The theme-recipient alternation in Chinese: tracking syntactic variation across seven centuries

Previous research has tracked the history of the theme-recipient alternation (or: “dative” alternation) in Chinese, but few studies have embedded their analysis in a probabilistic variationist framework. Against this backdrop, we explore the language-internal and language-external factors that probabilistically influence the alternation between theme-first and recipient-first ordering in a large diachronic corpus of Chinese writing (1300s–1900s). Our analysis reveals that the recipient-first variant is consistently more frequent than its competitor and even more common in more recent texts than in older texts. Regression analysis also suggests that there are stable linguistic constraints (i.e., animacy and definiteness of theme) and fluid constraints (i.e., end-weight, recipient animacy). Notably, the diachronic instability of end-weight and animacy points to cross-linguistic parallels for ditransitive constructions, including the English dative alternation. We thus contribute to theory building in variationist linguistics by advancing the field’s knowledge about the comparative fluidity versus stability of probabilistic constraints.

The acquisition of variation: Arab migrants' acquisition of (ING) and Coronal Stop Deletion in Wellington

<p>This dissertation investigates the patterns of acquisition found among Arab migrants to Wellington for two stable variables: coronal stop deletion (CSD) and (ING). CSD is the alternation between retained and deleted final consonant clusters, i.e. /wɛst/ vs. /wɛs/ and (ING) is the realisation of the final nasal in unstressed word-final syllables i.e. /dɹaivɪŋ/ vs. /dɹaivɪn/. CSD is a phonological variable that is mainly conditioned by articulatory constraints while (ING) is a morpho-phonemic variable with syntactic conditioning as well. An emerging trend in variationist sociolinguistics is to study variation in non-native varieties by analysing how far non-native speaker (NNS) patterns of variation replicate constraints on variation found among native speakers (NS) of a target variety. This study applies variationist methods to investigate the following questions: 1. What are the linguistic and the non-linguistic constraints that condition variation in the production of (ING) and CSD among NS in the New Zealand Spoken English Database (NZSED) in Wellington? 2. What are the linguistic and the non-linguistic constraints that condition variation in the production of (ING) and CSD among Arab migrants in Wellington (AM)? 3. Based on the results for (1) and (2), is there any evidence for “transformation under transfer” (Meyerhoff, 2009a). Interpretation of the results is done in line with the so-called “three lines of evidence”, and considers significant and non-significant constraints, constraint hierarchies and rank ordering of constraints (Tagliamonte & Temple, 2005). I consider the proposition that AMs, of all ages, are prone to transformation under transfer of NS constraints on the variables CSD and (ING), mainly illustrating strong and weak transfer. It is expected that old and middle-aged AMs will have patterns different from those found among young AMs. I also consider the possibility that articulatory constraints may be more readily transformed by AMs into ethnolectal marking, whereas grammatical constraints may be more likely to be strongly transferred by AMs. Old and middle-aged AMs seem to be more likely to display strong transfer of NS constraints, but they do not seem to be using variation in the L2 stylistically. By contrast, young AMs stylistically use articulatory constraints to convey important social indexicalities. The results suggest that oold and middle-aged AMs with developing grammars are like NS children acquiring variation of their L1, in the sense that old and middle-aged AMs are sensitive, in both CSD and (ING), to dialect-specific constraints on variation as they display strong transfer of the highest ranked NS constraint, be it articulatory or grammatical in nature; they also seem to perceive NS frequencies of occurrence of variables. Old and middle-aged AMs have an advantage over NS-children in their cognitive abilities that enable them to apply global constraints on variation by filtering their previous exposure to English, to replicate grammatical constraints of the L2 variables. Old and middle-aged AMs also seem to replicate the articulatory constraints that are perceptually salient, or that can host L1 transfer. They sometimes innovate articulatory constraints that are meaningful to them probably because of the influence of their L1. Young AM, who have arrived in New Zealand at an age of six years or younger, would be expected to illustrate strong transfer for stable variables like CSD and (ING). The results, nevertheless, illustrate that although young AMs share the same significant constraints found among NS of NZSED, they have different rank orderings, internal hierarchies and frequency of variants. Young AM, unexpectedly, diverge from NS norms and exhibit weak transfer of NS articulatory constraints on CSD, while they show strong transfer of NS grammatical constraints for the variable (ING). I suggest that young AMs seem to be using articulatory constraints in the L2 stylistically, to convey important social indexicalities. In addition, young AMs seem to hold an intermediate status between NS of NZSED and first-generation AM. Like old and middle-aged AMs, they replicate global-grammatical constraints on (ING) with an internal hierarchy that follows the Labovian nominal-verbal continuum, rather than the local, internal hierarchy. This suggests that (ING), as a morphophonemic variable with syntactic interfaces, has less room for the stylistic use of variation patterns as a reflection of identity marking. Articulatory constraints may be more subject to L1 transfer and these may become a marker of ethnicity among a Second-generation of migrants.</p>

