Books

This book explores the interaction of the grammar with the external systems, conceptual-intentional and sensori-motor. The papers in the Language section include configurational analyses of the interface properties of depictives, clitic clusters, imperatives, conditionals, clefts, as well as asymmetries in the structure of syllables and feet. The Brain section discusses questions related to human learning and comprehension of language: the acquisition of compounds, the acquisition of the definite article, the subject/object asymmetry in the comprehension of D-Linked vs. non D-linked questions, the evidence for syntactic asymmetries in American Sign Language, the acquisition of syllable types, and the role of stress shift in the determination of phrase ending. The papers in the Computation section present different perspectives on how the properties of UG can be implemented in a parser; implementations of different theories including configurational selection, incorporation, and minimalism; and the role of statistical and quantitative approaches in natural language processing.

Umbrüche ist keine lückenlose Darstellung aller Wendepunkte in der Philosophiegeschichte, sondern eine Sammlung von Beiträgen, die sowohl bekannte Neuanfänge als auch bislang wenig beachtete Denkbewegungen analysieren ­ bis hin zu Auseinandersetzungen mit Anregungen, die für sich selbst genommen Umbrüche bedeuten, als solche jedoch nicht historisch wirksam werden konnten. Folgende Autoren bzw. Themen werden berücksichtigt: die Sprach- und Erkenntnistheorie Platons, Naturphilosophie und Philosophiekritik bei Augustin, Meister Eckharts Predigt 21, wissenschaftstheoretische und ontologische Neuansätze bei Adam de Wodeham, Hervaeus Natalis und Wilhelm von Ockham, atheistische Tendenzen im 14. Jahrhundert, Niccolò Machiavellis politische Philosophie, philosophiehistorische Überlegungen zum Epochenbegriff, Kants kritische Transzendentalphilosophie und ihre Wende bei Fichte, die Bedeutung der Französischen Revolution für den Freiheitsbegriff Fichtes, die Vollendung des Anselmianischen Arguments durch Schellings Begriff des Überseienden, die Sprachphilosophie W. von Humboldts sowie die Dionysius-Pseudo-Areopagita-Rezeption bei Hugo Ball.

Beiträgen von: Burkhard Mojsisch; Arne Malmsheimer; Udo Reinhold Jeck; Franz-Bernhard Stammkötter; Jens Maassen; Christian Rode; Martin Lenz; Olaf Pluta; Bernhard Milz; Christiane Schultz; Christoph Asmuth; Annette Sell; Orrin F. Summerell; Klaus Kahnert; Matthias Bloch.The volume Umbrüche ­ the German word means “radical changes” ­ presents not a seamless account of the many turning points in the history of philosophy, but instead contributions individually reflecting on both well-known and little regarded crises in the development of philosophical thought, including some whose promise was never fully realized. At issue are the following authors and themes: Plato’s epistemology and theory of language, Augustine‘s philosophy of nature and his critique of philosophy, Meister Eckhart’s German sermon 21, Adam de Wodeham’s, Hervaeus Natalis’s and William of Ockham’s revolutionary theories of science and ontology; atheistic tendencies in the 14th century; Niccolò Machiavelli’s political philosophy; philosophical-historical deliberations on the concept of an ‘epoch’; Kant’s transcendental philosophy and its reception and change by Fichte; the significance of the French Revolution for Fichte’s concept of freedom; the culmination of the Anselmian argument in Schelling’s concept of what is ‘beyond being’; Wilhelm von Humboldt’s philosophy of language and Hugo Ball’s reception of Dionysius Pseudo-Areopagita.

Any informal discussion of a piece of nonsense literature produces highly varying interpretations which retain, however, a common core. It seemed, then, that nonsense would be a fertile base in the study of nonautomatic comprehension, i.e. comprehension where the word-meaning relations do not seem to be self-evident. And fertile it was! This monograph reports the results of a study into the nonautomatic functioning of the linguistic network which includes idiosyncratic as well as common, coded elements at all levels: semantic, syntactic, and phonetic as well as episodic. To carry it out, a number of adults and children were given nonsense texts to interpret. These interpretations were in turn analyzed as to the strategies applied toward the comprehension of those texts. Various examples of nonsense in mass media were also analyzed in the light of these findings.

