In many languages, the article cannot occur when a possessive phrase is present in the noun phrase (NP). Argues that these patterns can be understood in terms of economic motivation because possessed NPs are very likely to be definite. Shows how the performance motivation of economy creates the competence pattern in diachronic change. (Author/VWL)

Discusses problems that occur in information retrieval when foreign words appear in Korean texts. Describes an algorithm that identifies a phrase containing a foreign word and then extracts that word based on statistical information, and explains a method for back-transliteration of a foreign word to its English origin. (Author/LRW)

Shows that looking at individual semantic functions of grammatical morphemes is essential to explaining particular cases of noniconicity between lexical categories and their discourse functions. It is suggested that, in light of this importance of the functions of individual grammatical morphemes, it is now easier to evaluate why…

Discusses the bare-noun phrase (NP) complementation pattern of the Spanish verb "tener" (have). Shows that the maximality of the complement NP is dependent upon three factors: (1) idiosyncratic valence requirements; (2) encyclopedic knowledge related to possession; and (3) contextualized semantic construal. (Author/VWL)

Two experiments with 40 children (grades 4 to 8) found the children often used their knowledge of derivational suffixes in defining low-frequency derivatives, and knowledge of suffixes was significantly correlated with suffix production in a nonsense task. The children's morphological awareness of derivational suffixes included semantic…

In order to help frame a current theoretical impasse, in this essay we forward the figure of the zombie in Western cinema as an allegory for the reception of the concept of ideology by communication scholars. After noting parallels between (a) an early academic caricature of ideology and the laboring zombie, and (b) the subject of ideological…

We present interpretation-based processing--a theory of sentence processing that builds a syntactic and a semantic representation for a sentence and assigns an interpretation to the sentence as soon as possible. That interpretation can further participate in comprehension and in lexical processing and is vital for relating the sentence to the…

It is approaching a half century since Bill Stokoe published his revolutionary monograph, "Sign Language Structure: An Outline of the Visual Communication Systems of the American Deaf." It is rare for a work of innovative scholarship to spark a social as well as an intellectual revolution, but that is just what Stokoe's 1960 paper did. And it is…

In this article the linguistic features of three Italian Sign Language (Lingua Italiana dei Segni, or LIS) registers are analyzed focusing on iconic phenomena. Previous treatments of iconicity and motivation in spoken and signed language are discussed. Iconicity is defined as a regular mapping between expressive form and meaning that can be active…

This paper presents an empirical study of how different "wh"-words behave in English speakers' L2 Chinese "wh"-questions. Our results indicate that L2 Chinese "wh"-questions are specified by the Chinese "wh" -particle ne and that there is neither variability nor L1 transfer in this aspect of L2 grammars as no "wh"-movement is found in English…

In the last two decades, La Heij and colleagues have presented accounts of a number of context effects in Stroop-like word-production tasks. Roelofs (2007 this issue) criticises various aspects of our proposals, ranging from the number of processing stages assumed to details of simulation results. In this reply we first argue that we do not…

This article investigates the L2 acquisition of clausal syntax in postpuberty learners of German and Swedish regarding V2, VP headedness, and verb particle constructions. The learner data are tested against L2 theories according to which lower structural projections (VP) are acquired before higher functional projections (IP, CP), VP syntax is…

This paper focuses on the temporal and modal meanings associated with root infinitives (RIs) and other non-finite clauses in several typologically diverse languages--English, Russian, Greek and Dutch. I discuss the role that event structure, aspect, and modality play in the interpretation of these clauses. The basic hypothesis is that in the…

This study examines the ten major contemporary standard Slavic languages (Polish, Ukrainian, Russian, Bielorussian, Czech, Slovak, Serbo-Croatian, Macedonian, Slovenian, and Bulgarian) from the point of view of their similarities and differences in morpho-syntactic structure. Areas examined include: vowel and consonant systems, morphophonemics,…

The first section of this report describes the follow-up program designed to determine any improvements in the teaching of English language and composition achieved by participants of the NDEA Institute at State University College Cortland, N. Y., 1968. It covers (1) the background and planning of the program, (2) school visitations of the summer…