Publications

Abstract

This special issue is devoted to a relatively neglected topic in linguistics, namely the verbal component of locative statements. English tends, of course, to use a simple copula in utterances like “The cup is on the table”, but many languages, perhaps as many as half of the world's languages, have a set of alternate verbs, or alternate verbal affixes, which contrast in this slot. Often these are classificatory verbs of ‘sitting’, ‘standing’ and ‘lying’. For this reason, perhaps, Aristotle listed position among his basic (“noncomposite”) categories.

Abstract

Understanding how communicative goals impact and drive the learning process has been a long-standing issue in the field of language acquisition. Recent years have seen renewed interest in the social and pragmatic aspects of language learning: the way interaction shapes what and how children learn. In this volume, we bring together researchers working on interaction in different domains to present a cohesive overview of ongoing interactional research. The studies address the diversity of the environments children learn in; the role of para-linguistic information; the pragmatic forces driving language learning; and the way communicative pressures impact language use and change. Using observational, empirical and computational findings, this volume highlights the effect of interpersonal communication on what children hear and what they learn. This anthology is inspired by and dedicated to Prof. Eve V. Clark – a pioneer in all matters related to language acquisition – and a major force in establishing interaction and communication as crucial aspects of language learning.

Abstract

Artificial lexicons have previously been used to examine the time course of the learning and recognition of spoken words, the role of segment type in word learning, and the integration of context during spoken word recognition. However, in all of these studies the experimenter determined the frequency and order of the words to be learned. In three experiments, we asked whether adult learners choose to listen to novel words in a particular order based on their acoustic similarity. We use a new paradigm for learning an artificial lexicon in which the learner, rather than the experimenter, determines the order and frequency of exposure to items. We analyze both the proportions of selections and the temporal clustering of subjects' sampling of lexical neighborhoods during training as well as their performance during repeated testing phases (accuracy and reaction time) to determine the time course of learning these neighborhoods. In the first experiment, subjects sampled the high and low density neighborhoods randomly in early learning, and then over-sampled the high density neighborhood until test performance on both neighborhoods reached asymptote. A second experiment involved items similar to the first, but also neighborhoods that are not fully revealed at the start of the experiment. Subjects adjusted their training patterns to focus their selections on neighborhoods of increasing density was revealed; evidence of learning in the test phase was slower to emerge than in the first experiment, impaired by the presence of additional sets of items of varying density. Crucially, in both the first and second experiments there was no effect of dense vs. sparse neighborhood in the accuracy results, which is accounted for by subjects’ over-sampling of items from the dense neighborhood. The third experiment was identical in design to the second except for a second day of further training and testing on the same items. Testing at the beginning of the second day showed impaired, not improved, accuracy, except for the consistently dense items. Further training, however, improved accuracy for some items to above Day 1 levels. Overall, these results provide a new window on the time-course of learning an artificial lexicon and the role that learners’ implicit preferences, stemming from their self-selected experience with the entire lexicon, play in learning highly confusable words.

Abstract

Disfluency is a common characteristic of spontaneously produced speech. Disfluencies (e.g., silent pauses, filled pauses [uh’s and uhm’s], corrections, repetitions, etc.) occur in both native and non-native speech. There appears to be an apparent contradiction between claims from the evaluative and cognitive approach to fluency. On the one hand, the evaluative approach shows that non-native disfluencies have a negative effect on listeners’ subjective fluency impressions. On the other hand, the cognitive approach reports beneficial effects of native disfluencies on cognitive processes involved in speech comprehension, such as prediction and attention.

This dissertation aims to resolve this apparent contradiction by combining the evaluative and cognitive approach. The reported studies target both the evaluation (Chapters 2 and 3) and the processing of fluency (Chapters 4 and 5) in native and non-native speech. Thus, it provides an integrative account of native and non-native fluency perception, informative to both language testing practice and cognitive psycholinguists. The proposed account of fluency perception testifies to the notion that speech performance matters: communication through spoken language does not only depend on what is said, but also on how it is said and by whom.

