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Arie Verhagen

Bio: Arie Verhagen is an academic researcher from Leiden University. The author has contributed to research in topics: Grammar & Cognitive linguistics. The author has an hindex of 19, co-authored 79 publications receiving 1510 citations. Previous affiliations of Arie Verhagen include Max Planck Society & Utrecht University.


Papers
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Book
01 Jan 2007
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors discuss the role of conceptualizers on stage and discuss the importance of discourse connections in managing inferences across perspectives across perspectives, including mutual management, negation and virtual argumentation.
Abstract: 1. Intersubjectivity - Mutual Management 2. Negation and Virtual Argumentation 3. Finite Complements - Putting Conceptualizers on Stage 4. Discourse Connections - Managing Inferences Across Perspectives 5. Concluding Remarks

322 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: This approach is simple, unified, has greater explanatory power both for cross-linguistic Variation and for intricate intralinguistic distributional facts; finally, it accords with a cognitively-based view of language, in which the knowledge underlying grammar is not qualitatively different from other aspects of human understanding and reasoning.
Abstract: Analytic causative constructions can best be described as extensions of simpler kinds of expressions, rather than as reductions from more complex underlying structures. In particular, causatives of intransitive predicates (e.g. I made Mary cryj are viewed as modelled on simple two-participant clauses (like I ate the cake,), and causatives of transitive predicates (e.g. He had the servant taste the foodj are seen as modelled on simple threeparticipant clauses (like I gave Mary a flower, or She broke it with a hammer—i.e. mainly ditransitive and instrumental clause types). One especially important advantage of this approach is that it offers an explanatory semantic account of the Variation of case markings found in causative constructions (such as the rather general alternation of dative, or other non-oblique, with instrumental), itpredicts that such Variation is related systematically to the semantics ofcase markings in simple clauses, which is in fact the case. It is argued that accounts ofcase marking of causees formulated strictly in terms of a formal hierarchy ofcases cannot be adequate, given the semantic factors affecting the choice of case. The marking of the causee is a consequence of conceived differences in its role in the causal event, which relate to such aspects of event structure as (in)directness of causation and (relatedly) degree of agency and affectedness of participants. Such factors are elements ofcertain general conceptual models of causation. This approach not only has wider empirical coverage than syntactic, hierarchy-based accounts, but is simple, unified, has greater explanatory power both for cross-linguistic Variation andfor intricate intralinguistic distributional facts; finally, it accords with a cognitively-based view oflanguage, in which the knowledge underlying grammar is not qualitatively different from other aspects of human understanding and reasoning.

156 citations

BookDOI
Arie Verhagen1
01 Jan 2007
TL;DR: The authors argue that semantics is, indeed, primarily cognitive and not a matter of relationships between language and the world (or truth conditions with respect to a model). This principle becomes especially manifest in the research into facets of meaning and grammatical organization which crucially makes use of notions such as "perspective", "subjectivity" or "point of view".
Abstract: A fundamental principle in Cognitive Linguistics is that semantics is, indeed, primarily cognitive and not a matter of relationships between language and the world (or truth conditions with respect to a model). This principle becomes especially manifest in the research into facets of meaning and grammatical organization which crucially makes use of notions such as ‘perspective’, ‘subjectivity’, or ‘point of view’. What these notions have in common is that they capture aspects of conceptualization that cannot be sufficiently analyzed in terms of properties of the object of conceptualization, but, in one way or another, necessarily involve a subject of conceptualization. A strong incentive for this type of research stems from the awareness that the more linguistic problems can be solved by making use of these notions, the more (heuristically) successful the fundamental principle is; in addition, this research is motivated by the awareness that the best way to make these notions relevant for linguistic analysis is not given a priori and thus requires empirical investigation. It is therefore not surprising that there is in fact quite a large body of research into such nonobjective facets of linguistic meaning. The cover term that has come to be used for different ways of viewing a particular situation is ‘construal’. At a very elementary level, construal is a feature of the meaning of all linguistic expressions, if only as a consequence of the fact that languages provide various ways for categorizing situations, their participants and features, and the relations between them. Speaking thus always implies a choice:

109 citations

Book
01 Jan 2005

99 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The Dutch verbs doen and laten categorize an event as involving either direct or indirect causation, respectively, and the difference between these verbs reflect the folk world view in which the mental world is seen as separate from the physical, each having distinct causal properties as discussed by the authors.

