The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language

The complete title of this book runs ‘Analyzing Linguistic Data: A Practical Introduction to Statistics using R’ and as such it very well reflects the purpose and spirit of the book. The author guides the reader in about 350 pages from descriptive and basic statistical methods over classification and clustering to (generalised) linear and mixed models. Each of the methods is introduced in the context of concrete linguistic problems and demonstrated on exciting datasets from current research in the language sciences. In line with its practical orientation, the book focuses primarily on using the methods and interpreting the results. This implies that the mathematical treatment of the techniques is held at a minimum if not absent from the book. In return, the reader is provided with very detailed explanations on how to conduct the analyses using R [1]. The first chapter sets the tone being a 20-page introduction to R. For this and all subsequent chapters, the R code is intertwined with the chapter text and the datasets and functions used are conveniently packaged in the languageR package that is available on the Comprehensive R Archive Network (CRAN). With this approach, the author has done an excellent job in enabling researchers and students alike to reproduce the analyses and learn by doing. Another quality as a textbook is the fact that every chapter ends with Workbook sections where the user is invited to exercise his or her analysis skills on supplemental datasets. Full solutions including code, results and comments are given in Appendix A (30 pages). Instructors are therefore very well served by this text, although they might want to balance the book with some more mathematical treatment depending on the target audience. After the introductory chapter on R, the book opens on graphical data exploration. Chapter 3 treats probability distributions and common sampling distributions. Under basic statistical methods (Chapter 4), distribution tests and tests on means and variances are covered. Chapter 5 deals with clustering and classification. Strangely enough, the clustering section has material on PCA, factor analysis, correspondence analysis and includes only one subsection on clustering, devoted notably to hierarchical partitioning methods. The classification part deals with decision trees, discriminant analysis and support vector machines. The regression chapter (Chapter 6) treats linear models, generalised linear models, piecewise linear models and a substantial section on models for lexical richness. The final chapter on mixed models is particularly interesting as it is one of the few text book accounts that introduce the reader to using the (innovative) lme4 package of Douglas Bates which implements linear mixed-effects models. Moreover, the case studies included in this

Analyzing linguistic data: a practical introduction to statistics using R

Naming and necessity

1. Introduction 2. A Preliminary Case for Conventional Implicatures 3. A Logic for Conventional Implicatures 4. Supplements 5. Expressive Content 6. The Supplement Relation: A Syntactic Analysis 7. A Look Outside Grice's Definition Appendix Bibliography

/pdf/the-logic-of-conventional-implicatures-1ywowc3e2k.pdf

The logic of conventional implicatures

When one form replaces another over time in a changing language, the new form does not occur equally often in all linguistic contexts. Linguists have generally assumed that those contexts in which the new form is more common are those in which the form first appears and in which it advances most rapidly. However, evidence from several linguistic changes (most importantly the rise of the periphrastic auxiliary do in late Middle English) shows that the general assumption is false. Instead, at least for syntactic cases, change seems to proceed at the same rate in all contexts. Contexts change together because they are merely surface manifestations of a single underlying change in grammar. Differences in frequency of use of a new form across contexts reflect functional and stylistic factors, which are constant across time and independent of grammar.

/pdf/reflexes-of-grammar-in-patterns-of-language-change-4bbtsepks6.pdf

Reflexes of grammar in patterns of language change

In this paper we present some results from an experimental study that we have been conducting into the effects of syntactic attrition on the L1 of Greek and Italian speakers who have achieved near-native proficiency in their L2 (English) but still use their L1 on a regular basis. In particular, we test the hypothesis, developed on the basis of assumptions regarding syntactic modularity, that the changes in L1 syntax will be restricted to the interface with the conceptual / intentional cognitive systems. The area of investigation is the domain of grammatical subjects in Greek and Italian. More specifically, we tested the participants on the production and interpretation of null and overt subjects, and of preverbal and postverbal subjects. We also elicited grammaticality judgments on subject extraction and subject position in various syntactic contexts. In this paper we report on the results of one of the production tasks (of preverbal and postverbal subjects) and two interpretation tasks. Attrition effects are found in the production of preverbal subjects in the Greek group whereas Italian speakers show attrition effects in the interpretation of overt pronominal subjects. We argue that these results are in the right direction, that is, that semantic features are vulnerable in language attrition whereas syntactic options remain intact.

/pdf/first-language-attrition-and-syntactic-subjects-a-study-of-3sf6qmpyw6.pdf

First language attrition and syntactic subjects: A study of Greek and Italian near-native speakers of English

Lexical-Functional Grammar (LFG) starts from the idea that grammatical knowledge is factored into different levels of representation, which encode different kinds of information, and are in not in a one-one mapping relation. LFG makes a sharp distinction between some grammatical information (at f-structure) and the overt structure which expresses that information (the c-structure). The c-structure encodes phrasal dominance and precedence relations, represented as a phrase structure tree. In contrast, the f-structure encodes information about the functional relations between the parts, such as what is the subject and what is the predicate, what agreement features are present, and so on. F-structure presents all of the grammatically relevant information about a sentence or other unit of analysis. C-structure is a representation of constituency, categorial labeling, and linear precedence relations. One central idea of the LFG approach is that the truly universal aspects of syntax are determined with regard to f-structure information.

The Syntax of Predication

Pseudoclefts constitute a difficult challenge for linguistic theory, displaying effects of core syntactic conditions in a noncanonical configuration that cannot be normalized with standard syntactic operations. We argue that these “connectedness” effects follow from the nature of pseudoclefts as equatives. This treatment yields an integrated account of the syntactic and semanticopragmatic properties of the construction, but leads to the conclusion that certain syntactic constraints apply to a level of representation more abstract than LF under most current conceptions. This representation is built up in the process of discourse interpretation and may constitute the interface with the conceptual-intentional system of mind.

Pseudocleft Connectedness: Implications for the LF Interface Level

Embedded Root Phenomena

Il a ete observe que la reconstruction (ou connectivite) apparaissait obligatoire pour les predicats, mais facultative pour les arguments. L'A. veut montrer que le contraste argument/predicat appartient a un ensemble plus general de contrastes entre les syntagmes referentiels et non referentiels dans le cadre de la reconstruction. les syntagmes non referentiels doivent obligatoirement se reconstruire par rapport a la forme logique pour etre interpretes correctement, alors que les syntagmes referentiels peuvent conserver leur position deplacee. L'A. admet que les conditions du liage s'appliquent a la forme logique pour expliquer les asymetries observees

Caroline Heycock

Papers

First language attrition and syntactic subjects: A study of Greek and Italian near-native speakers of English

The Syntax of Predication

Pseudocleft Connectedness: Implications for the LF Interface Level

Embedded Root Phenomena

Asymmetries in reconstruction