The construction "won't" is ambiguous: it can be a prediction by the speaker based on his assumptions, or it may be a report of what the expressed subject of "won't" said. "I talked to them and they won't come" could mean "I predict they won't come" or "they refused to come." (PJM)

Certain verbs in English can be followed by both "ing" and by a "to"+ infinitive, with a difference in meaning. The "ing" ending is used for events or states already in existence at the time of the preceding verb. The infinitive points ahead to a later time. Examples are given. (PJM)

Uses a detailed analysis of a single grammatical problem to present the principal commitments and mechanisms of a grammatical theory that assigns a central role to the notion of grammatical construction. The grammatical phenomenon used to introduce construction grammar is the construction that licenses the surprising syntactic and semantic…

Examines parallelisms between surface structure and logical structure and why those parallelisms do not extend farther than they do. If syntactic deep structures are identified with logical structures, an appropriate cyclic principle guarantees that cyclic rules will apply so that large-scale parallelisms exist between surface syntactic structures…

Divides Taiwanese modals into: (1) authority, where a deep structure agent exercises authority; (2) contigency, which concerns the speaker's judgment of the possibility or logical necessity df the occurrence of an event; and (3) volition, which expresses the subject's desires. The constructions in which these modals appear are examined. (PJM)

Proposes that the distinction between syntactic and nonsyntactic use of reflexives is not necessarily one of lexical ambiguity, positing one type of referentially dependent element (reflexives) which have two options for being related to their antecedents (syntactic binding and discourse conference). The paper focuses on Chinese reflexive ziji and…

Explores the role of negative marking in the mapping of the semantic and syntactic structures of Taiwanese modals on to their surface structure in terms of syntactic transformations. Particular attention is paid to the process of lexical fusion as it occurs in such negative forms as "be" and "m." (Author/PJM)