The acquisition of variation: Arab migrants' acquisition of (ING) and Coronal Stop Deletion in Wellington

<p>This dissertation investigates the patterns of acquisition found among Arab migrants to Wellington for two stable variables: coronal stop deletion (CSD) and (ING). CSD is the alternation between retained and deleted final consonant clusters, i.e. /wɛst/ vs. /wɛs/ and (ING) is the realisation of the final nasal in unstressed word-final syllables i.e. /dɹaivɪŋ/ vs. /dɹaivɪn/. CSD is a phonological variable that is mainly conditioned by articulatory constraints while (ING) is a morpho-phonemic variable with syntactic conditioning as well. An emerging trend in variationist sociolinguistics is to study variation in non-native varieties by analysing how far non-native speaker (NNS) patterns of variation replicate constraints on variation found among native speakers (NS) of a target variety. This study applies variationist methods to investigate the following questions: 1. What are the linguistic and the non-linguistic constraints that condition variation in the production of (ING) and CSD among NS in the New Zealand Spoken English Database (NZSED) in Wellington? 2. What are the linguistic and the non-linguistic constraints that condition variation in the production of (ING) and CSD among Arab migrants in Wellington (AM)? 3. Based on the results for (1) and (2), is there any evidence for “transformation under transfer” (Meyerhoff, 2009a). Interpretation of the results is done in line with the so-called “three lines of evidence”, and considers significant and non-significant constraints, constraint hierarchies and rank ordering of constraints (Tagliamonte & Temple, 2005). I consider the proposition that AMs, of all ages, are prone to transformation under transfer of NS constraints on the variables CSD and (ING), mainly illustrating strong and weak transfer. It is expected that old and middle-aged AMs will have patterns different from those found among young AMs. I also consider the possibility that articulatory constraints may be more readily transformed by AMs into ethnolectal marking, whereas grammatical constraints may be more likely to be strongly transferred by AMs. Old and middle-aged AMs seem to be more likely to display strong transfer of NS constraints, but they do not seem to be using variation in the L2 stylistically. By contrast, young AMs stylistically use articulatory constraints to convey important social indexicalities. The results suggest that oold and middle-aged AMs with developing grammars are like NS children acquiring variation of their L1, in the sense that old and middle-aged AMs are sensitive, in both CSD and (ING), to dialect-specific constraints on variation as they display strong transfer of the highest ranked NS constraint, be it articulatory or grammatical in nature; they also seem to perceive NS frequencies of occurrence of variables. Old and middle-aged AMs have an advantage over NS-children in their cognitive abilities that enable them to apply global constraints on variation by filtering their previous exposure to English, to replicate grammatical constraints of the L2 variables. Old and middle-aged AMs also seem to replicate the articulatory constraints that are perceptually salient, or that can host L1 transfer. They sometimes innovate articulatory constraints that are meaningful to them probably because of the influence of their L1. Young AM, who have arrived in New Zealand at an age of six years or younger, would be expected to illustrate strong transfer for stable variables like CSD and (ING). The results, nevertheless, illustrate that although young AMs share the same significant constraints found among NS of NZSED, they have different rank orderings, internal hierarchies and frequency of variants. Young AM, unexpectedly, diverge from NS norms and exhibit weak transfer of NS articulatory constraints on CSD, while they show strong transfer of NS grammatical constraints for the variable (ING). I suggest that young AMs seem to be using articulatory constraints in the L2 stylistically, to convey important social indexicalities. In addition, young AMs seem to hold an intermediate status between NS of NZSED and first-generation AM. Like old and middle-aged AMs, they replicate global-grammatical constraints on (ING) with an internal hierarchy that follows the Labovian nominal-verbal continuum, rather than the local, internal hierarchy. This suggests that (ING), as a morphophonemic variable with syntactic interfaces, has less room for the stylistic use of variation patterns as a reflection of identity marking. Articulatory constraints may be more subject to L1 transfer and these may become a marker of ethnicity among a Second-generation of migrants.</p>