Abstract

Japanese translation of Some universals in language usage, 1987, Cambridge University Press

Abstract

Research on second language acquisition typically focuses on how a first language (L1) influences a second language (L2) in different linguistic domains and across modalities. This dissertation, in contrast, explores interactions between languages in the mind of a language learner by asking 1) can an emerging L2 influence an established L1? 2) if so, how is such influence realized? 3) are there parallel influences of the L1 on the L2? These questions were investigated for the expression of Manner (e.g. climb, roll) and Path (e.g. up, down) of motion, areas where substantial crosslinguistic differences exist in speech and co-speech gesture. Japanese and English are typologically distinct in this domain; therefore, narrative descriptions of four motion events were elicited from monolingual Japanese speakers (n=16), monolingual English speakers (n=13), and native Japanese speakers with intermediate knowledge of English (narratives elicited in both their L1 and L2, n=28). Ways in which Path and Manner were expressed at the lexical, syntactic, and gestural levels were analyzed in monolingual and non-monolingual production. Results suggest mutual crosslinguistic influences. In their L1, native Japanese speakers with knowledge of English displayed both Japanese- and English-like use of morphosyntactic elements to express Path and Manner (i.e. a combination of verbs and other constructions). Consequently, non-monolingual L1 discourse contained significantly more Path expressions per clause, with significantly greater mention of Goal of motion than monolingual Japanese and English discourse. Furthermore, the gestures of non-monolingual speakers diverged from their monolingual counterparts with differences in depiction of Manner and gesture perspective (character versus observer). Importantly, non-monolingual production in the L1 was not ungrammatical, but simply reflected altered preferences. As for L2 production, many effects of L1 influence were seen, crucially in areas parallel to those described above. Overall, production by native Japanese speakers who knew English differed from that of monolingual Japanese and English speakers. But L1 and L2 production within non-monolingual individuals was similar. These findings imply a convergence of L1-L2 linguistic systems within the mind of a language learner. Theoretical and methodological implications for SLA research and language assessment with respect to the 'native speaker standard language' are discussed.

Abstract

The influence of culture on cognitive development is well established for school age and older children. But almost nothing is known about how different parenting and socialization practices in different cultures affect infants' and young children's earliest emerging cognitive and social-cognitive skills. In the current monograph, we report a series of eight studies in which we systematically assessed the social-cognitive skills of 1- to 3-year-old children in three diverse cultural settings. One group of children was from a Western, middle-class cultural setting in rural Canada and the other two groups were from traditional, small-scale cultural settings in rural Peru and India. In a first group of studies, we assessed 1-year-old children's most basic social-cognitive skills for understanding the intentions and attention of others: imitation, helping, gaze following, and communicative pointing. Children's performance in these tasks was mostly similar across cultural settings. In a second group of studies, we assessed 1-year-old children's skills in participating in interactive episodes of collaboration and joint attention. Again in these studies the general finding was one of cross-cultural similarity. In a final pair of studies, we assessed 2- to 3-year-old children's skills within two symbolic systems (pretense and pictorial). Here we found that the Canadian children who had much more experience with such symbols showed skills at an earlier age. Our overall conclusion is that young children in all cultural settings get sufficient amounts of the right kinds of social experience to develop their most basic social-cognitive skills for interacting with others and participating in culture at around the same age. In contrast, children's acquisition of more culturally specific skills for use in practices involving artifacts and symbols is more dependent on specific learning experiences.

Abstract

This volume comprises refereed papers and abstracts of the 10th International Conference on the Evolution of Language (EVOLANGX), held in Vienna on 14–17th April 2014. As the leading international conference in the field, the biennial EVOLANG meeting is characterised by an invigorating, multidisciplinary approach to the origins and evolution of human language, and brings together researchers from many subject areas, including anthropology, archaeology, biology, cognitive science, computer science, genetics, linguistics, neuroscience, palaeontology, primatology and psychology. For this 10th conference, the proceedings will include a special perspectives section featuring prominent researchers reflecting on the history of the conference and its impact on the field of language evolution since the inaugural EVOLANG conference in 1996.

