Syntactic and Semantic Variation in Copular Sentences

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel J. Wilson
Keyword(s):  
Semantic Variation ◽  
Copular Sentences

scholarly journals Linguistics meets economics: Dealing with semantic variation

2020 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 67
Author(s):  
Adam D. Clark-Joseph ◽  
Brian D. Joseph
Keyword(s):  
Speech Act ◽  
Cheap Talk ◽  
Economic Perspective ◽  
Communicative Acts ◽  
Semantic Variation ◽  
Successful Communication

We explore here what happens in conversation when listeners encounter variation as well as change in semantics. Working within a general Gricean framework, and in ways somewhat akin to the “Cheap Talk” model of Crawford and Sobel (1982) and the “Rational Speech Act” model of Goodman and Frank (2016), we develop here a transactional view of communicative acts, based largely on insights drawn from economics. Taking a novel perspective, we build on what happens when communication misfires rather than examining what makes for successful communication. We see this effort as a demonstration of the utility of taking an economic perspective on linguistic issues, specifically the analysis of communicative acts.

scholarly journals The Anglicization of Cuban Spanish: Lexico-Semantic Variations and Patterns

2017 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 233-248
Author(s):  
José Antonio Sánchez Fajardo
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Study ◽  
Descriptive Analysis ◽  
Semantic Transparency ◽  
Semantic Variation ◽  
Cuban Spanish ◽  
The Impact

The impact of English on Cuban Spanish has represented the embodiment of a profound process of acculturation on the island. This empirical study is intended to examine the anglicization of Cuban Spanish by determining anglicizing patterns or strategies in the phonological, morphological, lexical and semantic levels. Thus, the article demonstrates the variability of word-building mechanisms and semantic transparency dia-synchronically. The normative and descriptive analysis is also accompanied by brief contrastive commentaries on divergent and common aspects between Cuban Spanish and European Spanish, illustrated with examples extracted from prior corpora and dictionary revision. The research has shed more light on the universality of certain morpho-phonological patterns in Spanish, as well as the correlation between pragmatic or extralinguistic aspects with lexico-semantic variation, revealing significant changes in sociolects and attitudes. 

scholarly journals Ad hoc properties and locations in Maltese

2015 ◽  
Vol 1 ◽  
pp. 64-85 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gréte Dalmi
Keyword(s):  
Ad Hoc ◽  
Semantic Theory ◽  
Alternative States ◽  
Verbal Predicate ◽  
Spatio Temporal ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Copular Sentences ◽  
Event Variable ◽  
Temporal Variable ◽  
Account Variation

This paper aims to show that the four-way BE-system of Maltese can best be accommodated in a theory of non-verbal predication that builds on alternative states, without making any reference to the Davidsonian spatio-temporal event variable. The existing theories of non-verbal predicates put the burden of explaining the difference between the ad hoc vs. habitual interpretations either solely on the non-verbal predicate, by postulating an event variable in their lexical layer (see Kratzer 1995; Adger and Ramchand 2003; Magri 2009; Roy 2013), or solely on the copular or non-copular primary predicate, which contains an aspectual operator or an incorporated abstract preposition, responsible for such interpretive differences (Schmitt 2005, Schmitt and Miller 2007, Gallego and Uriagereka 2009, 2011, Marín 2010, Camacho 2012). The present proposal combines Maienborn’s (2003, 2005a,b, 2011) discourse-semantic theory of copular sentences with Richardson’s (2001, 2007) analysis of non-verbal adjunct predicates in Russian, based on alternative states. Under this combined account, variation between the ad hoc vs. habitual interpretations of non-verbal predicates is derived from the presence or absence of a modal OPalt operator that can bind the temporal variable of non-verbal predicates in accessible worlds, in the sense of Kratzer (1991). In the absence of this operator, the temporal variable is bound by the T0 head in the standard way. The proposal extends to non-verbal predicates in copular sentences as well as to argument and adjunct non-verbal predicates in non-copular sentences.

scholarly journals A remark on Béjar & Kahnemuyipour 2017: Specificational subjects do have phi-features

2018 ◽  
Vol 54 (3) ◽  
pp. 611-627 ◽  
Author(s):  
JUTTA M. HARTMANN ◽  
CAROLINE HEYCOCK
Keyword(s):  
Subject Position ◽  
Correct Analysis ◽  
Agreement Morphology ◽  
Copular Sentences ◽  
Specificational Sentences ◽  
Actual Agreement

In a number of languages, agreement in specificational copular sentences can or must be with the second of the two nominals, even when it is the first that occupies the canonical subject position. Béjar & Kahnemuyipour (2017) show that Persian and Eastern Armenian are two such languages. They then argue that ‘NP2 agreement’ occurs because the nominal in subject position (NP1) is not accessible to an external probe. It follows that actual agreement with NP1 should never be possible: the alternative to NP2 agreement should be ‘default’ agreement. We show that this prediction is false. In addition to showing that English has NP1, not default, agreement, we present new data from Icelandic, a language with rich agreement morphology, including cases that involve ‘plurale tantum’ nominals as NP1. These allow us to control for any confound from the fact that typically in a specificational sentence with two nominals differing in number, it is NP2 that is plural. We show that even in this case, the alternative to agreement with NP2 is agreement with NP1, not a default. Hence, we conclude that whatever the correct analysis of specificational sentences turns out to be, it must not predict obligatory failure of NP1 agreement.

Templatable Metamodels for Semantic Variation Points

2007 ◽  
pp. 68-82 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arnaud Cuccuru ◽  
Chokri Mraidha ◽  
François Terrier ◽  
Sébastien Gérard
Keyword(s):  
Semantic Variation
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