Semantic studies are often hard to carry out, for the distinctions are subtle, and intuitions not always easy to grasp. In the study of aspect, this problem is compounded by the complexity and abstract nature of the theoretical concepts, which often have a long history in languagespecific grammars a
In The grammar of French quantification, Lena Baunaz analyzes the syntax-semantics interface of French indefinites, WH-expressions, universal quantifiers, and n-words in the framework of minimalist grammar. She is particularly interested in the syntax of noncanonical quantification, where the quanti
The present study was set up to evaluate the extent to which the context in which a foreign language is learned can influence the strategic competence of children. To assess this we conducted a series of think aloud protocols with 101 children. We compared children who have learned an additional lan
To appear in M. Rathert and A. Giannakidou (eds.). Quantification, Definiteness, and Nominalization, Oxford University Press (to appear) In Farkas and de Swart (2006), we proposed an analysis of the cross-linguistic variation in article choice in plural generics. In this paper, we develop an extende
We discuss two groups of languages where article use contrasts in generic plural sentences but is otherwise essentially similar. The languages in the first group (English and Dutch) use bare plurals in the expression of kind reference (‘Dinosaurs are extinct’) and in generic generalizations (‘Dogs a
Prefinal version. This paper concentrates on the syntax and semantics of bare nominals in Germanic and Romance languages. These languages do not normally allow nominals to occur without an article. However, some syntactic configurations, including predicative constructions, supplementives and some p
The leading hypothesis of this paper is that interpretation is a process of constraint satisfaction, conflict resolution, and optimization, along the lines of Optimality Theory. Support for this view is drawn from very different domains, and based on both experimental and theoretical research. We di
Since Reichenbach (1947), the Present Perfect has been discussed in relation to the Simple Past. The Reichenbachian characterization E-R,S has led to the view that the English Present Perfect, with its restrictions on modification by time adverbials and its resistance to narrative structure is the P
In languages like English, bare nominals are only used in special constructions, and they come with special meaning effects. This paper applies bidirectional Optimality Theory to explain why unmarked (articleless) forms have unmarked (stereotypical) meanings. The syntactic unmarkedness of bare nomin
Early second language has been defined as a restricted linguistic system that can offer a “window” on language genesis. In this paper, I model the acquisition of negation by L2 (adult) learners as a sequence of constraint rankings in the framework of Optimality Theory. The rankings shift from pragma
Omhoog
Ga terug naar de inhoud
Ga terug naar de site navigatie