Abstract

How do we refer to people in everyday conversation? No matter the language or culture, we must choose from a range of options: full name ('Robert Smith'), reduced name ('Bob'), description ('tall guy'), kin term ('my son') etc. Our choices reflect how we know that person in context, and allow us to take a particular perspective on them. This book brings together a team of leading linguists, sociologists and anthropologists to show that there is more to person reference than meets the eye. Drawing on video-recorded, everyday interactions in nine languages, it examines the fascinating ways in which we exploit person reference for social and cultural purposes, and reveals the underlying principles of person reference across cultures from the Americas to Asia to the South Pacific. Combining rich ethnographic detail with cross-linguistic generalizations.

Abstract

Lao is the national language of Laos, and is also spoken widely in Thailand and Cambodia. It is a tone language of the Tai-Kadai family (Southwestern Tai branch). Lao is an extreme example of the isolating, analytic language type. This book is the most comprehensive grammatical description of Lao to date. It describes and analyses the important structures of the language, including classifiers, sentence-final particles, and serial verb constructions. Special attention is paid to grammatical topics from a semantic, pragmatic, and typological perspective.

Abstract

Rede uitgesproken bij de aanvaarding van het ambt van hoogleraar Etnolinguïstiek, in het bijzonder die van Zuid-Oost Azië, aan de Faculteit der Letteren van de Radboud Universiteit Nijmegen op woensdag 4 november 2009 door prof. dr. N.J. Enfield

Abstract

What causes a language to be the way it is? Some features are universal, some are inherited, others are borrowed, and yet others are internally innovated. But no matter where a bit of language is from, it will only exist if it has been diffused and kept in circulation through social interaction in the history of a community. This book makes the case that a proper understanding of the ontology of language systems has to be grounded in the causal mechanisms by which linguistic items are socially transmitted, in communicative contexts. A biased transmission model provides a basis for understanding why certain things and not others are likely to develop, spread, and stick in languages. Because bits of language are always parts of systems, we also need to show how it is that items of knowledge and behavior become structured wholes. The book argues that to achieve this, we need to see how causal processes apply in multiple frames or 'time scales' simultaneously, and we need to understand and address each and all of these frames in our work on language. This forces us to confront implications that are not always comfortable: for example, that "a language" is not a real thing but a convenient fiction, that language-internal and language-external processes have a lot in common, and that tree diagrams are poor conceptual tools for understanding the history of languages. By exploring avenues for clear solutions to these problems, this book suggests a conceptual framework for ultimately explaining, in causal terms, what languages are like and why they are like that.

Abstract

Reciprocals are an increasingly hot topic in linguistic research. This reflects the intersection of several factors: the semantic and syntactic complexity of reciprocal constructions, their centrality to some key points of linguistic theorizing (such as Binding Conditions on anaphors within Government and Binding Theory), and the centrality of reciprocity to theories of social structure, human evolution and social cognition. No existing work, however, tackles the question of exactly what reciprocal constructions mean cross-linguistically. Is there a single, Platonic ‘reciprocal’ meaning found in all languages, or is there a cluster of related concepts which are nonetheless impossible to characterize in any single way? That is the central goal of this volume, and it develops and explains new techniques for tackling this question. At the same time, it confronts a more general problem facing semantic typology: how to investigate a category cross-linguistically without pre-loading the definition of the phenomenon on the basis of what is found in more familiar languages.