The study of childhood deafness offers researchers many interesting insights into the role of experience and sensory inputs for the development of language and cognition. This volume provides a state of the art look at these questions and how they are being applied in the areas of clinical and educational settings. It also marks the career and contributions of one of the greatest scholars in the field of deafness: Bencie Woll. As the field of deafness goes through rapid and profound changes, we hope that this volume captures the latest perspectives regarding the impacts of these changes for our understanding of child development. The volume will be of essential interest to language development researchers as well as teachers and clinical researchers.

By combining theoretical analysis and empirical investigation, this monograph investigates the status of interfaces in Minimalist linguistic theory, second language acquisition and native language attrition. Two major questions are currently under debate: (1) what exactly makes a linguistic phenomenon an ‘interface phenomenon’, and (2) what is the specific role that the interfaces play in explaining language loss and persistent problems in second language acquisition? Answers to these questions are provided by a theoretical examination of the role that economy and computational efficiency play in recent Minimalist models of the language faculty, as well as by evidence obtained in two empirical studies examining the acquisition and attrition of two interface phenomena: Spanish subject realization and word order variation. The result is a new definition of ‘interface phenomena’ which deemphasizes syntactic complexity and focuses on the effect of interface interpretive conditions on syntactic structure. This work also shows that representational deficits cannot be ruled out in the acquisition and attrition of interface structures.

Bilingualism is a ubiquitous global phenomenon. Beyond being a language experience, bilingualism also entails a social experience, and it interacts with development and learning, with cognitive and neural consequences across the lifespan. The authors of this volume are world renowned experts across several subdisciplines including linguistics, developmental psychology, and cognitive neuroscience. They bring to light bilingualism’s cognitive, developmental, and neural consequences in children, young adults, and older adults. This book honors Ellen Bialystok, and highlights her profound impact on the field of bilingualism research as a lifelong experience. The chapters are organized into four sections: The first section explores the complexity of the bilingual experience beyond the common characterization of “speaking multiple languages.” The next section showcases Ellen Bialystok’s earlier impact on psychology and education; here the contributors answer the question “how does being bilingual shape children’s development?” The third section explores cognitive and neuroscientific theories describing how language experience modulates cognition, behavior, and brain structures and functions. The final section shifts the focus to the impact of bilingualism on healthy and abnormal aging and asks whether being bilingual can stave off the effects of dementia by conferring a “cognitive reserve.”

This book aims to help researchers and teachers interested in language processing and Processability Theory (PT) to understand this theory and its applications. PT is an influential account of second language processing which hypothesizes that, due to the architecture of language processing, learners acquire second languages in developmental stages. This book lays out PT’s predictions and research on the development of diverse target languages – particularly English and Scandinavian languages – by learners of various categories. It discusses the typological issues facing PT and its contribution to an understanding of variation and cognitive constraints on pedagogy. However, the book also raises a critical eye to the literature which, after almost twenty years of evolution, requires explanation, clarification and, in some cases, extension. Why do some phenomena belong to different stages in different languages? Why are important types of variation under-represented? Is teaching as constrained as proposed in PT?

The book analyses the differences between the mathematical interpretation and the phenomenological intuition of the continuum. The basic idea is that the continuity of the experience of space and time originates in phenomenic movement. The problem of consciousness and of the spaces of representation is related to the primary processes of perception. Conceived as an interplay between cognitive science, linguistics and philosophy, the book presents a conceptual framework based on a dynamic and experimental approach to the problem of the continuum. Besides presenting the primitives of a theory of cognitive space and time, it presents a theory of the observer, analyzing the relationship among perspective, points of view and unity of consciousness. The book's chapters deal with the dynamic elaboration and recognition of forms from the lower to the higher processes in the various perceptual fields. Experimental analysis from visual, auditory and tactile perception outline the basic structures of intentionality and its counterpart in language and gesture. (Series B)

This monograph focuses on an interesting typological property shared by four languages: the ungrammaticality of multiple wh-questions in Irish, Berber, Italian and Somali. It contains a broad discussion of data related to the grammar of wh-questions, a comparative analysis of wh-constructions in the four languages, and a theoretical account for the observed phenomenon. The analysis is based on the minimalist syntax theory as developed by Chomsky since 1995. It takes up the standard assumption that wh-phrases are typical representatives of elements bearing new information, in theoretical terms referred to as information focus. Most importantly, in the languages without multiple wh-questions the information focus is licensed in a unique syntactic position. The basic claim is that languages with unique focus are languages without multiple wh-questions. The analysis makes possible the classification of the languages without multiple wh-questions into the crosslinguistic typology of wh-constructions. Furthermore, this book is a contribution to the better understanding of information structure in natural languages, especially of focusing phenomena.