‘Saved by the reflexive’

2007 ◽  
Vol 5 ◽  
pp. 193-238 ◽  
Author(s):  
Francisco Gonzálvez-García
Keyword(s):  
Lexical Semantics ◽  
Explanatory Power ◽  
Dynamic Interaction ◽  
Specific Nature ◽  
Fine Grained ◽  
Reflexive Pronoun ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Personal Assessment ◽  
Incontrovertible Evidence

This paper argues for the existence of a dynamic interaction between constructional polysemy and coercion in shaping lower-level configurations of the subjective-transitive construction in English and Spanish. In particular, a fine-grained analysis is provided of those configurations featuring coercion via a reflexive pronoun in the object slot. The corpus-based analysis provided here shows that the verbs in question, regardless of their inherent lexical semantics, are construed in this construction as expressing a personal assessment by the subject/speaker about himself/herself, thus providing incontrovertible evidence for a constructionist analysis of the type invoked here. Moreover, the coercion effects examined here lend further credence to the construction-specific and also language-specific nature of constructions, especially in the light of instances of the reflexive subjective-transitive construction after saber (‘know’) in Spanish. This paper also suggests that the explanatory power of the anatomy of a given construction can be further maximized if the morphosyntactic properties of the XPCOMP are mapped onto their inherent meaning properties.

scholarly journals Underspecified changes: a dynamic, probabilistic frame theory for verbs

2018 ◽  
Vol 61 ◽  
pp. 181-198
Author(s):  
Ralf Naumann ◽  
Wiebke Petersen ◽  
Thomas Gamerschlag
Keyword(s):  
Probabilistic Reasoning ◽  
Political Power ◽  
Lexical Semantics ◽  
Frame Theory ◽  
World Knowledge ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Current Value ◽  
General Meaning

The verb ‘rise’ can be used both with property-denoting nouns like ‘temperature’but also with NPs like ‘a Titan’ or ‘China’. Whereas in the former case the change triggeredby a rising event is directly related to the subject (its current value increases), this does nothold for ‘a titan’ or ‘China’. In this case it is a property of these objects, say their height ortheir political power, which increases in value. Furthermore, ‘rise’ does not target a particularproperty as the examples above show. This data has led Cooper (2010) to the conclusion thatit is presumably not possible (i) “to extract a single general meaning of words which covers allthe particular meanings of the word in context”, and (ii) “to determine once and for all the setof particular contextually determined meanings of a word”. In this article we present a solutionto the two problems raised by ‘rise’ in a frame theory. ‘Rise’ is analyzed as a scalar verb whichdoes not lexicalize a complete scale in its meaning. Rather, it shows underspecification relativeto the dimension (property) parameter of a scale. The set of admissible properties is determinedby a constraint on the value ranges of properties. If the property is not uniquely determinedby the subject, the comprehender uses probabilistic reasoning based on world knowledge anddiscourse information to defeasibly infer the most likely candidates from this set (2nd problem).The first problem is solved not by simply introducing objects into the representation of adiscourse but instead by pairs consisting of an object and an associated frame component whichcollects the object information contributed by the discourse. Changes triggered by events likethe one denoted by ‘rise’ are modelled as update operations on the frame component while theobject component is left unchanged.Keywords: lexical semantics, scalar changes, frame theory, probabilities.

Reflexive constructions in German, Spanish, and French as a product of cyclic interaction

2021 ◽  
pp. 137-164
Author(s):  
Matthew L. Maddox ◽  
Jonathan E. MacDonald
Keyword(s):  
Old French ◽  
Null Subject ◽  
Reflexive Pronoun ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Subject Agreement ◽  
Categorial Status

German sich and Spanish se can have reflexive or anticausative interpretations but only Spanish se can have a passive interpretation. We argue that Spanish Passse is the result of interaction between the subject agreement cycle and the reflexive object cycle. We make two claims: i) pro merges in Spec-Voice in Passse, due to the subject agreement cycle; and ii) se heads Voice due to the reflexive cycle. The types of reflexive constructions a language has depends on the presence/absence of pro and the categorial status of the reflexive pronoun (head or DP). French appears problematic since it has Passse but lacks subject pro. However, Passse existed in Old French (Cennamo 1993), which was a null subject language (Vance 1997). Thus, French is consistent with this claim; i.e., it developed Passse when it had subject pro and se as a head. Passse survived into Modern French as a historical remnant.

What is Legal Logic?

