http://www.cs.ox.ac.uk/activities/ieg/e-library/sources/pinker_conn.pdf

On language and connectionism: analysis of a parallel distributed processing model of language acquisition

This paper reports on the results of a detailed empirical study of word order correlations, based on a sample of 625 languages. The primary result is a determination of exactly what pairs of elements correlate in order with the verb and object. Some pairs of elements that have been claimed to correlate in order with the verb and object do not in fact exhibit any correlation. I argue against the Head-Dependent Theory (HDT), according to which the correlations reflect a tendency towards consistent ordering of heads and dependents. I offer an alternative account, the Branching Direction Theory (BDT), based on consistent ordering of phrasal and nonphrasal elements. According to the BDT, the word order correlations reflect a tendency for languages to be consistently right-branching or consistently left-branching.*

The Greenbergian word order correlations

Presentation de la theorie de la grille metrique. Etude dans le cadre de la phonologie generative de la place qu'occupe l'accent dans la phrase selon differents parametres : profondeur de l'enchâssement d'un constituant phrastique, focus, presuppostion, mot compose.

http://lear.unive.it/jspui/bitstream/11707/91/1/A%20null%20Theory%20of%20Phrase%20and%20Compound%20Stress2.opd.pdf

A null theory of phrase and compound stress

Words and rules

This book is the second edition of a highly successful introduction to the study of word-formation, that is, the ways in which new words are built on the bases of other words (e.g. happy - happy-ness), focusing on English. The book's didactic aim is to enable students with little or no prior linguistic knowledge to do their own practical analyses of complex words. Readers are familiarized with the necessary methodological tools to obtain and analyze relevant data and are shown how to relate their findings to theoretical problems and debates. The second edition incorporates new developments in morphology at both the methodological and the theoretical level. It introduces the use of new corpora and data bases, acquaints the reader with state-of-the-art computational algorithms modeling morphology, and brings in current debates and theories.

/pdf/word-formation-in-english-2i5q58lfkt.pdf

E Williams

Papers

On the Notions Lexically Related and Head of a Word