here will provide important insights to inform and extend current studies of time in language and in language acquisition.
  • Kuperman, V. (2008). Lexical processing of morphologically complex words: An information-theoretical perspective. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
  • Levelt, W. J. M. (2013). A history of psycholinguistics: The pre-Chomskyan era. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Abstract

    Describes the history of the field in terms of its multidisciplinary "roots" so that readers from different disciplines can concentrate on, or selectively read, the corresponding chapters. * Explores the history of research on brain and language, making the book valuable for aphasiologists, communication scientists and neuroscientists of language. * Covers the history of linguistic approaches to psycholinguistics - making the book of interest to both theoretical and applied linguists. * Written by a scientist whose own contribution to the field has been seminal, resulting in a work that will be seen as the definitive of psycholinguistics, for many years to come How do we manage to speak and understand language? How do children acquire these skills and how does the brain support them?These psycholinguistic issues have been studied for more than two centuries. Though many Psycholinguists tend to consider their history as beginning with the Chomskyan "cognitive revolution" of the late 1950s/1960s, the history of empirical psycholinguistics actually goes back to the end of the 18th century. This is the first book to comprehensively treat this "pre-Chomskyan" history. It tells the fascinating history of the doctors, pedagogues, linguists and psychologists who created this discipline, looking at how they made their important discoveries about the language regions in the brain, about the high-speed accessing of words in speaking and listening, on the child's invention of syntax, on the disruption of language in aphasic patients and so much more. The book is both a history of ideas as well of the men and women whose intelligence, brilliant insights, fads, fallacies, cooperations, and rivalries created this discipline. Psycholinguistics has four historical roots, which, by the end of the 19th century, had merged. By then, the discipline, usually called the psychology of language, was established. The first root was comparative linguistics, which raised the issue of the psychological origins of language. The second root was the study of language in the brain, with Franz Gall as the pioneer and the Broca and Wernicke discoveries as major landmarks. The third root was the diary approach to child development, which emerged from Rousseau's Émile. The fourth root was the experimental laboratory approach to speech and language processing, which originated from Franciscus Donders' mental chronometry. Wilhelm Wundt unified these four approaches in his monumental Die Sprache of 1900. These four perspectives of psycholinguistics continued into the 20th century but in quite divergent frameworks. There was German consciousness and thought psychology, Swiss/French and Prague/Viennese structuralism, Russian and American behaviorism, and almost aggressive holism in aphasiology. As well as reviewing all these perspectives, the book looks at the deep disruption of the field during the Third Reich and its optimistic, multidisciplinary re-emergence during the 1950s with the mathematical theory of communication as a major impetus. A tour de force from one of the seminal figures in the field, this book will be essential reading for all linguists, psycholinguists, and psychologists with an interest in language. Readership: Linguists, psychologists, aphasiologists, communication scientists, cognitive (neuro-)scientists, whether professionals or graduate students. Historians of science
  • Levelt, W. J. M. (2008). An introduction to the theory of formal languages and automata. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
  • Levelt, W. J. M. (2008). Formal grammars in linguistics and psycholinguistics [Re-ed.]. Amsterdam: Benjamins.

    Abstract

    Contains: Vol. 1 An introduction to the theory of formal languages and automata Vol. 2 Applications in linguistic theory Vol. 3 Psycholinguistic applications

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    Table of contents
  • Levelt, W. J. M. (2008). Speaking [Korean edition]. Seoul: Korean Research Foundation.
  • Levelt, W. J. M., & Flores d'Arcais, G. B. (Eds.). (1978). Studies in the perception of language. London: Wiley.
  • Levinson, S. C. (2008). Space in language and cognition. Singapore: Word Publishing Company/CUP.

    Abstract

    Chinese translation of the 2003 publication.
  • Majid, A. (Ed.). (2008). Field manual volume 11. Nijmegen: Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics.
  • Matić, D., & Lavrillier, A. (Eds.). (2013). Even Nimkans by Dar'ja Osenina. Dar'ja Osenina ewedi nimkar. Evenskie nimkany Dar'ji Oseniny. Fürstenberg: Kulturstiftung Sibirien.
  • Mulder, K. (2013). Family and neighbourhood relations in the mental lexicon: A cross-language perspective. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.

