The Grammatical Relevance Of Thematic Roles PDF Download

Are you looking for read ebook online? Search for your book and save it on your Kindle device, PC, phones or tablets. Download The Grammatical Relevance Of Thematic Roles PDF full book. Access full book title The Grammatical Relevance Of Thematic Roles.

The grammatical relevance of thematic roles

The grammatical relevance of thematic roles
Author: Dorothea Kallfass
Publisher: GRIN Verlag
Total Pages: 27
Release: 2007-01-15
Genre: Literary Collections
ISBN: 3638592324

Download The grammatical relevance of thematic roles Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle

Seminar paper from the year 2004 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies - Linguistics, grade: 1,7, Humboldt-University of Berlin, course: Ergativity: A Comparative Perspective, language: English, abstract: Thematic roles are a linguistic phenomenon describing the more specific relations between a predicate and its respective arguments. This is especially important in the field of language acquisition, or, more generally stated, for the process of understanding. A discussion of thematic roles is closely linked to one of the most complex questions ever: what is meaning? Thematic roles are a linguistic approach to this question which is characterized by its comparative simplicity. Still, it is a complex theory. It ist acknowledged that if you know the grammar of a language you really know this language. Since grammar takes a closer look at units of speech such as sentences, and smaller chunks of sentences, one has to come up with some strategies for interpreting these chunks and the sort of relation they have with each other in order to know grammar. Theta theory is one of these strategies, focusing on "who does what to whom in a clause". In short: a predicate is able to assign certain thematic roles to its respective arguments - we say that predicates have a thematic structure. The part of grammar whicht regulates the assignment of these roles is called theta theory. As an issue of linguistic interest, thematic roles have gained importance during the last two decades. Theta theory as part of the Government and Binding Theory will be discussed in the following chapters. First, the theory has to be localized in the field of grammar. Then, there follows a brief introduction to Noam Chomsky's current theory of principles and parameters. After these introductory sections the main issues will be addressed, for example the grammatical relevance of thematic roles, and also the question as to which extent theta marking is grammatically realized.


Thematic Relations

Thematic Relations
Author: Wendy Wilkins
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 322
Release: 2020-01-13
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9004373217

Download Thematic Relations Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle

Thematic Relations provides information pertinent to thematic relations, which focus both on what sematic roles are expressible in the grammar and how these roles come to be associated with noun phrases. This book presents the interaction of components of the language faculty and other aspects of cognition. Organized into 13 chapters, this volume begins with an overview of the semantic relations involved in verb-argument structure. This text then examines the predicate-argument representations, which have come to figure prominently in all current generative theories of syntax. Other chapters consider the generalizations about thematic relations that are most insightfully captured at the level of syntax of at the level of semantics. This book discusses as well the importance of thematic roles to the grammar. The final chapter deals with the central role of thematic roles in language comprehension. This book is a valuable resource for linguists, syntacticians, and semanticists with an active involvement in research on natural language.


Ten Lectures on Event Structure in a Network Theory of Language

Ten Lectures on Event Structure in a Network Theory of Language
Author: Nikolas Gisborne
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 319
Release: 2020-08-31
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9004375295

Download Ten Lectures on Event Structure in a Network Theory of Language Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle

In Ten Lectures on Event Structure in a Network Theory of Language, Nikolas Gisborne offers an account of verb meaning from the perspective of a model that treats language structure as part of the wider cognitive network.


Thematic Relations

Thematic Relations
Author: Mário A. Perini
Publisher: Springer Nature
Total Pages: 245
Release: 2019-10-23
Genre: Psychology
ISBN: 3030285383

Download Thematic Relations Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle

This book presents a proposal to better define thematic relations by exploring the relation between language and cognition. It analyzes the relation between grammatically defined roles such as agent and patient (semantic roles), and elaborate thematic relations (ETRs) actually accessible to language users. It shows that many phenomena previously analyzed as grammatical can be described in a more simple and convenient way by postulating direct connection between syntactic complements and cognitive relations present in the schema evoked by the verb. The volume focuses on a topic which has been the object of much discussion in the recent literature, namely the definition and delimitation of semantic roles, proposing new solutions to some important theoretical and practical problems in the description of the lexicogrammatical structure of languages, and in particular of verb valency. It shows that in many cases a direct relation can be established between morphosyntactic units and functions, on one hand, and ETRs, on the other, without the intermediation of grammatically defined semantic roles. This makes it possible to analyze thematic relations that have been traditionally problematic, such as the patient, in a linguistically simple and cognitively well-motivated way. Thematic Relations – A Study in the Grammar-Cognition Interface will be a useful resource for practicing linguists working on the analysis of natural languages, in particular on verb valency; verb subcategorization and thematic structure; semantic (thematic) roles, their definition and syntactic coding; the relation between grammatical structure and cognitive schemata (frames); and the structure of the lexicon.