Abstract

This dissertation is an ethnographic study of race and other forms of social categorization as approached through the discourse of the indigenous Chachi people of northwestern lowland Ecuador and their Afro-descendant neighbors. It combines the ethnographic methods of social anthropology with the methods of descriptive linguistics, letting social questions about racial formation guide linguistic inquiry. It provides new information about the largely unstudied indigenous South American language Cha’palaa, and connects that information about linguistic form to problems of the study of race and ethnicity in Latin America. Individual descriptive chapters address how the Cha’palaa number system is based on collectivity rather than plurality according to an animacy hierarchy that codes only human and human-like social collectivities, how a nominal set of ethnonyms linked to Chachi oral history become the recipients of collective marking as human collectivities, how those collectivities are co-referentially linked to speech participants through the deployment of the pronominal system, and how the multi-modal resource of gesture adds to these rich resources supplied by the spoken language for the expression of social realities like race. The final chapters address Chachi and Afrodescendant discourses in dialogue with each other and examine naturally occurring speech data to show how the linguistic forms described in previous chapters are used in social interaction. The central argument advances a position that takes the socially constructed status of race seriously and considers that for such constructions to exist as more abstract macro-categories they must be constituted by instances of social interaction, where elements of the social order are observable at the micro-level. In this way localized articulations of social categories become vehicles for the broader circulation of discourses structured by a history of racialized social inequality, revealing the extreme depth of racialization in human social conditioning. This dissertation represents a contribution to the field of linguistic anthropology as well as to descriptive linguistics of South American languages and to critical approaches to race and ethnicity in Latin America.

Abstract

Background Stroke-induced aphasia is associated with adverse effects on quality of life and the ability to return to work. However, the predictors of recovery are still poorly understood. Anatomical variability of the arcuate fasciculus, connecting Broca’s and Wernicke’s areas, has been reported in the healthy population using diffusion tensor imaging tractography. In about 40% of the population the arcuate fasciculus is bilateral and this pattern is advantageous for certain language related functions, such as auditory verbal learning (Catani et al. 2007). Methods In this prospective longitudinal study, anatomical predictors of post-stroke aphasia recovery were investigated using diffusion tractography and arterial spin labelling. Patients An 18-subject strong aphasia cohort with first-ever unilateral left hemispheric middle cerebral artery infarcts underwent post stroke language (mean 5±5 days) and neuroimaging (mean 10±6 days) assessments and neuropsychological follow-up at six months. Ten of these patients were available for reassessment one year after symptom onset. Aphasia was assessed with the Western Aphasia Battery, which provides a global measure of severity (Aphasia Quotient, AQ). Results Better recover from aphasia was observed in patients with a right arcuate fasciculus [beta=.730, t(2.732), p=.020] (tractography) and increased fractional anisotropy in the right hemisphere (p<0.05) (Tract-based spatial statistics). Further, an increase in left hemisphere perfusion was observed after one year (p<0.01) (perfusion). Lesion analysis identified maximal overlay in the periinsular white matter (WM). Lesion-symptom mapping identified damage to periinsular structure as predictive for overall aphasia severity and damage to frontal lobe white matter as predictive of repetition deficits. Conclusion These findings suggest an important role for the right hemisphere language network in recovery from aphasia after left hemispheric stroke.

Abstract

Researchers have long avoided neurophysiological experiments of overt speech production due to the suspicion that artifacts caused by muscle activity may lead to a bad signal-to-noise ratio in the measurements. However, the need to actually produce speech may influence earlier processing and qualitatively change speech production processes and what we can infer from neurophysiological measures thereof. Recently, however, overt speech has been successfully investigated using EEG, MEG, and fMRI. The aim of this Research Topic is to draw together recent research on the neurophysiological basis of language production, with the aim of developing and extending theoretical accounts of the language production process. In this Research Topic of Frontiers in Language Sciences, we invite both experimental and review papers, as well as those about the latest methods in acquisition and analysis of overt language production data. All aspects of language production are welcome: i.e., from conceptualization to articulation during native as well as multilingual language production. Focus should be placed on using the neurophysiological data to inform questions about the processing stages of language production. In addition, emphasis should be placed on the extent to which the identified components of the electrophysiological signal (e.g., ERP/ERF, neuronal oscillations, etc.), brain areas or networks are related to language comprehension and other cognitive domains. By bringing together electrophysiological and neuroimaging evidence on language production mechanisms, a more complete picture of the locus of language production processes and their temporal and neurophysiological signatures will emerge.

