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This cutting-edge collection of articles provides the first organised reflection on the language of films and television series across British American and Italian cultures. The volume suggests new directions for research and applications and offers a variety of methodologies and perspectives on the complexities of "telecinematic" discourse – a hitherto virtually unexplored area of investigation in linguistics.

The papers share a common vision of the big and small screen: the belief that the discourses of film and television offer a re-presentation of our world. As such telecinematic texts reorganise and recreate language (together with time and space) in their own way and with respect to specific socio-cultural conventions and media logic. The volume provides a multifaceted yet coherent insight into the diegetic – as it revolves around narrative – as opposed to mimetic – as referring to other non-narrative and non-fictional genres – discourses of fictional media. The collection will be of interest to researchers tutors and students in pragmatics stylistics discourse analysis corpus linguistics communication studies and related fields.

This research monograph is an investigation of wh-movement and wh-expletive constructions in the Indic languages Kashmiri and Hindi-Urdu. It advances a novel theory of the periphery or the clausal positions that mediate A-bar movement. In particular a detailed study of wh-expletives and wh-expletive constructions reveals an underlying similarity of design between the A and A-bar systems and indicates that the two can be understood as driven by the same basic set of mechanisms. The monograph offers an account of wh-movement and the clausal periphery in the two languages informed by the latest strands of research on the syntax and semantics of A-bar movement. This micro-comparative analytical method yields an important result: we can understand a set of systematic contrasts between the two languages in terms of the properties of specifically the phase-defining heads C and v. Empirically this work explores the lesser-studied language Kashmiri bringing to the fore linguistic data not yet discussed in formal syntactic literature. The significance of these data for the development of the wider theoretical framework is stressed throughout making the book of substantial interest for general linguistic research.

Cognitive science is the interdisciplinary study of the human mind. As far as the exact relationship between the cognitive sciences and other fields is concerned however it appears that interdisciplinary exchange often remains unrealized possibly because of the uni-directional application of theories concepts and methods which impedes the productive transfer of knowledge in both directions. In the course of the ‘cognitive turn’ in the humanities and social sciences many disciplines have selectively borrowed ideas from ‘core cognitive sciences’ like psychology and artificial intelligence. The day-to-day practice of interdisciplinarity thus thrives on one-directional borrowings. Focusing on cognitive approaches in linguistics and literary studies this volume explores bi-directionality a genuine transdisciplinary interchange in which both disciplines are borrowing and lending. The contributions take different perspectives on bi-directionality: some extend uni-directional borrowing practices and point to avenues and crossroads while others critically discuss obstacles challenges and limitations to bi-directional transfer.

This edited volume brings together a range of contributions solely on the linguistics of humour. Rather than favour one approach this collection of articles gives a state-of-the-art picture of current directions in pragmatic humour studies. The contributors assume multifarious theoretical perspectives and discuss a wide array of issues germane to different types of humour across discourse domains. Consequently the whole gamut of humorous forms and mechanisms are elucidated such as surrealist irony incongruity in register humour mechanisms of pun formation as well as interpersonal functions of conversational humour. In addition the papers address diversified manifestations of humour such as puns in Shakespeare’s plays gendered jokes on the Internet sexuality in anti-proverbs Woody Allen’s prose humour in “Friends” and parody by Monty Python’s Flying Circus. Most importantly the chapters offer new research findings and advocate novel theoretical conceptualisations of humorous phenomena drawing on the wealth of existing scholarship. Therefore the volume is bound to serve as a well of knowledge and inspiration for both seasoned and beginning researchers with interests in the pragmatics of humour.

This is the first book devoted entirely to the history of compound words in Spanish. Based on data obtained from Spanish dictionaries and databases of the past thousand years it documents the evolution of the major compounding patterns of the language. It analyzes the structural semantic and orthographic features of each compound type and also provides a description of its Latin antecedents early attestations and relative frequency and productivity over the centuries. The combination of qualitative and quantitative data shows that although most compound types have survived they have undergone changes in word order and relative frequency. Moreover the book shows that the evolution of compounding in Spanish may be accounted for by processes of language acquisition in children. This book which includes all the data in chronological and alphabetical order will be a valuable resource for morphologists Romance linguists and historical linguists more generally.

