This dissertation examines the particle "ye" in the IV century BCE Chinese Guodian manuscripts by providing a synchronic analysis of its functions and a diachronic hypothesis relating all functions to focus marking. I have subdivided the around 600 occurrences of "ye" into four main functions: focus marker, topic marker, clause connection…

Examination of the behavior of different types of Spanish complements in two different grammatical constructions supports the argument that behavior differences result from the complement's different pragmatic status. Empirical evidence supports the hypothesis that complements representing old information appear in the subjunctive mood. The notion…

V-Te-I and V-Te-Ar are Japanese verb forms used to express "overlapping," or the relationships of expressions in time. In English these have the form Be-V-Ing. Progressive, concomitant, and stative overlapping are discussed with references to their meanings and to the type of verb each takes. (SC)

Considers the frequently indefinable distinctions between descriptive and prescriptive English grammars, using examples of standard English and dialects to illustrate the uses of each. (Author/CB)

This article maintains that linguistic generalizations are likely to be invalid when they are based on data whose synchronic status is not well-defined. An example is made of the universal principles of grammatical rule ordering proposed in a 1974 study by Koutsoudas, Sanders, and Noll. (CLK)

Presented is a systematic linguistic description of such features as intonation and stress, usually summed up in the phrase "tone of voice." Paying special attention to English, the author has aimed to present as complete a description as possible, and to clarify the theoretical concepts needed to talk precisely about these phenomena. Following…

The textbook is designed as a self-contained introduction to English syntax, providing an overview of key theoretical concepts and descriptive devices used in contemporary linguistic work rather than a historical perspective and using varieties of English from around the world rather than other languages for illustration. Chapter topics include:…

Discusses the various functions of the Spanish gerund/participle: (1) as a constituent in the progressive construction, (2) as an adverb, (3) as an adverbial, and (4) as the head of clause. (EKN)

Offers suggestions about explaining the use of the accusative case in Russian time expressions. (PMP)

This article proposes a description of Spanish conjunctions based on functional and structural criteria, and attempts to present a taxonomy of the different functions of conjunctions. (Text is in Spanish.) (CLK)

This article attempts to find a systematic structure behind French verbal idiomatic expressions, specifically the opposition between the verb, article, noun sequence and the sequence verb, noun. (Text is in French.) (AM)

The third volume in this series on Serbo-Croatian-English contrastive analysis contains three articles. They are: "Recent Approaches to Grammar and Their Significance for Contrastive Structure Studies," by Rolf Berndt; "Some Remarks on the Factive and Non-Factive Complements in English and Serbo-Croatian," by Ljiljana Bibovic; and "On Conjoined…

This article discusses diminutives in Spanish from both a semantic and a formal standpoint. (Text is in Spanish.) (CLK)

The textbook provides an intensive introduction to recent work in syntactic theory within the minimalist framework. The approach taken is to presuppose no background knowledge of syntactic theory or historical linguistics. Rather than compare English with other languages, illustrations are drawn from varieties of English from around the world.…