Abstract

This doctoral dissertation investigated the learning of auditory categories by applying insights from child language learning, visual category learning and phonetic categorization by adults. The experiments in chapter 2 concern supervised learning of multidimensional non-speech categories varying in two dimensions: duration and a non speech analogue of formant frequency. In experiment 1, one dimension of variation determined category membership, variation in the other dimension was irrelevant. Listeners quickly learned to categorize according to this distinction. In experiment 2, both dimensions needed to be combined to categorize correctly. Performance was much lower, but most listeners succeeded in this task. However, in a maintenance phase without feedback or distributional information, listeners reverted to a unidimensional solution. In a maintenance phase with distributional information, listeners did use both dimensions correctly, arguing for the importance of distributional information in (auditory) category acquisition. In chapter 3, the listeners had to classify the same categories, but without feedback. In experiment 1, listeners succeeded to discover the relevant dimension of variation (and ignore the irrelevant one) without feedback. Much of this learning was lost in the maintenance phase, especially for the dimension formant frequency. With two relevant dimensions (Experiment 2), listeners were not able to learn to use both dimensions and reverted to a unidimensional solution. Chapter 4 applied the paradigms of chapter 2 and 3 to the learning of speech categories. Spanish native listeners learned Dutch vowel contrast with one relevant dimension of variation. With feedback, learning was swift, although was not well maintained without feedback or distributional information. Without feedback, Spanish listeners reverted to the dimensions best known in their native phonology, formant frequency, even when distributional information pointed to duration. The results are discussed in chapter 5. The implications for models of speech acquisition are discussed.

Abstract

Gestures are prevalent in communication and tightly linked to language and speech. As such they can shed important light on issues of language development across the lifespan. This volume, originally published as a Special Issue of Gesture Volume 8:2 (2008), brings together studies from different disciplines that examine language development in children and adults from varying perspectives. It provides a review of common theoretical and empirical themes, and the contributions address topics such as gesture use in prelinguistic infants, the relationship between gestures and lexical development in typically and atypically developing children and in second language learners, what gestures reveal about discourse, and how all languages that adult second language speakers know can influence each other. The papers exemplify a vibrant new field of study with relevance for multiple disciplines.

Abstract

To understand the nature of language learning, the factors that influence it, and the mechanisms that govern it, it is crucial to study the very earliest stages of language learning. This volume provides a state-of-the art overview of what we know about the cognitive and neurobiological aspects of the adult capacity for language learning. It brings together studies from several fields that examine learning from multiple perspectives using various methods. The papers examine learning after anything from a few minutes to months of language exposure; they target the learning of both artificial and natural languages, involve both explicit and implicit learning, and cover linguistic domains ranging from phonology and semantics to morphosyntax. The findings will inform and extend further studies of language learning in multiple disciplines.

Abstract

This thesis elaborates on a methodological approach to reliably infer cognitive preferences in an extinct evolutionary ancestor of modern humans. In attempts to understand cognitive evolution, humans have been compared to capuchin monkeys, tamarins, and chimpanzees to name but a few. But comparisons between humans and one other, maybe even distantly related primate, as interesting as they might be, will not tell us anything about an evolutionary ancestor to humans. To put it bluntly: None of the living primates, not even chimpanzees, are a human ancestor. With that in mind, we can still use a comparative approach to gain information about our evolutionary ancestors, as long as we are careful about whom we compare with whom. If a certain trait exists in all genera of a phylogenetic clade, it was most likely present in their common ancestor. The great apes are such a clade (Pongo, Gorilla, Pan and Homo). It follows that, if members of all great ape genera shared a particular cognitive preference or ability, it is most likely part of the evolutionary inheritance of the clade at least ever since their last common ancestor, and therefore also an evolutionarily old, inherited cognitive default in humans. This thesis contains studies comparing all 4 extant Hominid genera, including humans of 4 different age-groups and 2 different cultures. Results show that all great apes do indeed share some cognitive preferences, which they most likely inherited from an evolutionary ancestor. Additionally, human cognitive preferences can change away from such an inherited predisposition given ontogenetic factors, and are at least in part variably adaptable to cultural circumstance.