    Abstract

    We lezen en horen dagelijks duizenden woorden zonder dat het ons enige moeite lijkt te kosten. Toch speelt zich in ons brein ondertussen een complex mentaal proces af, waarbij tal van andere woorden dan het aangeboden woord, ook actief worden. Dit gebeurt met name wanneer die andere woorden overeenkomen met de feitelijk aangeboden woorden in spelling, uitspraak of betekenis. Deze activatie als gevolg van gelijkenis strekt zich zelfs uit tot andere talen: ook daarin worden gelijkende woorden actief. Waar liggen de grenzen van dit activatieproces? Activeer je bij het verwerken van het Engelse woord 'steam' ook het Nederlandse woord 'stram'(een zogenaamd 'buurwoord)? En activeer je bij 'clock' zowel 'clockwork' als 'klokhuis' ( twee morfolologische familieleden uit verschillende talen)? Kimberley Mulder onderzocht hoe het leesproces van Nederlands-Engelse tweetaligen wordt beïnvloed door zulke relaties. In meerdere experimentele studies vond ze dat tweetaligen niet alleen morfologische familieleden en orthografische buren activeren uit de taal waarin ze op dat moment lezen, maar ook uit de andere taal die ze kennen. Het lezen van een woord beperkt zich dus geenszins tot wat je eigenlijk ziet, maar activeert een heel netwerk van woorden in je brein.

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    full text via Radboud Repository
  • Ortega, G. (2013). Acquisition of a signed phonological system by hearing adults: The Role of sign structure and iconcity. PhD Thesis, University College London, London.

    Abstract

    The phonological system of a sign language comprises meaningless sub-lexical units that define the structure of a sign. A number of studies have examined how learners of a sign language as a first language (L1) acquire these components. However, little is understood about the mechanism by which hearing adults develop visual phonological categories when learning a sign language as a second language (L2). Developmental studies have shown that sign complexity and iconicity, the clear mapping between the form of a sign and its referent, shape in different ways the order of emergence of a visual phonology. The aim of the present dissertation was to investigate how these two factors affect the development of a visual phonology in hearing adults learning a sign language as L2. The empirical data gathered in this dissertation confirms that sign structure and iconicity are important factors that determine L2 phonological development. Non-signers perform better at discriminating the contrastive features of phonologically simple signs than signs with multiple elements. Handshape was the parameter most difficult to learn, followed by movement, then orientation and finally location which is the same order of acquisition reported in L1 sign acquisition. In addition, the ability to access the iconic properties of signs had a detrimental effect in phonological development because iconic signs were consistently articulated less accurately than arbitrary signs. Participants tended to retain the iconic elements of signs but disregarded their exact phonetic structure. Further, non-signers appeared to process iconic signs as iconic gestures at least at the early stages of sign language acquisition. The empirical data presented in this dissertation suggest that non-signers exploit their gestural system as scaffolding of the new manual linguistic system and that sign L2 phonological development is strongly influenced by the structural complexity of a sign and its degree of iconicity.
  • Poellmann, K. (2013). The many ways listeners adapt to reductions in casual speech. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
  • Puccini, D. (2013). The use of deictic versus representational gestures in infancy. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
  • Roberts, L., Myles, F., & David, A. (Eds.). (2008). EUROSLA Yearbook 8. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
  • Rommers, J. (2013). Seeing what's next: Processing and anticipating language referring to objects. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
  • Senft, G. (Ed.). (2008). Serial verb constructions in Austronesian and Papuan languages. Canberra: Pacific Linguistics Publishers.