1968 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-6 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ch. Perelman
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Legal Reasoning ◽  
Formal Logic ◽  
The Other ◽  
Contemporary Philosophy ◽  
Specific Nature ◽  
Legal Thought ◽  
General Logic ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Practical Logic

That the question what is legal logic should still arise today appears paradoxical, for law is after all one of the oldest of human disciplines and logic has in the twentieth century become one of the most developed of the disciplines of contemporary philosophy. Yet comparison of a number of recent works dealing with the subject, all of which, not being without merit, have enjoyed a measure of success, is enough to show that the problem exists and is even strongly disputed.Of four such works, two—those by E. Levi and K. Engisch—do not use the word “logic” in their titles, though they deal with legal reasoning and legal thought. The other two, on the contrary, expressly purport to deal with legal logic. Strangely enough, however, their authors explicitly deny the specific existence of such a discipline, whereas Levi and Engisch underscore, without any hesitation, the specific nature of legal reasoning and the existence of a particular logic, legal logic.Thus in the first paragraph of his work, where Klug attempts to define the concept of legal logic, he states that it comprises the study of the rules of formal logic as used in the judicial application of rules of law (p. 6); that legal logic is therefore practical logic, consisting of the application to law of the rules of pure or theoretical logic which is general logic (p. 7).

The politics of historical vision: Use of the past in the Analects

2017 ◽  
Vol 16 (4) ◽  
pp. 392-410 ◽  
Author(s):  
Youngmin Kim
Keyword(s):  
Textual Analysis ◽  
Political Identity ◽  
Ritual Performance ◽  
Fine Grained ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Analects ◽  
Comprehensive Discussion ◽  
Ritual Practices

This paper is about how the historical vision of Confucius was constructed in the Analects of Confucius. This analysis concentrates on its particular aspects like the notion of Zhou (1046–256 BCE) – the historical dynasty from which Confucius takes much of his guidance on culture, virtue, and refinement. The first part of this paper is to open up a space for a multidimensional and conceptually rich approach to what we might call Confucius’ ‘vision of history’. It challenges some problematic assumptions and approaches that have constituted an obstacle to inquiry into the study of Confucius’ thought – among them, the idea that Confucius was a ‘traditionalist’ who sought to bring back the ritual practices of the early Zhou. Then, I proceed to present a fine-grained textual analysis of the Analects and consider some broader conceptual issues involved in it. In particular, I argue that Confucius’ recognition of meta-knowing infuses the subject with new depths, which link Confucian ritual performance with agency and self-consciousness. In the next section, by establishing as an object of inquiry the imaginary category of ‘Zhou’, rather than the ‘factual’, evidentiary category of ‘Zhou’, I position Confucius’s vision in a comprehensive discussion of political identity.

Once More the Indirect Reflexive

Antichthon ◽  
1986 ◽  
Vol 20 ◽  
pp. 21-24 ◽  
Author(s):  
Benjamin D. Meritt ◽  
Malcolm F. McGregor
Keyword(s):  
New England ◽  
The Other ◽  
Marshall University ◽  
Reflexive Pronoun ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
The Subject

This is the text of Meritt, McGregor and H.T. Wade-Gery published in ATL as D 22, except that has replaced their in line 20.In 1980 the restoration of line 22 was challenged by A.S. Henry: Vindex Humanitatis, Essays in Honour of John Huntly Bishop, edited by B.A. Marshall (University of New England Publishing Unit, Armidale), 17-33. He pointed out that is a reflexive pronoun, which must refer to the subject of the verb to which it is attached. The subject of on the other hand, is ; our restoration, he concluded, is therefore impossible.

scholarly journals The meaning-making mechanism(s) behind the eyes and between the ears

2019 ◽  
Vol 375 (1791) ◽  
pp. 20190301 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Hagoort
Keyword(s):  
Frontal Cortex ◽  
Meaning Making ◽  
Explanatory Power ◽  
Brain Activation ◽  
Dynamic Interaction ◽  
Mechanistic Models ◽  
Single Word ◽  
Theme Issue ◽  
Word Meanings ◽  
Lexical Meaning

In this contribution, the following four questions are discussed: (i) where is meaning?; (ii) what is meaning?; (iii) what is the meaning of mechanism?; (iv) what are the mechanisms of meaning? I will argue that meanings are in the head. Meanings have multiple facets, but minimally one needs to make a distinction between single word meanings (lexical meaning) and the meanings of multi-word utterances. The latter ones cannot be retrieved from memory, but need to be constructed on the fly. A mechanistic account of the meaning-making mind requires an analysis at both a functional and a neural level, the reason being that these levels are causally interdependent. I will show that an analysis exclusively focusing on patterns of brain activation lacks explanatory power. Finally, I shall present an initial sketch of how the dynamic interaction between temporo-parietal areas and inferior frontal cortex might instantiate the interpretation of linguistic utterances in the context of a multimodal setting and ongoing discourse information. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Towards mechanistic models of meaning composition’

Material and presentation condition effects on sentence interpretation task performance: methodological examinations of the competition experiment

