Abstract: Sign languages have two strikingly different kinds of morphological structure: sequential and simultaneous The simultaneous morphology of two unrelated sign languages, American and Israeli Sign Language, is very similar and is largely inflectional, while what little sequential morphology we have found differs significantly and is derivational We show that at least two pervasive types of inflectional morphology, verb agreement and classifier constructions, are iconically grounded in spatiotemporal cognition, while the sequential patterns can be traced to normal historical development We attribute the paucity of sequential morphology in sign languages to their youth This research both brings sign languages much closer to spoken languages in their morphological structure and shows how the medium of communication contributes to the structure of languages

Abstract: This study reconsiders the acquisition of relative clauses based on data from two sentencerepetition tasks. Usingmaterials modeled on the relative constructions of spontaneous child speech, we asked four-year-old English- and German-speaking children to repeat six different types of relative clauses. Although English and German relative clauses are structurally very different, the results were similar across studies: intransitive subject relatives caused fewer errors than transitive subject relatives and direct object relatives, which in turncaused fewer errors thanin direct object relatives and oblique relatives; finally, genitive relatives caused by far the most problems. Challenging previous analyses in which the acquisition of relative clauses has been explained by the varying distance between filler and gap, we propose a multifactorial analysis in which the acquisitionprocess is determined primarily by the similarity betweenthe various types of relative clauses and their relationship to simple sentences.

Abstract: Chomsky and Halle (1968) and many formal linguists rely on the notion of a universally available phonetic space defined in discrete time. This assumption plays a central role in phonological theory. Discreteness at the phonetic level guarantees the discreteness of all other levels of language. But decades of phonetics research demonstrate that there exists no universal inventory of phonetic objects. We discuss three kinds of evidence: first, phonologies differ incommensurably. Second, some phonetic characteristics of languages depend on intrinsically temporal patterns, and, third, some linguistic sound categories within a language are different from each other despite a high degree of overlap that precludes distinctness. Linguistics has mistakenly presumed that speech can always be spelled with letter-like tokens. A variety of implications of these conclusions for research in phonology are discussed.

Abstract: Segmental features of child-directed speech (CDS) were studied in a corpus drawn from thirtynine mothers living in Tyneside, England. Focus was on the phonetic variants used for (t) in word-medial and word-final prevocalic contexts since it is known that these variants display clear sociolinguistic patterning in the adult community. Variant usage in CDS was found to differ markedly from that in interadult speech. Effects were also found with respect to the age and gender of the children being addressed. Speech to girls generally contained more standard variants than speech to boys, which, by contrast, contained higher rates of vernacular variants. The differentiation by gender was most apparent for the youngest children. The findings are assessed in comparison to other studies of CDS. It has previously been claimed that modifications made in the CDS register help children to learn linguistic structures and also to learn that speech is a social activity. Our findings suggest that CDS may play an additional role, providing boys and girls as young as 2;0 with differential opportunities to learn the social-indexical values of sociolinguistic variables.

Abstract: In this article we extend the model of language evolution exemplified in Ringe et al. 2002, which recovers phylogenetic trees optimized according to a criterion of weighted maximum compatibility, to include cases in which languages remain in contact and trade linguistic material as they evolve. We describe our analysis of an Indo-European (IE) dataset (originally assembled by Ringe and Taylor) based on this new model. Our study shows that this new model fits the IE family well and suggests that the early evolution of IE involved only limited contact between distinct lineages. Furthermore, the candidate histories we obtain appear to be consistent with archaeological findings, which suggests that this method may be of practical use. The case at hand provides no opportunity to explore the problem of conflict between network optimization criteria; that problem must be left to future research.

Abstract: NOUN INCORPORATION (NI) in Mapudungun is different from NI in better-studied languages like Mohawk in three ways: the incorporated noun is invisible to verbal agreement, incorporation into unaccusative verbs is impossible unless a possessor is stranded, and possessors are the only modifiers that can be stranded These differences can be explained by saying that the trace of NI retains its person, number, and gender features in Mohawk but not in Mapudungun Those aspects of grammar that do not involve these features treat NI in the two languages the same; thus, NI has the same gross distribution and anaphoric possibilities in both languages We extend these results to Nahuatl, Chukchee, Ainu, Southern Tiwa, Mayali, and Wichita, showing that our theory accounts for MithunOs (1984) distinction between Type III and Type IV noun incorporation in a general way

Abstract: This article investigates whether certain animacy effects are an artifact of syntactic weight (because statistically, animate referents tend to be short) or whether animacy is an independent variable in grammatical variation. The empirical domain of investigation is a case of grammatical variation in the noun phrase, specifically, English genitive variation. Data from a corpus study as well as the results of an experimental study are brought forward, showing that animacy and weight are independent factors. These data are further supported by typological evidence. Moreover, the analysis of the interaction of animacy and weight provides evidence that animacy can even dominate weight up to a certain cut-off point. Finally, it is argued that animacy is a processing factor influencing grammatical variation, just as weight is.

