Causality and Connectives

Causality and Connectives
Author: Valandis Bardzokas
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
Total Pages: 220
Release: 2012-01-19
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9027275017

The book explores finely-grained distinctions in causal meaning, mostly from a relevance-theoretic perspective. To increase the challenge of this double task, i.e. a thorough as well as satisfactory account of cause and a detailed assessment of the theoretical model employed to this end, the current study involves an investigation carried out by way of contrasting the prototypical causal exponents of Modern Greek subordination, i.e. epeiδi and γiati. In addition, this objective is achieved in the methodological framework of contrasting a range of contextual applications of the two connectives against their translated versions in English, realizable by means of because. Despite first impressions, a closer observation of the wide range of applications of these markers in the discourse of coherence relations illustrates divergences in their distribution, which, in turn, are taken to highlight differing aspects of causal interpretation. The proposal for the relevance-theoretic model emanates from a reaction to an array of problems undermining traditional tenets of pragmatic theory originating with Grice’s stance, but is also made in response to the common practice in pragmatic research (since its origin) to pay low regard for the contribution of typical causal markers to debates aiming at the determination of the distinction that has been instrumental to issues of cognition and pragmatic interpretation, i.e. propositional vs. non-propositional meaning.

From Will to Well

From Will to Well
Author: Stefaan Slembrouck
Publisher: Academia Press
Total Pages: 499
Release: 2009
Genre: Linguistics
ISBN: 9038214960

Micro- and Macro-variation of Causal Clauses

Micro- and Macro-variation of Causal Clauses
Author: Łukasz Jędrzejowski
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing Company
Total Pages: 363
Release: 2023-03-01
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9027254478

This collection presents novel insights into the micro- and macro-variation of causal clauses from a cross-linguistic perspective. It contains a general introduction to the topic setting the scene and nine chapters based on data from Dutch, German, English, Icelandic, Chinese, and Japanese. Topics discussed in the individual chapters involve, inter alia, external, internal and linear syntax of adverbial clauses expressing a causal relation, their semantic interpretation and information-structural properties, verb position, volitionality, and the development of particular causal conjunctions. The findings gained here are of synchronic and diachronic nature and offer new theoretical perspectives on how causal dependency relationships are expressed by inherent causal morpho-syntactic patterns. They also provide a deeper comprehension of how sentential modifiers work, emerge, and develop in general. This volume is an asset to grammarians, syntacticians, theoretical, and historical linguists.

Studies in Specialized Discourse

Studies in Specialized Discourse
Author: John Flowerdew
Publisher: Peter Lang
Total Pages: 308
Release: 2006
Genre: Foreign Language Study
ISBN: 9783039111787

This book analyses the various features of specialized discourse in order to assess its degree of specificity and diversification, as compared to general language. Prior to any analysis of such traits, the notion of specialized discourse and its distinctive properties are clarified, also as compared to other features frequently occurring in specialized texts which cannot be considered distinctive. The presence of such properties are accounted for not only in linguistic but also in pragmatic terms since the approach is interpretative rather tan merely descriptive. The complexity of this discourse calls for a multidimensional analysis, covering both lexis and morpho-syntax as well as textual patterning. Some lexical aspects, morphosyntactic features and textual genres are also examined from a diachronic perspective, thus showing how various conventions concerning specialized discourse have developed over the last few centuries.

Grammar of Spoken and Written English

Grammar of Spoken and Written English
Author: Douglas Biber
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing Company
Total Pages: 1258
Release: 2021-11-15
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9027260478