Cross-linguistic constraints and lineage-specific developments in the semantics of cutting and breaking in Japonic and Germanic

Semantic variation in the cutting and breaking domain has been shown to be constrained across languages in a previous typological study, but it was unclear whether Japanese was an outlier in this domain. Here we revisit cutting and breaking in the Japonic language area by collecting new naming data for 40 videoclips depicting cutting and breaking events in Standard Japanese, the highly divergent Tohoku dialects, as well as four related Ryukyuan languages (Amami, Okinawa, Miyako and Yaeyama). We find that the Japonic languages recapitulate the same semantic dimensions attested in the previous typological study, confirming that semantic variation in the domain of cutting and breaking is indeed cross-linguistically constrained. We then compare our new Japonic data to previously collected Germanic data and find that, in general, related languages resemble each other more than unrelated languages, and that the Japonic languages resemble each other more than the Germanic languages do. Nevertheless, English resembles all of the Japonic languages more than it resembles Swedish. Together, these findings show that the rate and extent of semantic change can differ between language families, indicating the existence of lineage-specific developments on top of universal cross-linguistic constraints.

The fragment of Classical Logic that respects the Variable-Sharing Principle

We examine the set of formula-to-formula valid inferences of Classical Logic, where the premise and the conclusion share at least a propositional variable in common. We review the fact, already proved in the literature, that such a system is identical to the first-degree entailment fragment of R. Epstein's Relatedness Logic, and that it is a non-transitive logic of the sort investigated by S. Frankowski and others. Furthermore, we provide a semantics and a calculus for this logic. The semantics is defined in terms of a \(p\)-matrix built on top of a 5-valued extension of the 3-element weak Kleene algebra, whereas the calculus is defined in terms of a Gentzen-style sequent system where the left and right negation rules are subject to linguistic constraints.

A General Framework for Domain-Specialization of Stance Detection

We present a generalized framework for domain-specialized stance detection, focusing on Covid-19 as a use case. We define a stance as a predicate-argument structure (combination of an action and its participants) in a simplified one-argument format, e.g., wear(a mask), coupled with a task-specific belief category representing the purpose (e.g., protection) of an argument (e.g., mask) in the context of its predicate (e.g., wear), as constrained by the domain (e.g., Covid-19). A belief category PROTECT captures a belief such as “masks provide protection,” whereas RESTRICT captures a belief such as “mask mandates limit freedom.” A stance combines a belief proposition, e.g., PROTECT(wear(a mask)), with a sentiment toward this proposition. From this, an overall positive attitude toward mask wearing is extracted. The notions purpose and function serve as natural constraints on the choice of belief categories during resource building which, in turn, constrains stance detection. We demonstrate that linguistic constraints (e.g., light verb processing) further refine the choice of predicate-argument pairings for belief and sentiment assignments, yielding significant increases in F1 score for stance detection over a strong baseline.

Deciphering Undersegmented Ancient Scripts Using Phonetic Prior

Most undeciphered lost languages exhibit two characteristics that pose significant decipherment challenges: (1) the scripts are not fully segmented into words; (2) the closest known language is not determined. We propose a decipherment model that handles both of these challenges by building on rich linguistic constraints reflecting consistent patterns in historical sound change. We capture the natural phonological geometry by learning character embeddings based on the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA). The resulting generative framework jointly models word segmentation and cognate alignment, informed by phonological constraints. We evaluate the model on both deciphered languages (Gothic, Ugaritic) and an undeciphered one (Iberian). The experiments show that incorporating phonetic geometry leads to clear and consistent gains. Additionally, we propose a measure for language closeness which correctly identifies related languages for Gothic and Ugaritic. For Iberian, the method does not show strong evidence supporting Basque as a related language, concurring with the favored position by the current scholarship. 1