Abstract: We argue that subject-like obliques of the impersonal construction show behavioral properties of syntactic subjects in Old Germanic, contrary to standard assumptions (Cole et al. 1980). Subject tests, including control infinitives, reveal that subject-like obliques in Old and Early Middle English, Old Swedish, and Old Norse-Icelandic exhibit behavioral properties of subjects, as they do in Modern Icelandic and Faroese. We also present new data from Modern German, illustrating the same syntactic behavior of corresponding arguments in that language. Thus, we conclude that subject-like obliques exhibit behavioral properties of syntactic subjects from the earliest attested Germanic period onwards. Our findings contradict the standard view that these arguments were objects, which gradually acquired subject properties. We show that data from Gothic intended to support the standard view has been misinterpreted. Given the validity of our findings there are no grounds for reconstructing a stage at which subject-like obliques were objects in Germanic.

Abstract: It is widely believed that the difference between regular and irregular verbs is restricted to form. This study questions that belief. We report a series of lexical statistics showing that irregular verbs cluster in denser regions in semantic space. Compared to regular verbs, irregular verbs tend to have more semantic neighbors that in turn have relatively many other semantic neighbors that are morphologically irregular. We show that this greater semantic density for irregulars is reflected in association norms, familiarity ratings, visual lexical-decision latencies, and word-naming latencies. Meta-analyses of the materials of two neuroimaging studies show that in these studies, regularity is confounded with differences in semantic density. Our results challenge the hypothesis of the supposed formal encapsulation of rules of inflection and support lines of research in which sensitivity to probability is recognized as intrinsic to human language.

Abstract: It is well known that nearly all nonrhotic dialects of English exhibit linking and/or intrusive /r/. What is not known are the details about how linking and intrusive /r/ emerge. This article provides the first empirical data on the diachronic relationship between the decline of rhoticity and the emergence of /r/-sandhi in a dialect of English. The results are based on an analysis of rhoticity and /r/-sandhi in the speech of New Zealanders born between 1860 and 1925, dates that encompass the formative years of New Zealand English. The results demonstrate that the /r/- sandhi system in New Zealand English emerged gradually and overlapped with the decline of rhoticity. This is a significant advance on previous descriptive work on this topic and provides results that should both inform and constrain potential phonological theories of /r/-sandhi.

Abstract: This study examined continuity in literacy achievements from kindergarten to school, among low SES Israeli children, controlling for family factors. Kindergartners’ early oral and code-related language skills as well as family measures were assessed at age 51/2. In school, 21/2 years later, their literacy achievements were evaluated. Correlations emerged between all kindergarten literacy measures and school literacy achievements. Oral and code-related early literacy measures similarly predicted all school literacy achievements. Moreover, early literacy predicted literacy achievements at the end of second grade beyond home environmental measures. Results highlighted the stability in children’s learning through the kindergarten-to-school transition, confirming the importance of promoting early literacy in kindergarten, especially among low SES children.

Abstract: This article proposes a feature-geometric analysis of the interpretable features of Infl, using MINIMALIST syntax and DISTRIBUTED MORPHOLOGY. A small universal set of monovalent interpretable features and a set of entailment relations among them provide the basis for a principled account of the tense systems of English and Spanish. While each feature, each lexical item, and each vocabulary item has a unified representation, surface polysemy is shown to arise from the mappings between them. Crosslinguistic variation is shown to arise from the different features chosen by each language and from the ways in which each language assembles its features into lexical items and vocabulary items. In addition, the presence or absence of a dependent feature F in a given language is shown to have important consequences for the semantic interpretation of the feature dominating F. These three possible differences interact to produce the significant superficial differences between the tense systems of the two languages.

Abstract: In this article we describe and develop an optimality-theoretic (OT) analysis of foot-level (secondary) and word-level (primary) stress in Nanti, a Kampa language of Peru. The distribution of stress in Nanti is sensitive to rhythmic factors, syllable quantity, vowel quality, and to whether a syllable is open or closed. The interaction of these independent variables produces a complex, multigrade stress scale married to an iterative stress system whose default preference is alternating, iambic rhythm. While each of the interacting factors in this system is familiar to phonologists, Nanti is special because the particular combination of influences and factors in Nanti contributes to a complexity of interactions that has not been documented in any other language to date.

