Lexical differences between English and German in "there" constructions are examined. Contrastive evidence is also examined to propose analyses for certain troublesome types of "there" constructions in English. The descriptive approach attempts to show that the structuring of information in "there" sentences is dependent on lexical features of the…

By the fifth grade no differences were found between the order of adjectives in a sentence preferred by children and by adults. (ED/JD)

The analysis predicts the distribution of cleft-like sentence types whose introducing particle is "this" or "that" rather than "it," and asserts a correlation between judgements of grammaticality of pseudo clefts and sentences containing free relatives. (Author/NCR)

Presents five basic decoding patterns which can be applied in a linguistic approach to teaching reading or spelling. (JM)

Discusses an experiment in progress to prove that irony in written texts is discernible to the non-native speaker through logical or linguistic cues. (Text is in French.) (AM)

The article looks at idiomaticity from the semantic and syntactic angles. After a summary of the problems arising from a semantic definition, some recent proposals regarding the syntactic behavior of idioms are reviewed briefly and evaluated. There is a sizable bibliography. (AMH)

Evaluates various explanations for the fact that Chinese writing has remained at the ideographic stage for several thousand years. Reasons include dialect differences, social and political unrest, and attempts by the ruling class and men of letters to preserve complex character writing as an indication of class superiority. (Author/DB)

An investigation is made of the use of prefixes with borrowed verbs in Serbocroatian. The data on which it is based reflect usage in speech and journalism. One conclusion is that the adaptation of borrowed verbs to the native aspectual system is almost exclusively through prefixation. (Author/RM)

Determining the gender of German nouns is an awesome task for the beginning student of German. This article lists rules which might facilitate this task. The gender can sometimes be inferred from the ending of a word, sometimes by the meaning, but sometimes only through memorization. (Author/TL)

This monograph presents a descriptive analysis of the syntactic patterns in 16 corpora of word combinations from 11 infants learning either English (six children), Samoan, Finnish, Hebrew, or Swedish. The mean utterance lengths range up to about 1.7 morpehmes. There are both reanalyses of corpora in the literature and new corpora. The data…

The derivation of Latin "sum,""es(s),""est" from Indo-European "esmi,""est,""esti" involves methodological problems. It is claimed here that the development of "sum" from "esmi" is related to the origin of the variation "est-st" (less than"esti"). The study is primarily concerned with this process, but chronological suggestions are also made. (CHK)

Investigation of the communicative functions of pitch direction and range in one-year-olds (N=2) indicated that use of pitch among infants may be related to a period where communicative intentions are clearly defined, but language is not yet available. A higher pitch was observed among infants who made repeated requests for objects as opposed to…

The possible cognitive consequences of learning to read are explored. The conditions of learning, it is argued, combine with the degree of technical mastery to affect thinking powers and conceptions of language, learning, and authority. (Author/MT)

Presents a model of the structure of logic considered necessary for computer processing of metaphorical language. Formally states and diagrams the algorithm for metaphors, isolating domain distance, predicate inequality, and hyperbole as particularly important factors. Distinguishes explanatory literal analogies from expressive metaphors,…

Reports cross-linguistic differences in forward digit span among four-, five-, and six-year-old Chinese and American children. Examines several explanations for the superior performance of Chinese children, and finds that only a temporally limited store hypothesis was supported. (SKC)