The analysis of syllable and pause durations in speech production can provide information about the properties of a speaker's grammatical code. Seven experiments analyzed syllable and pause durations in structurally ambiguous sentences. Results showed that a single hierarchial principle provided a unified account of speech timing effects for…

Various theories are presented in support of a rationist approach to linguistics. (Author/HP)

Precise and effective writing can be taught and learned; a knowledge of grammar makes it easier both for the student and teacher. (Editor)

It is argued here that English contains a distinct class of relative clauses called amount relatives. On the surface, these are much like restrictive relative clauses, but they have a syntax and semantics that align them more with comparatives than with restrictive relatives. (Author/KM)

The current approach in teaching Japanese as a second language is questioned as inefficient. The forward-looking approach does not condition students to expect that they must learn all the items of a set before being able to learn anything else. (HP)

A general guideline is offered as a reference point to choosing the appropriate preposition (a or par) for French causative sentences with faire. Full noun phrase complements of infinitives are treated. (SW)

Reports on the composition program at a New Jersey high school and on faculty members' viewpoints about goals and problems in the teaching of writing skills. (GW)

Discusses the rules governing the usage of the indefinite article in Spanish. (HP)

This second change sheet for its publication manual states the American Psychologist Association's policy on sexist language in its journals offers some general principles for journal authors to consider, and suggests some ways to avoid sexist language. (Author)

The author responds to W. Arndt's and M. Byrne's criticisms of the Northwestern Syntax Screening Test (NSST), a test for assessing receptive and expressive grammar in young children. (SBH)

Considers the question of how much psycholinguistics can contribute to foreign language teaching. Transformational grammar as well as behaviorist, psychobiological and development-psychological approaches are considered. These various psycholinguistic directions are sketched and examined for their applicability to foreign language teaching. (Text…

An elaboration of the official instruction on teaching French to native speakers in elementary school. The topics covered are: Methodological development of exercises; the linguistic ability and milieu of the students; operative criteria; and the question of a logical progression or spontaneous use of grammar exercises. (Text is in French.) (AMH)

A study of the spoken French of 120 residents of Montreal. The researchers were interested in the linguistic and social factors influencing the use of "avoir" and "etre." Results show that this usage corresponds to a tendancy to regularize conjugations. (Text is in French.) (AMH)

Zwicky's analysis of syntactic notions as possible candidates for "head," based on constituent-structure theory, is discussed in detail. This analysis is contrasted with the results gained form one provided in a dependency-based theory in which "head" is the name of a grammatical relation category. (Author/LMO)

In the frameword of generalized phrase-structure grammar, possessive clitics (POSS), bound words (BWs), and phrasal affixes (PAs) are analyzed. It is argued that English POSS should be treated as an edge-located inflectional affix, since POSS is suppressed in the presence of other Z affixes (plural, other possessives). (Author/LMO)