Abstract

Baby's begrijpen woorden eerder dan dat ze deze zeggen. Dit stadium is onderbelicht want moeilijk waarneembaar. Caroline Junge onderzocht de vaardigheden die nodig zijn voor het leren van de eerste woordjes: conceptherkenning, woordherkenning en het verbinden van woord aan betekenis. Daarvoor bestudeerde ze de hersenpotentialen van het babybrein tijdens het horen van woordjes. Junge stelt vast dat baby's van negen maanden al woordbegrip hebben. En dat is veel vroeger dan tot nu toe bekend was. Als baby's een woord hoorde dat niet klopte met het plaatje dat ze zagen, lieten ze een N400-effect zien, een klassiek hersenpotentiaal. Uit eerder Duits onderzoek is gebleken dat baby's van twaalf maanden dit effect nog niet laten zien, omdat de hersenen nog niet rijp zouden zijn. Het onderzoek van Junge weerlegt dit. Ook laat ze zien dat als baby's goed woorden kunnen herkennen binnen zinnetjes, dit belangrijk is voor hun latere taalontwikkeling, wat mogelijk tot nieuwe therapieën voor taalstoornissen zal leiden.

Abstract

Word segmentation, or detecting word boundaries in continuous speech, is not an easy task. Spoken language does not contain silences to indicate word boundaries and words partly overlap due to coarticalution. Still, adults listening to their native language perceive speech as individual words. They are able to combine different distributional cues in the language, such as the statistical distribution of sounds and metrical cues, with lexical information, to efficiently detect word boundaries. Infants in the first year of life do not command these cues. However, already between seven and ten months of age, before they know word meaning, infants learn to segment words from speech. This important step in language acquisition is the topic of this dissertation. In chapter 2, the first Event Related Brain Potential (ERP) study on word segmentation in Dutch ten-month-olds is discussed. The results show that ten-month-olds can already segment words with a strong-weak stress pattern from speech and they need roughly the first half of a word to do so. Chapter 3 deals with segmentation of words beginning with a weak syllable, as a considerable number of words in Dutch do not follow the predominant strong-weak stress pattern. The results show that ten-month-olds still largely rely on the strong syllable in the language, and do not show an ERP response to the initial weak syllable. In chapter 4, seven-month-old infants' segmentation of strong-weak words was studied. An ERP response was found to strong-weak words presented in sentences. However, a behavioral response was not found in an additional Headturn Preference Procedure study. There results suggest that the ERP response is a precursor to the behavioral response that infants show at a later age.

Abstract

The purpose of this book is to provide some indication of the scope of linguistic pragmatics. First the historical origin of the term pragmatics will be briefly summarized, in order to indicate some usages of the term that are divergent from the usage in this book. We will review some definitions of the field, which, while being less than fully statisfactory, will at least serve to indicate the rough scope of linguistic pragmatics. Thirdly, some reasons for the current interest in the field will be explained, while a final section illustrates some basic kinds of pragmatic phenomena. In passing, some analytical notions that are useful background will be introduced.

Abstract

When we speak, we mean more than we say. In this book, the author explains some general processes that underlie presumptions in communication. This is the first extended discussion of preferred interpretation in language understanding, integrating much of the best research in linguistic pragmatics from the last two decades. Levinson outlines a theory of presumptive meanings, or preferred interpretations, governing the use of language, building on the idea of implicature developed by the philosopher H. P. Grice. Some of the indirect information carried by speech is presumed by default because it is carried by general principles, rather than inferred from specific assumptions about intention and context. Levinson examines this class of general pragmatic inferences in detail, showing how they apply to a wide range of linguistic constructions. This approach has radical consequences for how we think about language and communication.