Abstract: Should parents be encouraged to teach their hearing infants to communicate using gestural signs? Does signing in infancy advance child behaviour and development as claimed by many commercially avai...

Abstract: Maternal overall verbal responsiveness to prelinguistic infants at 0;10 was analysed by categorizing responses according to their function. In addition, the predictive validity of the response cate...

Abstract: In an article in a recent issue of Language (Newmeyer 2003), Frederick Newmeyer argues for a clear separation between what he terms 'knowledge of language [i.e. grammar] and use of language [i.e. pragmatics]' (682). In developing his argument, N makes frequent reference to linguistic analyses that are corpus-based, that is, centered on information taken from large datasets of actual speech or writing (e.g. transcriptions of conversations, newspaper articles, novels). In N's view, grammar is distinct from pragmatics, and because a corpus contains examples of actual language use drawn from a large community of speakers and writers, it can yield only performance data. As a result, N argues, 'there is no way that one can draw conclusions about the grammar of an individual from usage facts about communities, particularly communities from which the individual receives no speech input' (696). Implicit in this argument, however, is the view that the traditional way of collecting linguistic data-introspection-somehow gives us insights into the competence of the native speaker that corpus data cannot. The real issue, we argue, is not which kind of data gets us closer to the native speaker's competence, a goal that we believe is largely unobtainable, but rather how linguists can best collect data relevant to the linguistic analyses they are conducting. There is considerable evidence that a corpus can enrich our understanding of language and, in many cases, provide linguists with examples they would have never considered had they relied only on data obtained through introspection. To support this view, it is worth reviewing N's critique of Manning's (2003) use of corpus data to challenge Pollard and Sag's (1994) analysis of verb subcategorization in English. Manning (2003:299) notes that Pollard and Sag claim that the verb regard can be followed by as-complements (1) but not by predicative to-complements (2). (1) We regard Kim as an acceptable candidate. (2) *We regard Kim to be an acceptable candidate. However, in an analysis of texts in the New York Times, Manning (2003:300) found examples such as 3, where regard can take a to-complement.

Abstract: Using a natural interactional setting, a quasi-experiment investigated stop consonants in Norwegian infant directed speech (IDS) compared with adult directed speech (ADS) in six mothers interacting with their infants at 10 points throughout six months. Voice onset time (VOT) in voiced and voiceless bilabial, alveolar and velar stops was compared between the two speech types. Results from two repeated measures analysis show longer VOTs in IDS than in ADS for alveolar and velar stops, as well as for /b/, but not for /p/. These results were stable across the six months. This suggests that stops are overspecified in speech to infants from birth until six months, maybe enhancing both auditory and visual aspects of speech in the first six months.

Abstract: This article offers a comprehensive analysis of the constituent-structure and linear-order properties of English transitive and intransitive V-P constructions involving so-called OparticlesO (turn on the lights/the lights on, mess up the song/the song up, shut up, sit down, etc.). Drawing on both standard and certain new evidence and arguments, it is proposed that V-P constructions generally come in one or both of two varieties: lexical compounds (mess up in mess up the song) and/or discontinuous verbs, that is, lexemes with more than one piece projected as a word or phrase (mess . . . up in mess the song up), and that the alternation, for those that have both manifestations, reflects different argument structure possibilities for a lexemewith the same overall conceptual semantics. The internal structure of VPs built on V-P lexemes is examined in some detail. The popular Osmall-clauseO approach, according to which the DP of transitive V-P structures is the subject of a phrase that has the P as its predicate, is shown to be problematic, primarily because there in fact exists a true small-clause construction that can have a P as its predicate and the putative small clause of cases like mess the song up systematically lacks the defining properties of this construction. The word-order restrictions that the small-clause approach is designed, in part, to account for are shown to follow from a set of independently needed linearization constraints, which are motivated by functional principles.

Abstract: Cette discussion autour de l'article de Goldberg et Jackendoff The English resultative as a family of constructions (Language, 2004, vol. 80, p. 532-568) regroupe un commentaire de H. C. Boas Determining the productivity of resultatives, un commentaire de S. Wechsler Weighing in on scales et une reponse des auteurs The end result(ative). La critique de Boas porte plus particulierement sur la maniere de prevoir exactement l'equilibre delicat entre idiosyncrasie et generalisation lors de l'etude de la productivite des resultatives, et celle de Wechsler porte sur les contraintes scalaires de l'adjectif resultatif.

