Addresses the argument that access to Universal Grammar in second-language acquisition implies an asymmetrical knowledge of ungrammaticality. The author attempts to prove that the asymmetry position is conceptually defective and that the evidence for it is inconclusive, inappropriate, and contradicted by other data. (12 references) (Author/CK)

The nature of grammatical relations such as subject and object are examined. The ways in which subjects differ from language to language are described and the way in which a language can do without a subject relation is revealed. Three primitive functional properties of sentences which underlie the syntactic relations of subject and topic are…

Provides a critical review of the syntactic study of code mixing, discussing data drawn from African and South Asian languages, and focuses particular attention on the syntactic constraints paradigm. An examination of seven major surface constraints, deemed to have universal applicability, shows that none of these constraints is universal. (53…

Analyzes the rhetorical functions carried out by the selection of voice--active, passive, or "se"-passive--in biological research articles in Spanish. The author compares these rhetorical functions with those found in French and English scientific papers and on the basis of this comparison, suggests the existence of some universals. (18…

Proposes six related cognitive statuses relevant for explicating the use of referring expressions in natural language discourse. A study of the distribution of referring expressions in naturally occurring discourse in English, Japanese, Mandarin Chinese, Russian, and Spanish is offered as support for the proposal. (Contains 91 references.) (Author)

Error analysis of the informal conversations (in both the interlanguage [IL] and native language) of two native Vietnamese speakers gave limited support to the hypothesis that a universal preference for the open syllable is a shaping force in IL phonology that is independent of the process of native language transfer. (Author/CB)

Eighteen experimental corpora of spontaneous speech in five languages (English, Finnish, French, German, and Spanish) were examined under hypothesis that they are characterized by commonalities in use of time. Each study, based on story telling elicited by pictures, confirmed hypothesis. In addition, further support for hypothesis was found by…

Examines the use and function of Chinese discourse particles in informal speech in Singaporean English, comparing the intonation and pitch movement of native varieties of English to Singaporean English. (Author/OD)

The present research investigated whether children's referential choices for verb arguments are motivated by pragmatic features of discourse referents across different developmental stages, not only for children learning null argument languages but also for those learning overt argument languages. In Study 1, the form (null, pronominal, or…

Every sentence conveys a temporal point of view through its aspectual meaning. This viewpoint arises through presenting a situation from a certain temporal perspective and indirectly classifying the situation as an exemplar of an idealized situation type. The information is conveyed by the aspectual categories of a language. This paper presents a…

Suggests that cognitive semantics is governed by principles similar to prosodies in phonology. Illustrates this claim by words referring to negative states, events, and properties in English and in Polish, arguing that they carry 'negative prosodies' that spread over other lexical items. It is suggested that the semantic prosodies of some triggers…

Investigation of use of stative, process, punctual, and non-punctual verbs by a child acquiring Japanese as a first language found that sampled present progressive verb forms occurred with process verbs while these forms were never used with stative verbs. Most omissions of present progressive forms occurred with the early use of "mixed"…

Analysis of negative utterances from English-, French-, and Korean-speaking one- through three-year-olds identified nine distinct semantic/pragmatic categories with a similar developmental order in all three languages. Different patterns were found in the form-function relationship for the different categories. (Author/CB)

The source of syntactic ambiguity and facts concerning the resolution of such ambiguity are discussed in this paper. The attitude of qenerative linguists towards ambiguity is examined, and a working distinction is drawn between vaqueness and ambiguity. The consequences of this distinction are then examined for syntactic ambiguity and an ordering…

Four conference papers on discourse are included. In "How Context Contributes to the Interpretation of Temporal Expressions," Carlota S. Smith provides a summary analysis of the temporal interpretation of English sentences. Many sentences are shown to be semantically incomplete; it is argued that information from neighboring sentences is…