Presents a novel formalism for representing the notion of approximation to the truth, and analyzes the meanings of these expressions in terms of this formalism. Pragmatic looseness of this kind should be distinguished from authentic truth-conditional vagueness. (Author/VWL)

Argues that there is a large class of expressions, typified by "plastic flower," stuffed animal," and "kosher bacon," that have a unique semantics combining compositional, idiomatic, and decompositional interpretation. (Author/VWL)

The lexical semantic structures of change-of-state verbs are explored by linguistic theory, corpus analysis, and psycholinguistic experimentation. Data support the idea that these verbs can be divided into two classes, those for which change of state is internally caused and those for which it is externally caused. (Author/VWL)

Introduces selected concepts from the Space Grammar theory of linguistic structure. It is argued that the form of the auxiliary, apart from certain morphological adjustments, reflects each step of the conceptual path leading from the speaker to the objective situation described by the main verb. (Author/EJS)

The principal nominal deictic affixes of Bella Coola, a Salishan language of British Columbia, are examined. (Author/RM)

Using data from Japanese, this article shows that the distinction between unergatives and unaccusatives is fully determined on the basis of the verb's inherent lexical meanings. (55 references) (Author/CK)

Presents an integrated theory of the syntactic and semantic representation of complements where the unexpressed subjects of the embedded verb-phrase complement are subject to certain interpretation restrictions. It is argued that the grammar of English controlled complements can be derived from the interaction of semantically based principles of…

Discusses the characterization of the meaning of the Russian perfective-imperfective opposition and concludes that these characterizations fail. The article maintains that aspects are temporal relations between the time at which some situation obtains and the time for which an assertion is made by the utterance that describes the situation. (33…

Polar interrogative sentences differ from declarative sentences in terms of illocutionary forces and the linguistic analysis of their meaning. It is possible to isolate small numbers of syntactic and semantic categories and an unlimited number of illocutionary forces resulting from their interaction with the total situation. (CK)

The analysis presented here comprises a series of morphophonological rules (nasalization, assimilation, degemination) and a proposal for the way in which "in-" is incorporated in the lexicon. (Author/RM)

Introduces the theory that the conversational historical present (CHP) in itself has no significance. It is the switching between CHP and the past tenses that is the relevant feature. (Author/CFM)

Proposes to model the synchronic and diachronic semantics of the diminutive category with a "Radial Category," a type of structured polysemy that explicitly models the different senses of the diminutive and the metaphorical and inferential relations that bind them. The model is tested by considering the semantics of the diminutive in…

Reports on a study of the native lexicon of two genetically unrelated languages: Kambera and Dutch. Focuses on the expressive elements. (Author/VWL)