    Abstract

    This volume of new work explores the nature of verb serialisation in a range of languages from the Pacific region – both Austronesian and non-Austronesian. Serial verbs can be described linguistically as a sequence of verbs which behave as a single complex predicate. A particular focus of this book is the detailed examination given by most authors to the relationship of such uniclausal linguistic structures with the real world notion of eventhood. The book also makes a valuable addition to the description and analysis of serial verb constructions from the Pacific, a region which has generally been under-represented in cross-linguistic discussions of verb serialisation.
  • Senft, G., & Wilkins, D. (1995). A man, a tree, and forget about the pigs: Space games, spatial reference and cross-linguistic comparison. Plenary paper presented by at the 19th international LAUD symposium "Language and space" Duisburg. Mimeo: Nijmegen.
  • Senft, G. (Ed.). (2008). Systems of nominal classification [2nd ed.] (2). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Abstract

    This book addresses the fundamental linguistic question of how the perceived world is expressed through systems of nominal classification that are grammatically encoded in various languages. A team of leading international scholars reviews the whole spectrum of nominal classification, from gender systems through to numeral classifiers, providing cutting-edge theoretical interpretations and empirical case studies based on a wide range of languages. The volume presents ideas about the problems of classification, advances theory by proposing typological categories and clarifies the interface between anthropological and grammatical work. Focusing on systems that have a conceptual-semantic basis, the contributors reflect and represent approaches in nominal classification research. This invaluable reference work will appeal to linguists, anthropologists and psychologists alike, as well as specialists in languages as diverse as Australian, Amazonian, Mayan and Japanese.
  • Seuren, P. A. M. (1985). Discourse semantics. Oxford: Blackwell.
  • Seuren, P. A. M. (2013). From Whorf to Montague: Explorations in the theory of language. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
  • Shao, Z. (2013). Contributions of executive control to individual differences in word production. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
  • Sinclair, A., Jarvella, R. J., & Levelt, W. J. M. (Eds.). (1978). The child's conception of language. Berlin: Springer.
  • Stivers, T., & Sidnell, J. (Eds.). (2013). The handbook on conversation analysis. Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell.

    Abstract

    Presenting a comprehensive, state-of-the-art overview of theoretical and descriptive research in the field, The Handbook of Conversation Analysis brings together contributions by leading international experts to provide an invaluable information resource and reference for scholars of social interaction across the areas of conversation analysis, discourse analysis, linguistic anthropology, interpersonal communication, discursive psychology and sociolinguistics. Ideal as an introduction to the field for upper level undergraduates and as an in-depth review of the latest developments for graduate level students and established scholars Five sections outline the history and theory, methods, fundamental concepts, and core contexts in the study of conversation, as well as topics central to conversation analysis Written by international conversation analysis experts, the book covers a wide range of topics and disciplines, from reviewing underlying structures of conversation, to describing conversation analysis' relationship to anthropology, communication, linguistics, psychology, and sociology
  • Van der Zande, P. (2013). Hearing and seeing speech: Perceptual adjustments in auditory-visual speech processing. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
  • Van Valin Jr., R. D. (Ed.). (2008). Investigations of the syntax-semantic-pragmatics interface. Amsterdam: Benjamins.

    Abstract

    Investigations of the Syntax-Semantics-Pragmatics Interface presents on-going research in Role and Reference Grammar in a number of critical areas of linguistic theory: verb semantics and argument structure, the nature of syntactic categories and syntactic representation, prosody and syntax, information structure and syntax, and the syntax and semantics of complex sentences. In each of these areas there are important results which not only advance the development of the theory, but also contribute to the broader theoretical discussion. In particular, there are analyses of grammatical phenomena such as transitivity in Kabardian, the verb-less numeral quantifier construction in Japanese, and an unusual kind of complex sentence in Wari’ (Chapakuran, Brazil) which not only illustrate the descriptive and explanatory power of the theory, but also present interesting challenges to other approaches. In addition, there are papers looking at the implications and applications of Role and Reference Grammar for neurolinguistic research, parsing and automated text analysis.
  • Wagner, A. (2008). Phoneme inventories and patterns of speech sound perception. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
  • Wegener, C. (2008). A grammar of Savosavo: A Papuan language of the Solomon Islands. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Njimegen.
  • Witteman, M. J. (2013). Lexical processing of foreign-accented speech: Rapid and flexible adaptation. PhD Thesis, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen.
  • Zeshan, U., & Perniss, P. M. (2008). Possessive and existential constructions in sign languages. Nijmegen: Ishara Press.

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