Abstract

This special issue of Cognitive Linguistics explores the linguistic encoding of events of cutting and breaking. In this article we first introduce the project on which it is based by motivating the selection of this conceptual domain, presenting the methods of data collection used by all the investigators, and characterizing the language sample. We then present a new approach to examining crosslinguistic similarities and differences in semantic categorization. Applying statistical modeling to the descriptions of cutting and breaking events elicited from speakers of all the languages, we show that although there is crosslinguistic variation in the number of distinctions made and in the placement of category boundaries, these differences take place within a strongly constrained semantic space: across languages, there is a surprising degree of consensus on the partitioning of events in this domain. In closing, we compare our statistical approach with more conventional semantic analyses, and show how an extensional semantic typological approach like the one illustrated here can help illuminate the intensional distinctions made by languages.

Abstract

Landscape is fundamental to human experience. Yet until recently, the study of landscape has been fragmented among the disciplines. This volume focuses on how landscape is represented in language and thought, and what this reveals about the relationships of people to place and to land. Scientists of various disciplines such as anthropologists, geographers, information scientists, linguists, and philosophers address several questions, including: Are there cross-cultural and cross-linguistic variations in the delimitation, classification, and naming of geographic features? Can alternative world-views and conceptualizations of landscape be used to produce culturally-appropriate Geographic Information Systems (GIS)? Topics included ontology of landscape; landscape terms and concepts; toponyms; spiritual aspects of land and landscape terms; research methods; ethical dimensions of the research; and its potential value to indigenous communities involved in this type of research.

Abstract

The scope of this volume reflects how wide-ranging Karl Franklin’s research interests have been. He is not only a linguist, but also an anthropologist, sociolinguist, and creolist. The contributors who honor Karl in this volume represent an international community of scholars who have researched languages and cultures across the globe and through history. The volume has three sections, each with contributions listed alphabetically by the authors’ names. Studies in Language consists of eighteen papers in phonology, grammar, semantics, dialectology, lexicography, and speech acts. These papers reflect diverse theories. Studies in Culture has five studies relating to cultures of Papua New Guinea. Interdisciplinary Studies concerns matters relating to translation.

Abstract

The use of language is a fundamental component of much of our day-to-day life. Language often co-occurs with other activities with which it must be coordinated. This raises the question of whether the cognitive processes involved in planning spoken utterances and in understanding them are autonomous or whether they are affected by, and perhaps affect, non-linguistic cognitive processes, with which they might share processing resources. This question is the central concern of Automaticity and Control in Language Processing. The chapters address key issues concerning the relationship between linguistic and non-linguistic processes, including: * How can the degree of automaticity of a component be defined? * Which linguistic processes are truly automatic, and which require processing capacity? * Through which mechanisms can control processes affect linguistic performance? How might these mechanisms be represented in the brain? * How do limitations in working memory and executive control capacity affect linguistic performance and language re-learning in persons with brain damage? This important collection from leading international researchers will be of great interest to researchers and students in the area.

Abstract

This issue investigates the linguistic encoding of events with three or more participants from the perspectives of language typology and acquisition. Such “multiple-participant events” include (but are not limited to) any scenario involving at least three participants, typically encoded using transactional verbs like 'give' and 'show', placement verbs like 'put', and benefactive and applicative constructions like 'do (something for someone)', among others. There is considerable crosslinguistic and withinlanguage variation in how the participants (the Agent, Causer, Theme, Goal, Recipient, or Experiencer) and the subevents involved in multipleparticipant situations are encoded, both at the lexical and the constructional levels

Abstract

Typologies are critical tools for linguists, but typologies, like grammars, are known to leak. This book addresses the question of typological overlap from the perspective of a single language. In Lowland Chontal of Oaxaca, a language of southern Mexico, change events are expressed with three types of predicates, and each predicate type corresponds to a different language type in the well-known typology of lexicalization patterns established by Talmy and elaborated by others. O’Connor evaluates the predictive powers of the typology by examining the consequences of each predicate type in a variety of contexts, using data from narrative discourse, stimulus response, and elicitation. This is the first de­tailed look at the lexical and grammatical resources of the verbal system in Chontal and their relation to semantics of change. The analysis of how and why Chontal speakers choose among these verbal resources to achieve particular communicative and social goals serves both as a documentation of an endangered language and a theoretical contribution towards a typology of language use.

