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)

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…

English has two classes of modal deference expressions that may be superordinate to performative verbs. Verbs representing the illocutionary force of a sentence are sometimes embedded in modal constructions whose function is auxiliary to the central illocutionary act. This phenomenon is discussed in this paper. (CK)

Shows that evidence exists for a rule of neg-raising in French. Neg-raising and its domain are then reconsidered from a functional perspective, whereby the transformation is shown to be hedging device. (Author/RM)

Work supported by a grant from the National Science Foundation to Harvard University and by the Language Research Foundation. Considers the properties and use of the word even'' in English. (VM)

Preliminary version of this paper was given at the 1968 winter meeting of the Linguistic Society of America, New York City, based upon work supported by the Office of Education as a Cooperative Research Project. (VM)

Describes the longitudinal emergence of verb inflections as observed in the speech of four American English-speaking children emphasizing occurrence of inflections, their linguistic/non-linguistic contexts, and their conditional use. Discusses results in terms of sentence relations between verbs and other constituents and the semantics of verb…