1997 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 66-91 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yoshinori Sasaki
Keyword(s):  
Task Performance ◽  
English Learners ◽  
Lexical Semantics ◽  
Native English Speakers ◽  
Competition Experiment ◽  
English Speakers ◽  
Native Japanese Speakers ◽  
Presentation Condition ◽  
Japanese Word ◽  
The Subject

Ten native English learners of Japanese, ten intermediate native English learners of Japanese and ten native Japanese speakers of English each were requested to report what they thought was the subject or actor of a series of English NVN word strings, in which case marking and lexical-semantics cues were systematically manipulated. These NVN strings were aurally presented first alone, and subsequently the same strings were presented for the second time together with noncanonical NNV and VNN strings. Similarly, their counterpart Japanese NNV strings were first presented alone, and secondly with noncanonical VNN and NVN strings. The results revealed that 1) a greater animacy effect (‘animacy noun as a subject’ bias) was detected when the sentence verb was see rather than eat(or each of their Japanese counterparts); 2) English accusative pronouns generally created greater case biases than nominative ones; and 3) native English speakers interpreting Japanese word strings responded differently under the two presentation conditions.

The Organisational and Social Climate Level of an Institution as One of the Determinants of Internal Security

2016 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 19-30
Author(s):  
Jadwiga Stawnicka ◽  
Iwona Klonowska
Keyword(s):  
Social Climate ◽  
Organisational Structure ◽  
Specific Nature ◽  
Internal Security ◽  
Current Form ◽  
The Third ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Climate Scale ◽  
Social Climate Scale

The subject of this article is the issue of the social climate of the institution as one of the determinants of security in the perspective of Police research. In the literature on the issue of the social climate of the institution the reality is that it is difficult to find references to this concept in respect of the police. It seems that this is conditioned by the specific nature of the current form of the functioning of the Police and its organisational structure. The subject of the study is a proposal for research into the social climate in the Police. Based on the literature on the subject the phenomenon of social climate is described along with its influence on the sense of comfort and satisfaction of the employees. A good social climate contributes to the co-operation of employees, as well as stimulates a sense of loyalty to the group and responsibility for its success. Further on in the article remarks on the study of a social climate scale by R H Moss are presented, along with an indication of the division of the statements contained in this scale, taking into account the content of the messages. This approach to the scale of social climate is justified in the third part of the article, which presents the concept of research on the social climate of the institution as one of the determinants of security in the perspective of the police research which will be carried out by the Authors of the article.

scholarly journals Liability for damage caused by unsafe innovative food – a legal perspective

2020 ◽  
pp. 47-63
Author(s):  
Łukasz Mikołaj Sokołowski
Keyword(s):  
Strict Liability ◽  
Tort Liability ◽  
Food Sector ◽  
Specific Nature ◽  
Effective Protection ◽  
Product Innovations ◽  
Legal Perspective ◽  
Risk Principle ◽  
The Subject

The subject of the considerations presented in the article are issues related to the liability for placing unsafe innovative food on the market. They are aimed at answering the question of whether the tort liability regime based on the risk principle meets the requirements of the modern agri-food sector and provides effective protection of consumer’s health and life against threats that may result from product innovations. The adoption of legal solutions providing for producer’s strict liability for an unsafe product must be assessed positively. They facilitate the consumer’s ability to seek redress for damage caused by an unsafe product. Unfortunately, these regulations do not take into account fully the specific nature of food, especially innovative food, limiting the possibility of redressing damage caused by this type of food.

scholarly journals Distinguishing coercion and underspecification in Type Composition Logic

2018 ◽  
Vol 61 ◽  
pp. 71-87
Author(s):  
Julia Lukassek ◽  
Alexandra Anna Spalek
Keyword(s):  
Recent Work ◽  
Lexical Semantics ◽  
Additional Mechanism ◽  
Fine Grained ◽  
Change Of State ◽  
Type Composition ◽  
The Way

This paper investigates the meaning adaptability of change of state (CoS) verbs. Itargues that both coercion and underspecification are necessary mechanisms in order to properlyaccount for the semantic adaptability observable for CoS verbs in combination with theircomplements. This type of meaning adaptability has received little formal attention to date,although some recent work has already led the way on this topic (Spalek, 2014; Lukassek andSpalek, 2016; Asher et al., 2017). Our paper is part of a cross-linguistic case study of Germaneinfrieren and Spanish congelar (‘freeze’). We model the meaning adaptability of this test casewithin Type Composition Logic (TCL) (Asher, 2011). We build on Asher’s coercion mechanismand introduce an additional mechanism for underspecification that exploits the fine-grained typesystem in TCL.Keywords: lexical semantics, change of state verbs, coercion, underspecification, Type CompositionLogic.

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