Stability of the critical equilibrium of a compressed column on a Winkler foundation

In this paper, the critical equilibrium of a simply supported compressed column on a Winkler foundation is analyzed based on Koiter’s theory. The exact expression of the potential energy functional is presented. By the Fourier series of the disturbance deflection, the second-order variation of the potential energy is expressed as a quadratic form. At critical equilibrium, the second-order variation of the potential energy is semi-positive definite, so that the stability of the critical equilibrium is determined by the sign of the fourth-order variation or sixth-order variation. It can be seen that only in two small ranges of elastic-foundation stiffness is the corresponding critical state stable and the bifurcation equilibrium upward. Then, the theoretical results of this paper are compared with previous experimental and theoretical results.

A template approach to pragmatic constituent order variation in modern Northern Mansi

Mansi belongs to the Ob-Ugrian branch of the Uralic language family. Northern Mansi constituent order and its pragmatic variation have not been examined comprehensively until now. This lack is filled in this article, by syntactic-pragmatic template analysis, using a new model of 9+1 templatic slots, which are filled with syntactic or pragmatic functions. Thus, this study is also an attempt to combine both pragmatic and syntactic levels in the same template analysis. Moreover, Rombandeeva’s (1979; 1984) earlier observations on Northern Mansi word order, and those of other scholars, are compared to those drawn here from contemporary data.

Word-order variation in a contact setting: A corpus-based investigation of Russian spoken in Daghestan

This paper deals with word-order variation in a situation of language contact. We present a corpus-based investigation of word order in the variety of Russian spoken in Daghestan, focusing specifically on noun phrases with a genitive modifier. In Daghestanian Russian, the nonstandard word order GEN+N (prepositive or left genitive) often occurs. At first glance, this phenomenon might be easily explained in terms of syntactic calquing from the speakers’ left-branching L1s. However, the order GEN+N does not occur with the same frequency in all types of genitive noun phrases but is affected by several lexicosemantic and formal features of both the head and the genitive modifier. Therefore, we are not dealing with simple pattern borrowing. Rather, L1 influence strengthens certain universal tendencies that are not motivated by contact. The comparison with monolinguals’ Russian, in which prepositive genitives sporadically occur too, supports this hypothesis.

Pre- and postnominal onymic genitives in (Early) New High German

This empirical study focuses on the diachrony of adnominal genitives of proper names in (Early) New High German (17th to 19th centuries), e.g., Carls Haus vs. das Haus Carls ‘Carl’s house’. Starting from the observation that word order variation exists within the whole period investigated, the study identifies determining factors for this variation and weights them in a multifactorial model of word order variation and change, the first time this has been done for German. The focus is on formal factors such as syntactic complexity, a factor that increases in importance over the observed time span. The historical data allow not only the investigation of established formal parameters but also the identification of new factors such as the type of inflectional marker (due to genitive allomorphy in older stages of German). In addition to these formal factors, genitive semantics, pragmatic information status and genre are also taken into account. Explanations for the trend towards the postnominal position of complex adnominal genitives as well as the stability of bare name possessors in the prenominal position are discussed.

Mind your weight: ‘Motionlessly’ sitting between the object and the verb in Japanese

The object in Japanese is often displaced from its canonical position next to the sentence-final verb, due to motivations such as information structure or animacy. Such flexibility allows for an adverb to be placed between the object and the verb. In the literature, there are suggestions for an almost equal preference to place Japanese manner adverbs before or after the object, inferred from both online and offline results. We will present a corpus study with a representative Japanese manner adverb zitto ‘motionlessly’ to show that either order may be preferred in different accounts of word order variation, but none can satisfy both requirements of distance minimization and accessibility, which are manifested in competing directions in Japanese, a verb-final language. In both accounts, weight has immense effect and should not be neglected. By using two heuristic methods to measure the weight effect, we propose that this case study with an object and an adverb sheds new light on the explanatory power of the distance minimization account, in particular by the Mimimize Domains principle (Hawkins 1994), which operates at both levels of (1) the constituency construction of the full VP, which favors the object-first order, and (2) the Phrasal Combination Domain between the head of object and the verb, which favors the adverb-first order. It is also proposed to implement a complement-and-adjunct distinction in the MiD principle, as a step toward a more effective study method of weight effect which I shall call efficiency profiling.