Abstract

Even though most studies of language have focused on speech channel and/or viewed language as an
amodal abstract system, there is growing evidence on the role our bodily actions/ perceptions play in language and communication.
In this context, Özyürek discusses what our meaningful visible bodily actions reveal about our language capacity. Conducting cross-linguistic, behavioral, and neurobiological research,
she shows that co-speech gestures reflect the imagistic, iconic aspects of events talked about and at the same time interact with language production and
comprehension processes. Sign languages can also be characterized having an abstract system of linguistic categories as well as using iconicity in several
aspects of the language structure and in its processing.
Studying language multimodally reveals how grounded language is in our visible bodily actions and opens
up new lines of research to study language in its situated,
natural face-to-face context.

Abstract

This dissertation investigates the expression of spatial relationships in German Sign Language (Deutsche Gebärdensprache, DGS). The analysis focuses on linguistic expression in the spatial domain in two types of discourse: static scene description (location) and event narratives (location and motion). Its primary theoretical objectives are to characterize the structure of locative descriptions in DGS; to explain the use of frames of reference and perspective in the expression of location and motion; to clarify the interrelationship between the systems of frames of reference, signing perspective, and classifier predicates; and to characterize the interplay between iconicity principles, on the one hand, and grammatical and discourse constraints, on the other hand, in the use of these spatial devices. In more general terms, the dissertation provides a usage-based account of iconic mapping in the visual-spatial modality. The use of space in sign language expression is widely assumed to be guided by iconic principles, which are furthermore assumed to hold in the same way across sign languages. Thus, there has been little expectation of variation between sign languages in the spatial domain in the use of spatial devices. Consequently, perhaps, there has been little systematic investigation of linguistic expression in the spatial domain in individual sign languages, and less investigation of spatial language in extended signed discourse. This dissertation provides an investigation of spatial expressions in DGS by investigating the impact of different constraints on iconicity in sign language structure. The analyses have important implications for our understanding of the role of iconicity in the visual-spatial modality, the possible language-specific variation within the spatial domain in the visual-spatial modality, the structure of spatial language in both natural language modalities, and the relationship between spatial language and cognition

Abstract

It has been argued that properties of the visual-gestural modality impose a homogenizing effect on sign languages, leading to less structural variation in sign language structure as compared to spoken language structure. However, until recently, research on sign languages was limited to a number of (Western) sign languages. Before we can truly answer the question of whether modality effects do indeed cause less structural variation, it is necessary to investigate the similarities and differences that exist between sign languages in more detail and, especially, to include in this investigation less studied sign languages. The current research climate is testimony to a surge of interest in the study of a geographically more diverse range of sign languages. The volume reflects that climate and brings together work by scholars engaging in comparative sign linguistics research. The 11 articles discuss data from many different signed and spoken languages and cover a wide range of topics from different areas of grammar including phonology (word pictures), morphology (pronouns, negation, and auxiliaries), syntax (word order, interrogative clauses, auxiliaries, negation, and referential shift) and pragmatics (modal meaning and referential shift). In addition to this, the contributions address psycholinguistic issues, aspects of language change, and issues concerning data collection in sign languages, thereby providing methodological guidelines for further research. Although some papers use a specific theoretical framework for analyzing the data, the volume clearly focuses on empirical and descriptive aspects of sign language variation.

Abstract

This dissertation investigates the roles of several probabilistic variables in the production and comprehension of reduced Dutch affixes. The central hypothesis is that linguistic units with a high probability of occurrence are
more likely to be reduced (Jurafsky et al., 2001; Aylett & Turk, 2004). This hypothesis is tested by analyzing the acoustic realizations of affixes, which are meaning-carrying elements embedded in larger lexical units. Most of the results prove to be compatible with the main hypothesis, but some appear to run counter to its predictions. The final chapter of the thesis discusses the implications of these findings for models of speech production, models of speech perception, and probability-based accounts of reduction.

Abstract

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