73 citations


Cited by
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01 Jan 2009

7,241 citations

Book
01 Jan 2006
TL;DR: In this article, the authors present a survey of the generalization process in the context of constructionist themes and cross-linguistic generalizations in argument realization, and explain how generalizations are learned.
Abstract: Part One: Constructions 1. Overview 2. Surface Generalizations 3. Item Specific Knowledge and Generalizations Part Two: Learning Generalizations 4. How Generalizations are Learned 5. How Generalizations are Constrained 6. Why Generalizations are Learned Part Three: Explaining Generalizations 7. Island Constraints and Scope 8. Grammatical Categorization: Subject Auxiliary Inversion 9. Cross-linguistic Generalizations in Argument Realization 10. Variations on a Constructionist Theme 11. Conclusion References Index

2,337 citations

01 Jan 2014
TL;DR: Using Language部分的�’学模式既不落俗套,又能真正体现新课程标准所倡导的�'学理念,正是年努力探索的问题.
Abstract: 人教版高中英语新课程教材中,语言运用(Using Language)是每个单元必不可少的部分,提供了围绕单元中心话题的听、说、读、写的综合性练习,是单元中心话题的延续和升华.如何设计Using Language部分的教学,使自己的教学模式既不落俗套,又能真正体现新课程标准所倡导的教学理念,正是广大一线英语教师一直努力探索的问题.

2,071 citations

01 Jan 2005
TL;DR: In “Constructing a Language,” Tomasello presents a contrasting theory of how the child acquires language: It is not a universal grammar that allows for language development, but two sets of cognitive skills resulting from biological/phylogenetic adaptations are fundamental to the ontogenetic origins of language.
Abstract: Child psychiatrists, pediatricians, and other child clinicians need to have a solid understanding of child language development. There are at least four important reasons that make this necessary. First, slowing, arrest, and deviation of language development are highly associated with, and complicate the course of, child psychopathology. Second, language competence plays a crucial role in emotional and mood regulation, evaluation, and therapy. Third, language deficits are the most frequent underpinning of the learning disorders, ubiquitous in our clinical populations. Fourth, clinicians should not confuse the rich linguistic and dialectal diversity of our clinical populations with abnormalities in child language development. The challenge for the clinician becomes, then, how to get immersed in the captivating field of child language acquisition without getting overwhelmed by its conceptual and empirical complexity. In the past 50 years and since the seminal works of Roger Brown, Jerome Bruner, and Catherine Snow, child language researchers (often known as developmental psycholinguists) have produced a remarkable body of knowledge. Linguists such as Chomsky and philosophers such as Grice have strongly influenced the science of child language. One of the major tenets of Chomskian linguistics (known as generative grammar) is that children’s capacity to acquire language is “hardwired” with “universal grammar”—an innate language acquisition device (LAD), a language “instinct”—at its core. This view is in part supported by the assertion that the linguistic input that children receive is relatively dismal and of poor quality relative to the high quantity and quality of output that they manage to produce after age 2 and that only an advanced, innate capacity to decode and organize linguistic input can enable them to “get from here (prelinguistic infant) to there (linguistic child).” In “Constructing a Language,” Tomasello presents a contrasting theory of how the child acquires language: It is not a universal grammar that allows for language development. Rather, human cognition universals of communicative needs and vocal-auditory processing result in some language universals, such as nouns and verbs as expressions of reference and predication (p. 19). The author proposes that two sets of cognitive skills resulting from biological/phylogenetic adaptations are fundamental to the ontogenetic origins of language. These sets of inherited cognitive skills are intentionreading on the one hand and pattern-finding, on the other. Intention-reading skills encompass the prelinguistic infant’s capacities to share attention to outside events with other persons, establishing joint attentional frames, to understand other people’s communicative intentions, and to imitate the adult’s communicative intentions (an intersubjective form of imitation that requires symbolic understanding and perspective-taking). Pattern-finding skills include the ability of infants as young as 7 months old to analyze concepts and percepts (most relevant here, auditory or speech percepts) and create concrete or abstract categories that contain analogous items. Tomasello, a most prominent developmental scientist with research foci on child language acquisition and on social cognition and social learning in children and primates, succinctly and clearly introduces the major points of his theory and his views on the origins of language in the initial chapters. In subsequent chapters, he delves into the details by covering most language acquisition domains, namely, word (lexical) learning, syntax, and morphology and conversation, narrative, and extended discourse. Although one of the remaining domains (pragmatics) is at the core of his theory and permeates the text throughout, the relative paucity of passages explicitly devoted to discussing acquisition and proBOOK REVIEWS

1,757 citations