Generative approaches to language have long recognized the natural link between theories of knowledge representation and theories of knowledge acquisition. The basic idea is that the knowledge representations provided by Universal Grammar enable children to acquire language as reliably as they do because these representations highlight the…

Treats the general linguistic aspect of Fillmore's theories. (RM)

Revised version of a paper supported by a National Science Foundation graduate fellowship. The universal base hypothesis states that all natural languages utilize the same base component in their transformational grammars. (DD)

In the past, linguistic descriptions of the relationships common to passive sentences have not been universally applicable. Junction grammar, a type of generative grammar, is a model that may provide a means of describing universal passive relationships. Junction grammar differs from transformational grammar in that its rules (1) claim other…

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 paper discusses the validity and role of linguistic theory in terms of philosophy and logic and considers the relationship among these fields of human knowledge. The main objective of linguistic science is to discover the composition laws actually used by speech communities at any given moment in history. Linguistics is therefore not…

There is a set of difficult Spanish grammar questions (ser-estar, preterite-imperfect, subjunctive-indicative, word order, and prepositions) in which the description of the semantic component is essential. Even though generative formulations treat them in differing ways, these questions possess the common characteristic of associating a form…

A review of traditional and transformational studies on the phenomenon of sentential complementation (noun clauses) reveals many areas of agreement. Although some adherents of generative grammar may have occasionally obscured this aspect because of the offensive nature of their criticism of other modes of analysis, it is seen that, in several…

The effect of presuppositions on the applicability of grammatical rules is discussed. It is argued that the speaker's presupposition may cause a grammatical rule to become optional. (RM)

This dissertation is an attempt to characterize the notion "exception to a rule of grammar" within the context of Chomsky's conception of grammar as given in "Aspects of the Theory of Syntax." This notion depends on a prior notion of "rule government"--in each phrase marker on which a transformational rule may…

The theme of this book is the concept of a sentence and the role which it plays in child language acquisition. The author argues that the concept of a sentence is innately available to children and is the "main guiding principle in a child's attempt to organize and interpret the linguistic evidence that fluent speakers make available to him."…

Presents theoretical syntactic formulas for translating sentences from one language to another. (KM)

The right roof constraint'' is the assumption that rightward-movement rules are always upward-bounded; see J.R. Ross' dissertation, Constraints on Variables in Syntax'' (MIT, 1967). (RS)