Cases and Thematic Roles

Cases and Thematic Roles
Author: Beatrice Primus
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter
Total Pages: 301
Release: 2010-09-03
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 3110912465

Download Cases and Thematic Roles Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle

This book is concerned with the mapping of thematic roles, such as agent and patient, onto syntactic cases, such as nominative or ergative, or onto structural relations. It shows that cases and structural relations code different aspects of thematic structure. The thematic determination of the structural relation of an argument is confined to its position in the thematic structure of the predicate. Case mapping is determined by the number of basic thematic concepts involved in this structure. This fact and other facts presented in the book presuppose an approach to thematic roles that decomposes them into more basic concepts involving volitionality, causation, activity, sentience, possession, etc., and motivate the hypothesis that syntactic cases cannot be derived from structural relations in universal grammar. The phenomena pertaining to relational typology that classifies languages into ergative, accusative and active languages are shown to be restricted to case mapping. The specific thematic determination of case mapping and the hierarchical organization of case systems explain not only the existence of these types of mapping, but also the fact that ergative and active phenomena are typically case-based. The book provides a global cross-linguistic perspective, but German data recurrently serve as an illustration of the main theoretical assumptions.


The Structure of Modern English

The Structure of Modern English
Author: Laurel J. Brinton
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
Total Pages: 357
Release: 2000-01-01
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9027225672

Download The Structure of Modern English Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle

This text is designed for undergraduate and graduate students interested in contemporary English, especially those whose primary area of interest is English as a second language. Focus is placed exclusively on English data, providing an empirical explication of the structure of the language.


Thematic Structure

Thematic Structure
Author: Iggy M. Roca
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter
Total Pages: 345
Release: 2012-01-19
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 3110872617

Download Thematic Structure Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle


Advances in Role and Reference Grammar

Advances in Role and Reference Grammar
Author: Robert D. Van Valin, Jr.
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
Total Pages: 583
Release: 1992-01-01
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9027277516

Download Advances in Role and Reference Grammar Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle

This volume presents research on major issues in syntactic theory within Role and Reference Grammar. This theory was first presented in detail in Functional Syntax and Universal Grammar [FSUG], and these papers represent both expansions and applications of the theory to a wide range of phenomena. The first section contains an introduction to the theory which is the most thorough statement of it since FSUG, summarizing the features of Role and Reference Grammar established there and developing new theoretical components and analyses of syntactic phenomena not discussed in the earlier work. Throughout the discussion features of RRG are compared and contrasted with comparable features of other syntactic theories. The remainder of the volume is devoted to detailed analyses of specific problems, e.g. control, case marking, in a wide variety of languages, e.g. Mandarin Chinese, Nootka, Mparntwe Arrernte and Turkish. Thus the works presented here illustrate well the strong cross-linguistic approach to syntactic theory and description in Role and Reference Grammar.


Grammatical Relations, Thematic Roles and Verb Semantics

Grammatical Relations, Thematic Roles and Verb Semantics
Author: Antonio Sanfilippo
Publisher:
Total Pages: 347
Release: 1990
Genre: Grammar, Comparative and general
ISBN:

Download Grammatical Relations, Thematic Roles and Verb Semantics Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle

Grammatical relations have always constituted a primary focus of attention in the study of language. Within the last three decades, the topicality of this trend has increasingly been determined by the quest for a universal characterization of the language faculty which has shaped the goals and directives of most current works in theoretical linguistics. Although the realization patterns and syntactic functionality of grammatical relations are subject to cross-linguistic variation, studies in comparative grammar have provided suggestive evidence that the range of variation found can often be contained within the limits fixed by a discrete set of parameters. The investigation of these parameters has broached the possibility of a universal specification of the nature of grammatical relations. This thesis proposes that such a specification should be achieved by establishing regularities in the syntax-semantics interface within a constraint-based approach to linguistic analysis that integrates a precise computational interpretation. In keeping with this objective, a unification-based categorial grammar framework is developed which incorporates the semantic insights of a Neo-Davidsonian approach to verb semantics and predicate-argument combination, where thematic roles are defined as clusters of entailments of verb meanings. This framework is extended with an integrated approach to argument selection and selection change. Properties of the resulting system are demonstrated with respect to a variety of natural language phenomena concerning grammatical function changing, unaccusativity and clitic dislocation.


Case, Semantic Roles, and Grammatical Relations

Case, Semantic Roles, and Grammatical Relations
Author: Petra Campe
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
Total Pages: 655
Release: 1994-07-01
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 9027282048

Download Case, Semantic Roles, and Grammatical Relations Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle

This is the first of a series of 6 books dealing with case phenomena in different languages, both Indo- and non-Indo-European, resulting from work by a team of 20 specialists at the University of Leuven. It is the first time such a large-scale investigation into case has been undertaken, and a remarkable feature of the project is the use of computer corpora of authentic material. This bibliography presents the many dimensions involved in research into case and case-related phenomena. This includes not only morphological case markers, but also the crossconstituent (semantic and grammatical) relations expressed by morphological case or by its various counterparts; morpho-syntactic processes such as transitivity and passivization; and pragmatic and textual considerations. In addition, the bibliography reflects the implications of case research for other disciplines, such as foreign language teaching and artificial intelligence. More than 6000 publications are listed. An extensive Subject Index provides easy access to all the topics and major concepts covered. A Language Index and a Guide to Languages/Language Families conclude the book. The other volumes in the series include The Dative (2 vols), The Genitive, The Nominative and Accusative, and Non-nuclear Cases.