Abstract: This article focuses on the grammatical properties of a Madurese structure in which an argument of a complement clause appears to occur in a nonthematic position in its dominating clause. RAISING-TO-OBJECT (or its analogue in nonderivational theories) has been proposed over the past thirty years or so for the corresponding construction in the closely related Austronesian languages of Balinese, Indonesian/Malay, and Javanese. Close examination of the Madurese data reveals that a proleptic NP analysis, in which the matrix NP is generated in the matrix clause, proves superior to the raising analysis and shares virtually all of the same properties as the parallel English construction (I believe about Marlena that she left for Jakarta on Wednesday). Enumeration of these properties and comparison with both RAISING and COPY RAISING provide the initial step in identifying the hallmarks of each construction and how they might differ typologically.

Abstract: We conducted 2 experiments that examined 3-year-olds’ ability to talk about future situations involving the self. In both experiments, children participated in a trip task. In this task, children were asked to choose various items that might be required on a trip, and to explain their choices verbally. A coding scheme that captured both the dimensions of futurity and uncertainty was developed to categorize children’s explanations. In addition, children were administered the Test of Early Language Development-2 (TELD-2) (Hresko, Reid & Hammill, 1991). Results from both experiments indicated that children’s language was beginning to reflect an ability to anticipate various situations involving the self that might arise during the course of a trip. The correlation between children’s scores on the trip task and their scores on the TELD-2 was positive, but not statistically significant. We discuss factors, other than general language ability, that may contribute to children’s talk, and thought, about the future.

Abstract: This study investigated early lexical development in French by analysing changes and variability in lexical production and composition of children's spontaneous speech samples from three age groups: 1;8, 2;6 and 3;3 years (20 children in each).

Abstract: Researchers have long debated the means by which children learn the argument structure of verbs Making syntactic generalizations often entails learning the semantics of different verbs, complicating and delaying the acquisition process This study investigates four- to twelve-yearolds' and adults' knowledge of animacy hierarchy restrictions on postverbal word order in Sesotho double object applicatives, constructions where verb semantics is kept constant Performance on forced-choice elicited production tasks showed that four-year-olds have early knowledge of the animacy hierarchy restrictions, providing evidence of syntactic generalization even on low-frequency constructions Although there were no verb frequency effects, performance was also better on the highest-frequency animacy constructions The results suggest that learning restrictions on verb-argument structure is facilitated when verb semantics is not a confound, but that construction frequency also plays a role in mastering the argument structure of verbs

Abstract: The recent finding that two languages develop autonomously in young simultaneous bilinguals has been challenged by several researchers. The current study attempts to show that both independence and interdependence are involved in early bilingual development. Longitudinal analysis of the acquisition of question formation was conducted in two Japanese/English bilingual children. The results indicate that the development of the two grammars is basically autonomous, but cross-language effects are also present, although not in both children. It is suggested that cross-linguistic cue competition best captures the transfer process, and that linguistic environment for each child may be the source of individual differences in the use of cross-linguistic structures. Implications of the current results for language acquisition theories are discussed.

Abstract: Cinq linguistes proposent ici leurs commentaires par rapport a l'article de F. J. Newmeyer intitule Grammar is grammar and usage is usage (2003, Language, vol. 79, 682-707) : B. Clark critique les arguments de Newmeyer contre la grammaire stochastique, R. Laury & T. Ono soulignent ses representations erronees de l'explication fonctionnelle en linguistique, et C. F. Meyer et H. Tao reviennent sur l'usage des corpus en recherche linguistique et nuancent le propos de Newmeyer consistant a opposer introspection et corpus pour analyser la competence des locuteurs natifs. Ces commentaires sont ensuite suivis d'une reponse de la part de Newmeyer.

Abstract: One of the central issues in morphology/morphosyntax has been the locus of the mechanisms responsible for word formation. LEXICALISM claims that the mechanisms employed for word formation are distinct from those found in other domains (e.g. syntax). I examine in this article so-called 'lexical' V-V compound formation in Japanese from a lexicalist point of view and show that it is indeed LEXICAL (some claim that it is syntactic). Though Japanese V-V compounds have been studied extensively, a principled and unified account has not been proposed due to their complexities, especially one that deals with the question of how arguments of component verbs are to be synthesized into a single argument structure. The current proposal embodies the notion of THEMATIC PROTO-ROLE and devises semantically driven argument matching giving rise to an argument structure of a V-V compound as a whole. In such a process, syntactic apparatuses or grammatical relations per se play no central role.