Bilingual Selection of Syntactic Knowledge PDF Download

Author: Teresa Satterfield
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 1461552591
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 167

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Book Description
Bilingual Selection of Syntactic Knowledge motivates a more formal approach in theoretical linguistics by investigating the parameters of syntactic variation and simultaneous acquisition of multiple languages. Taking the behavior of the Null Subject Parameter (NSP) across languages as an illustration, the book raises important questions concerning the adequacy of standard parameter-setting models in the face of compelling evidence from both mono- and bilingual child speech data. Teresa Satterfield argues convincingly that so-called `universal' premises guiding well-known parametric approaches greatly complicate attempts to construct an economical bilingual analysis. Further, she demonstrates the compatibility of more recent formulations in linguistic theory (i.e. the Minimalist Program) and studies on language learnability (Clark, 1992, 1993; Kapur, 1994) which present the view that while initially convincing, standard parameter models are potentially costly and less than effective in terms of monolinguals as well. Using Clark's application of the Genetic Algorithm as a point of departure, Bilingual Selection of Syntactic Knowledge describes a number of computational simulations. These simulations not only demonstrate the robustness of the GA-as-language-learner, they offer a more detailed account of the parameter-setting task confronting the bilingual child while also making more precise predictions regarding the process of syntactic knowledge.

Author: Robert C. Berwick
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 9780262022262
Category : Computers
Languages : en
Pages : 396

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Book Description
The computer model. Computation and language acquisition. The acquisition model. Learning phrase structure. Learning transformations. A theory of acquisition. Acquisition complexity. Learning theory: applications. Locality principles and acquisition.

Author: Regine Eckardt
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter
ISBN: 3110205394
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 417

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Book Description
Can language change be modelled as an evolutionary process? Can notions like variation, selection and competition be fruitfully applied to facts of language development? The present volume ties together various strands of linguistic research which can bring us towards an answer to these questions. In one of the youngest and rapidly growing areas of linguistic research, mathematical models and simulations of competition based developments have been applied to instances of language change. By matching the predicted and observed developmental trends, researchers gauge existing models to the needs of linguistic applications and evaluate the fruitfulness of evolutionary models in linguistics. The present volume confronts these studies with more empirically-based studies in creolization and historical language change which bear on key concepts of evolutionary models. What does it mean for a linguistic construction to survive its competitors? How do the interacting factors in phases of creolization differ from those in ordinary language change, and how - consequently - might Creole languages differ structurally from older languages? Some of the authors, finally, also address the question how different aspects of our linguistic competence tie in with our more elementary cognitive capacities. The volume contains contributions by Brady Clark et al., Elly van Gelderen, Alain Kihm, Manfred Krifka, Wouter Kusters, Robert van Rooij, Anette Rosenbach, John McWhorter, Teresa Satterfield, Michael Tomasello and Elizabeth C. Traugott. The book brings together contributions from two areas of research: the study of language evolution by means of methods from artifical intelligence/artificial life (like computer simulations and analytic mathematical methods) on the one hand, and empirically oriented research from historical linguistics and creolisation studies that uses concepts from evolutionary theory as a heuristic tool in a qualitative way. The book is thus interesting for readers from both traditions because it supplies them with information about relevant ongoing research and useful methods and data from the other camp.

Author: Yan-kit Ingrid Leung
Publisher: Multilingual Matters
ISBN: 1847691315
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 238

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Book Description
This volume presents studies which approach the relatively new field of third language (L3) acquisition from the generative linguistic perspective. It aims to bring together researchers who are interested in L3 acquisition and who are at the same time working within the generative framework i.e. Chomsky's Universal Grammar (UG) approach to language acquisition. A total of nine contributions are included, reporting research on L3 involving different combinations of source/target languages and investigating various UG-related properties.

Author: Carolyn Kessler
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 134

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Book Description

Author: Vivian Cook
Publisher: Multilingual Matters
ISBN: 1847699588
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 280

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Book Description
This book looks at changes in the first language of people who know a second language, thus seeing L2 users as people in their own right differing from the monolingual in both first and second languages. It presents theories and research that investigate the first language of second language users from a variety of perspectives including vocabulary, pragmatics, cognition, and syntax and using a variety of linguistic and psychological models.

Author: Vivian Cook
Publisher: Multilingual Matters
ISBN: 1853595845
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 356

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Book Description
Portraits of the L2 User treats second language users in their own right rather than as failed native speakers. It describes a range of psychological and linguistic approaches to diverse topics about L2 users. It thus provides an innovative overview of current second language acquisition theories, results and methods, seen from a common perspective.

Author: Timothy Gupton
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing Company
ISBN: 9027259925
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 227

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Book Description
This book is a collection of contemporary essays and squibs exploring the mental representation of Spanish and other languages in the Romance family. Although largely formal in orientation, they incorporate experimental and corpus data to inform questions of synchronic and diachronic importance. As a whole, these contributions explore two areas of particular interest to linguistic theorizing. The first is linguistic interfaces with chapters on syntax-information structure, syntax-prosody, syntax-semantics, and lexicon-phonology. The second consists of explorations of noun phrases of all sizes—from clitics to nominalized clauses. The results and conclusions of these studies encourage researchers to continue to explore individual languages in particular in order to gain insight on human language in general. This edited volume in honor of Dr. Paula Kempchinsky is reflective of the diversity of approaches that inspired her teaching, research, and mentoring for over thirty years at the University of Iowa and beyond.

Author: Marie-Hélène Côté
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing Company
ISBN: 9027269165
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 426

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Book Description
This volume is a selection of twenty peer-reviewed articles first presented at the 41st annual Linguistic Symposium on Romance Languages (LSRL), held at the University of Ottawa in 2011. They are thematically linked by a broad notion of variation across languages, dialects, speakers, time, linguistic contexts, and communicative situations. Furthermore, the articles address common theoretical and empirical issues from different formal, experimental, or corpus-based perspectives. The languages analyzed belong to the main members of the Romance family, Spanish, Portuguese, Catalan, French, Ladin, Italian, Sardinian, and Romanian, and a variety of topics across a wide spectrum of linguistic subfields, from phonetics to semantics, as well as historical linguistics, bilingualism and second-language learning, is covered. By illustrating the richness and complementarity of subjects, methods, and theoretical frameworks explored within Romance linguistics, significant contributieons are made to both the documentation of Romance languages and to linguistic theory.

Author: Barbara Köpke
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
ISBN: 9789027241443
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 272

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Book Description
This collection of articles provides theoretical foundations and perspectives for language attrition research. Its purpose is to enable investigations of L1 attrition to avail themselves more fully and more fundamentally of the theoretical frameworks that have been formulated with respect to SLA and bilingualism. In the thirteen papers collected here, experts in particular disciplines of bilingualism, such as neurolinguistics, formal linguistics, contact linguistics and language and identity, provide an in-depth perspective on L1 attrition which will make the translation of theory to hypothesis easier for future research.