Three grammars that, since the 50's, have supplemented or offered alternatives to traditional grammar are discussed in this article. The role of grammar in communicative utterances and the underlying considerations in describing a grammatical system are analyzed. Then, brief summaries about and comments on structural linguistics, tagmemic grammar,…

This first volume of a three-part language research study states and illustrates that the point of departure for comparative analysis of two languages rests on a comprehensive typology in each of a number of areas of grammar. The report suggests that a limited set of functions can be isolated, and that the range of grammatical possibilities open…

This second volume of a three-part language research report presents a sketch of Hungarian syntax with emphasis on several particular aspects of grammar. The first section considers the noun phrase and covers such issues as internal word order, number, demonstratives, cases and postpositions, genitive constructions, pronominal forms of cases and…

This book attempts to bring linguists and language teachers up to date on the latest developments in semantics. A survey of the role of semantics in linguistics and other academic areas is followed by a historical perspective of semantics in American linguistics. Various semantic models are discussed. Anomaly, ambiguity, and discourse are…

This paper examines the question of whether two labels should be used for the units traditionally called "sentence" and "clause" or whether the same label should be used and the units distinguished in some other way. Proponents of a two-level analysis have traditionally argued that sentences and clauses can have different…

This volume contains the papers presented at a workshop which brought together authorities from several different disciplines, each working in the area of natural language analysis, to participate in intensive, technical discussions of the issues involved in developing adequate grammars and semantics of natural languages. The disciplines…

Sketches Noam Chomsky's conception of language, the ways it can and should be studied, and how it works as a scientific enterprise. (Author/GT)

This discussion considers the process of subject raising, which takes the constituent subject out of the complement clause and makes it a constituent of the matrix clause and the occurrence of this process in Japanese and in other subject-object-verb (SOV) languages. The first part of the paper demonstrates why subject raising is not a common…

Two traditions are distinguishable in modern linguistic theory: the tradition of "universal grammar" which flourished in the 17th and 18th centuries, and the tradition of structural or descriptive linguistics which reached its peak 15 or 20 years ago. Universal grammar was concerned with (1) the relation of deep structure to surface forms and to…

Criteria for defining individual members of the preposition word class are set forth. Arguments are presented against calling prepositions meaningless, yet it is conceded and explained that those which occur in wider contexts are vaguer due to their greater variability. The unitary, polysemous, and/or homonymous nature of prepositions are…

This comparative study of traditional and transformational approaches to the syntax of standard Russian proposes the superiority of analysis in terms of possible and impossible transformations, thereby revealing the existence of a level of linguistic form superior to that of simple morphophonemic description. Five classes of word-combinations of…

The three papers contained in this document cover particular issues in diverse languages. The first concerns the distribution and function of postpositions in Awutu, an African language; the main function of such morphemes is marking case. The second paper discusses the unusual phonology system of Wichita; this American Indian language is…

This volume of working papers includes seven papers discussing current theory and research in linguistics, phonetics, semantics, and syntax. The following titles are in the collection: "'Do' from 'Occur',""The Syntax of the Verb 'Happen',""Subjects and Agents,""Modal Auxiliaries in Infinitive Clauses in English,""Some Problems in the Description…

In early transformational generative grammar, it was assumed that all semantic interpretation would be done off deep structure, but with the proposals for the extended standard theory (EST) of Chomsky (1968, 1972) came the realization that certain aspects of semantic interpretation, such as focus and presuppostion and scope of quantifiers, must be…