The completely redesigned Grammar of Spoken and Written English is a comprehensive corpus-based reference grammar. GSWE describes the structural characteristics of grammatical constructions in English, as do other reference grammars. But GSWE is unique in that it gives equal attention to describing the patterns of language use for each grammatical feature, based on empirical analyses of grammatical patterns in a 40-million-word corpus of spoken and written registers. Grammar-in-use is characterized by three inter-related kinds of information: frequency of grammatical features in spoken and written registers, frequencies of the most common lexico-grammatical patterns, and analysis of the discourse factors influencing choices among related grammatical features. GSWE includes over 350 tables and figures highlighting the results of corpus-based investigations. Throughout the book, authentic examples illustrate all research findings. The empirical descriptions document the lexico-grammatical features that are especially common in face-to-face-conversation compared to those that are especially common in academic writing. Analyses of fiction and newspaper articles are included as further benchmarks of language use. GSWE contains over 6,000 authentic examples from these four registers, illustrating the range of lexico-grammatical features in real-world speech and writing. In addition, comparisons between British and American English reveal specific regional differences. Now completely redesigned and available in an electronic edition, the Grammar of Spoken and Written English remains a unique and indispensable reference work for researchers, language teachers, and students alike.

Corpus Linguistics and Linguistic Theory

Corpus Linguistics and Linguistic Theory
Author: Christian Mair
Publisher: Rodopi
Total Pages: 408
Release: 2000
Genre: Computers
ISBN: 9789042014930

From being the occupation of a marginal (and frequently marginalised) group of researchers, the linguistic analysis of machine-readable language corpora has moved to the mainstream of research on the English language. In this process an impressive body of results has accumulated which, over and above the intrinsic descriptive interest it holds for students of the English language, forces a major and systematic re-thinking of foundational issues in linguistic theory. Corpus linguistics and linguistic theory was accordingly chosen as the motto for the twentieth annual gathering of ICAME, the International Computer Archive of Modern/ Medieval English, which was hosted by the University of Freiburg (Germany) in 1999. The present volume, which presents selected papers from this conference, thus builds on previous successful work in the computer-aided description of English and at the same time represents an attempt at stock-taking and methodological reflection in a linguistic subdiscipline that has clearly come of age.Contributions cover all levels of linguistic description - from phonology/ prosody, through grammar and semantics to discourse-analytical issues such as genre or gender-specific linguistic usage. They are united by a desire to further the dialogue between the corpus-linguistic community and researchers working in other traditions. Thereby, the atmosphere ranges from undisguised skepticism (as expressed by Noam Chomsky in an interview which is part of the opening contribution by Bas Aarts) to empirically substantiated optimism (as, for example, in Bernadette Vine's significantly titled contribution Getting things done).

Text Representation

Text Representation
Author: Ted Sanders
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
Total Pages: 378
Release: 2001
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9781588110770

This book brings together linguistics and psycholinguistics. Text representation is considered a cognitive entity: a mental construct that plays a crucial role in both text production and text understanding.The focus is on referential and relational coherence and the role of linguistic characteristics as processing instructions from a text linguistic and discourse psychology point of view. Consequently, this book presents various research methodologies: linguistic analysis, text analysis, corpus linguistics, computational linguistics, argumentation analysis, and the experimental psycholinguistic study of text processing. The authors compare, test, and evaluate linguistic and processing theories of text representation.A state of the art volume in an emerging field of interest, located at the very heart of our communicative behavior: the study of text and text representation.

Discourse Particles in Latin

Discourse Particles in Latin
Author: Caroline Kroon
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 416
Release: 2019-10-01
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 9004408991

Due to their extremely elusive nature, particles have long been treated in a stepmotherly way, in grammars of individual languages as well as in theories of language. This study is representative of the recent upsurge of interest in particles, more particularly in particles with a discourse marking function. By offering a detailed account of a number of Latin discourse particles, the study provides more insight into a vitually neglected area of Latin. At the same time it contributes to the theoretical and methodological foundations of current particle research and, more generally, to the development of linguistic models of discourse.

Actual Causality

Actual Causality
Author: Joseph Y. Halpern
Publisher: MIT Press
Total Pages: 240
Release: 2016-08-12
Genre: Computers
ISBN: 0262035022

Explores actual causality, and such related notions as degree of responsibility, degree of blame, and causal explanation. The goal is to arrive at a definition of causality that matches our natural language usage and is helpful, for example, to a jury deciding a legal case, a programmer looking for the line of code that cause some software to fail, or an economist trying to determine whether austerity caused a subsequent depression.