3,144 research outputs found

    Token-based typology and word order entropy: A study based on universal dependencies

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    The present paper discusses the benefits and challenges of token-based typology, which takes into account the frequencies of words and constructions in language use. This approach makes it possible to introduce new criteria for language classification, which would be difficult or impossible to achieve with the traditional, type-based approach. This point is illustrated by several quantitative studies of word order variation, which can be measured as entropy at different levels of granularity. I argue that this variation can be explained by general functional mechanisms and pressures, which manifest themselves in language use, such as optimization of processing (including avoidance of ambiguity) and grammaticalization of predictable units occurring in chunks. The case studies are based on multilingual corpora, which have been parsed using the Universal Dependencies annotation scheme

    Theticity

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    The subject matter of this chapter is the semantic, syntactic and discoursepragmatic background as well as the cross-linguistic behavior of types of utterance exemplified by the following English sentences […]: (1) My NECK hurts. […] (2) The PHONE's ringing. [...] Sentences such as […] are usually held to stand in opposition to sentences with a topical subject. The difference is said to be formally marked, for example, by VS order vs. topical SV order (as in Albanian po bie telefoni 'the PHONE is ringing' vs. telefoni po bie 'the PHONE is RINGING'), or by accent on the subject only vs. accent on both the subject and the verb (as in the English translations). The term theticity will be used in the following to label the specific phenomenological domain to which the sentences in (1) and (2) belong. It has long been commonplace that these and similar expressions occur at particular points in the discourse where "a new situation is presented as a whole". We will try to depict and classify the various discourse situations in which these expressions have been found in the different languages, and we will try to trace out areas of cross-linguistic comparability. Finally, we will raise the question whether or not there is a common denominator which would justify a unified treatment of all these expressions in functional/semantic terms

    Synchrony, diachrony and Greenberg's state-process model: From the viewpoint of typological characterization

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    After a brief survey of the history of diachronic typology, the author focuses his attention on the typological methods applied to historical comparative linguistics. Then some basic issues of Greenberg's state-process model are examined as a possible model for diachronic typology. Morphological and word-order typology are used for the illustration of the author's statements and comments

    Statistical parsing of morphologically rich languages (SPMRL): what, how and whither

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    The term Morphologically Rich Languages (MRLs) refers to languages in which significant information concerning syntactic units and relations is expressed at word-level. There is ample evidence that the application of readily available statistical parsing models to such languages is susceptible to serious performance degradation. The first workshop on statistical parsing of MRLs hosts a variety of contributions which show that despite language-specific idiosyncrasies, the problems associated with parsing MRLs cut across languages and parsing frameworks. In this paper we review the current state-of-affairs with respect to parsing MRLs and point out central challenges. We synthesize the contributions of researchers working on parsing Arabic, Basque, French, German, Hebrew, Hindi and Korean to point out shared solutions across languages. The overarching analysis suggests itself as a source of directions for future investigations

    Balto-Slavic accentuation revisited

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    There is every reason to welcome the revised edition (2009) of Thomas Olander’s dissertation (2006), which I have criticized elsewhere (2006). The book is very well written and the author has a broad command of the scholarly literature. I have not found any mistakes in Olander’s rendering of other people’s views. This makes the book especially useful as an introduction to the subject. It must be hoped that the easy access to a complex set of problems which this book offers will have a stimulating effect on the study of Balto-Slavic accentology

    Dativna vanjska posvojna konstrukcija u hrvatskom jeziku s arealnog-tipološkog stajališta

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    External possession constructions are defined as constructions in which a semantic possessor-possessum relation is expressed by coding the possessor as a core grammatical relation of the verb and in a constituent separate from that which contains the possessum. One construction representative of this phenomenon is that with the dative case as a marker of the possessor, which is known as the dative of possession (DP) and is widely attested in European languages as an areal feature. In this article, I analyze the DP in Croatian, both its standard variety and dialects, particularly from a (micro-)areal-typological perspective, to locate the place of Croatian among Slavic, paying special attention to the correlation between the use of DP and its areal tendency. My analysis led me to conclude that Croatian occupies a place between West Slavic and Slovene, which tend to have a narrower sphere of the use of DP, and Balkanized Slavic, which has a wider sphere of it. This finding can be explained by the fact that West Slavic and Slovene are more habere-type languages than Croatian, which still preserves more esse-type language features that can be also found in the Balkanized Slavic languages.Konstrukcije za vanjsku posvojnost su definirane kao konstrukcije u kojima je semantička veza između posjednika i posjedovanoga izrečena kodiranjem posjednika kao glavna gramatička veza glagola i konstituenta odvojenog od onoga koji sadrži posjednika. Jedna od konstrukcija koja predstavlja ovaj fenomen je konstrukcija u dativu koji markira posjednika tzv. posvojni dativ te koja je široko potvrđena u europskim jezicima kao arealna osobina. U ovome se članku analizira posvojni dativ u hrvatskome, kako njegova standardna varijanta tako i dijalektalna, posebno iz (mikro)arealne i tipološke perspektive, s ciljem lociranja hrvatskoga među slavenskim jezicima, obraćajući posebnu pozornost na korelaciju između uporabe posvojnog dativa i njegovih arealnih tendencija. Kao rezultat moje analize, došao sam do zaključka da hrvatski zauzima mjesto između zapadno-slavenskoga sa slovenskim koji teže užoj uporabi posvojnog dativa te balkaniziranog slavenskog koji ima širu uporabu istog. Ovo opažanje se može objasniti činjenicom da su zapadno-slavenski i slovenski postali tipološki više habere jezici nego hrvatski koji još uvijek tipološki zadržava osobine essere jezika koje se također mogu naći u balkaniziranim slavenskim jezicima

    Europe: So Many Languages, So Many Cultures

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    The number of different languages in Europe by far exceeds the number of countries. All European countries have national languages, and in nearly all of them there are minority languages as well, whereas all major languages have dialects. National borders rarely coincide with linguistic borders, but the latter (including dialect borders) mark by their nature also more or less distinct cultural areas. This paper presents a survey of the different language families represented in Europe: Indo-European, Uralic, Altaic, and the four Caucasian language families, each with their sub-branches and individual languages. Some information is given on characteristic structural phenomena and on the status and history of these languages or language families and on some of their extinct predecessors. The paper ends with a short discussion on the language policy and practices of the institutions of the European Union. Europe lacks a language with the status and power comparable to Indonesian in Indonesia. The policy is therefore based on equal status of all national languages and on respect for all languages, including national minority ones. The practice, however, is unavoidably practical: “the more languages, the more English”

    Principles of event framing : genetic stability in grammar and discourse

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    Ever since Wilhelm von Humboldt’s (1836) pioneering study of Nahuatl, linguists have recurrently recognized that languages differ fundamentally in the syntactic weight they attribute to noun-phrases as the arguments of a verb. Currently, the most prominent attempts to turn this intuition into a precise hypothesis revolve around the notion of ‘configurationality’

    Postalveolar fricatives in Slavic languages as retroflexes

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    The present study poses the question on what phonetic and phonological grounds postalveolar fricatives in Polish can be analyzed as retroflex and whether postalveolar fricatives in other Slavic languages are retroflex as well. Velarization and incompatibility with front vowels are introduced as articulatory criteria for retroflexion, based on crosslinguistic data. According to these criteria, Polish and Russian have retroflex fricatives, whereas Bulgarian and Czech do not. In a phonological representation of these Slavic retroflexes, the necessity of perceptual features is shown. Lastly, it is illustrated that palatalization of retroflex fricatives both in Slavic languages and more generally causes a phonetic and phonological change to a non-retroflex sound
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