What do the pointing gesture the imitation of new complex motor patterns the evocation of absent objects and the grasping of others’ false beliefs all have in common? Apart from being (one way or other) involved in the language they all would share a demanding requirement – a second mental centre within the subject. This redefinition of the simulationism is extended in the present book in two directions. Firstly mirror-neurons and likewise animal abilities connected with the visual field of their fellows although they certainly constitute important landmarks would not require this second mental centre. Secondly others’ beliefs would have given rise not only to predicative communicative function but also to pre-grammatical syntax. The inquiry about the evolutionary-historic origin of language focuses on the cognitive requirements on it as a faculty (but not to the indirect causes such as environmental changes or greater co-operation) pays attention to children and covers other human peculiarities as well e.g. symbolic play protodeclaratives self-conscious emotions and interactional or four-hand tasks.

Gestures are ubiquitous and natural in our everyday life. They convey information about culture discourse thought intentionality emotion intersubjectivity cognition and first and second language acquisition. Additionally they are used by non-human primates to communicate with their peers and with humans. Consequently the modern field of gesture studies has attracted researchers from a number of different disciplines such as anthropology cognitive science communication neuroscience psycholinguistics primatology psychology robotics sociology and semiotics. This volume presents an overview of the depth and breadth of current research in gesture. Its focus is on the interdisciplinary nature of gesture. The twenty-six chapters included in the volume are divided into six sections or themes: the nature and functions of gesture first language development and gesture second language effects on gesture gesture in the classroom and in problem solving gesture aspects of discourse and interaction and gestural analysis of music and dance.

As of March 2017 this e-book is freely available thanks to the support of libraries working with Knowledge Unlatched. It is licensed under a Creative Commons CC BY-NC-ND license.

Research on nominalization a process that gives rise to referring expressions has always played a central role in linguistic investigations. Over the years there has also been growing evidence that nominalization constructions often extend to non-referential domains. They participate in noun-modifying expressions (e.g. genitive and relative clauses) subordinate clauses and topic constructions finite structures with the nominalizers reanalyzed as TAM markers and stance constructions with evaluative attitudinal evidential and epistemic overtones. This volume brings together historical and crosslinguistic evidence from more than 20 different languages representing six different language families spanning the Asian continent and the Pacific and Indian oceans to elucidate the strategies and grammaticalization pathways that give rise to both referential and non-referential uses of nominalization constructions. This collection highlights the diversity of strategies and at the same time the robust cyclical nature of change within and across languages. The combined diachronic and typological analyses in this volume are particularly valuable for linguistic research on diachronic morphosyntax and linguistic ‘universals’ and are also an important supplementary cross-referencing tool for linguistic investigations of versatile and ubiquitous morphemes in under-documented languages.

While cognitive linguists are essentially in agreement on both the conceptual nature and the fundamental importance of metonymy there remain disagreements on a number of specific but nevertheless crucial issues. Research questions include: Is metonymy a relationship between “entities” or “domains”? Is it necessarily referential? What is meant by the claim that metonymy is a “stand-for” relationship? Can metonymy be considered a mapping? How can it be distinguished from “active zones” or “facets”? Is it a prototype category? The ten contributions of the present volume address such core issues on the basis of the latest research results. The volume is unique in being devoted exclusively to the delimitation of the notion of metonymy without ignoring points of divergence among the various contributors thus paving the way towards a consensual conception of metonymy.

The ten volumes of Handbook of Pragmatics Highlights focus on the most salient topics in the field of pragmatics thus dividing its wide interdisciplinary spectrum in a transparent and manageable way. While the other volumes select specific philosophical cognitive grammatical social cultural variational or interactional angles this 8^th volume focuses on theories and phenomena at the level of discourse but leaving aside conversational interaction. It provides the reader with pragmatics-oriented information on discourse analysis critical discourse analysis and critical linguistics as well as text linguistics and appraisal theory while introducing other specific approaches to discourse through concepts such as polyphony intertextuality genre and énonciation. Furthermore topics such as public discourse narrative figures of speech cohesion and coherence pragmatic markers manipulation and humor are all dealt with in separate chapters. The binding idea explained in the introduction is that ´discursive pragmatics´ may serve as a platform for a diversity of perspectives on discourse as they have emerged not only in the language sciences but also in the humanities and social sciences in general.