It is a well-known fact that the verb dare can be used with either modal or main verb characteristics both in its inflection and in its syntax. When used as a modal, it drops the -s ending in the third person singular present indicative (She dare not mention it in his presence), has no imperative, infinitive or participial forms, takes direct negation by not, AUX-inverts in questions (Dare I ask you another question?) and is followed by the bare infinitive. In main verb use, on the other hand, it has all the normal forms of the verb, occurs with do auxiliary in negatives and interrogatives, and is construed with the to infinitive (She doesn’t dare to mention it in his presence).

Some researchers have suggested that young children choose to say mainly words containing sounds they can produce and avoid words with sounds they find difficult to produce. This proposed pattern of ‘selection’ supports a hypothesis of dominance of phonological factors in words children choose to say. Based on longitudinal spontaneous data samples during their first 50 word period, word-based tokens produced by two English and two French monolingual children were analyzed. Token frequencies in spontaneously produced word targets (SW-T) were compared to children's actual productions (SW-A) of those target words to understand relationships between targets children choose to say and their patterns in actual productions, (i.e., to evaluate the presence of ‘selection’). Place of articulation (i.e., labial, coronal and dorsal) in initial word position within CV, CVC, and CVCV word forms was compared. Analysis of spontaneous output in daily interactions in children learning two languages with differing phonological systems enables a more general evaluation of issues related to the interface of phonological and lexical aspects during the earliest period of language acquisition.

This article aims to test whether the Theta System of Reinhart (1996, 2000, 2001, 2002) can account for the puzzles associated with psychological verbs in Polish. The first puzzle, called argument linking, relates to the mapping of the Experiencer onto a subject or an object position. The second puzzle, referred to as case linking, concerns the fact that Experiencers may be marked for different cases in the same sentence position. The analysis of Object Experiencer (OE)/Subject Experiencer (SE) alternations in Polish carried out in this article demonstrates that the predictions of the Theta System about Experiencer argument linking are borne out by the Polish data. SE alternants of eventive OE verbs in Polish show unergative properties, which directly follows from the mechanisms of the Theta System. However, the Theta System faces problems when confronted with dyadic OE verbs with dative Experiencers. The model predicts that dative Experiencers are merged internally, as a part of an unaccusative structure. This prediction is untenable for Polish, because dative Experiencers of dyadic predicates show some characteristics of external arguments, and hence must merge externally. Consequently, the conclusion drawn is that the Theta System can provide solutions to some, but not all, of the argument and case-linking puzzles associated with Polish Experiencers.

The Last twenty years of claims, counter-claims, and confusion in linguistic and psycholinguistic theory, and the accompanying proliferation of experimental literature without clear growth of knowledge has, if nothing else, demonstrated how remarkably little we can agree upon about language. We don’t seem able to decide on what it is, or where it is (‘out there’ or solely in the mind), let alone why it is. But, at least, our recent experiences have taught us something. We have learned a great deal about how not to proceed; and that, without cynicism, is a very important beginning.

Blackfoot verbs are marked with nominal agreement morphology in relative clauses, in place of verbal inflection. These relative clauses have previously been analyzed as nominalizations. The present study shows that a nominalization analysis makes incorrect predictions about the morphological composition of relative clauses, as well as the availability of non-agentive and possessive constructions, and adjectival modification. This study demonstrates that relative clauses can relativize subjects, direct objects, and indirect objects. Based on observations about obviation, recursion, long-distance extraction, inflection, and word order, I propose that relative clauses are participles: clausal entities with a nominal superstructure. This accounts for their mixed clausal and nominal properties, and provides an analysis of Blackfoot relative clauses similar to those proposed for related Algonquian languages.

A number of interesting syntactic processes in a variety of Micronesian languages arose in response to a restructuring of Proto-Micronesian verbal morphology, the restructuring itself triggered by purely phonological changes. This article provides an account of these changes, revealing at the same time aspects of Proto-Micronesian clause structure which have not previously been noted.

This article explores event nominals in Mēbengokre, a Jê language spoken in the eastern Amazon region in Brazil. On the basis of data from this language, the article argues that event nouns are more basic than the verbs to which they are related, and develops an account of event nominals where a process of nominalization does not play a part. Though it is conceded that derivation from fully-fledged verbs to nouns and from non-eventive nouns to verbs generally exists in language, it is claimed that embedding of categories under other categories is a marked option that is only analytically justified when there is syntactic evidence of grammatical category mixing.

The Notion of persistent rule in historical phonology has been discussed by Chafe in his important asticle on the order of phonological rules (Chafe 1968). Two examples are the wellknown devoicing of final obstruants in German - a rule added to the grammar of German at a point in time in its history, and still operative so that words introduced after the adding of the rule are subject to it; and the loss of final /n/ in Livonian, so that a word like /nainen/ first becomes /naine/, then is subject to a rule that eliminates final vowels, thus becoming /nain/, which, since the n-dropping rule is still in force, becomes /nai/. Rules are said to persist when they apply either to forms resulting from rules added later than they to the grammar of the language, or to forms introduced into the language from a source other than a later rule, i.e. through borrowing.

A long-standing problem in the reconstruction of proto-Italic has been the wide discrepancy between the Oscan/Umbrian and Latin perfectum markers. Latin for the most part employs either -s- or -u-/-v- throughout its perfect system, e.g. serp-s-it ‘he crawled’ (cf. pres. serp-it), al-u-it ‘he nourished’ (cf. pres. al-it), amā-v-it ‘he loved’ (cf. pres. ama-t). On the other hand, Osean and Umbrian have apparently created a number of new perfect formations: an f-perfect, shared by both (O. aíkda-f-ed ‘he decreed’, U. ateřa-f-ust ‘he will have made the circuit’); a -tt-formative found only in Osean (dadíka-tt-ed ‘he dedicated’) and in a few of the Minor Dialects; the -l- and *-nky- types, both peculiar to Umbrian (ape-l-ust ‘he will have offered up’, purdi-nsi-ust ‘he will have offered’).

Resumptive pronouns are produced in English in unguarded speech in restrictive relative clauses and appositive relative clauses. However, numerous studies have found that resumptive pronouns in restrictive relative clauses are not acceptable. To our knowledge, no studies have examined the acceptability of resumptive pronouns in appositive relative clauses, despite hints in the literature that they may be more acceptable in appositive than in restrictive relative clauses. This article fills that gap. We found that resumptive pronouns were rated as more natural in appositive relative clauses than in restrictive relative clauses. These findings may be due to which currently undergoing a reanalysis from a relative pronoun to a solely connective word, as has been suggested in the literature. A small-scale corpus search also reveals that appositive relative clauses with resumptive pronouns are increasing in American English.

Les données présentées en (1) illustrent le cas des phrases dites “infinitives de narration”. De nombreux exemples sont attestés dans Sandfeld (1965), Le Bidois (1952), Grevisse (1961), Nyrop (1930), etc.

The object of this article is to illustrate a particular model of grammatical description by using it to describe the Terena phrase. This model can, for convenience, be given the label “structure-function.” Like any model it employs certain interrelated categories and terms which are mutually defining. Each category can only be understood in reference to the model as a whole.

This model sets up grammatical units which are hierarchically arranged. The hierarchy consists of a series of levels of description. At each level there is a grammatical unit and this grammatical unit gives its name to the level concerned. At a given level there is only one grammatical unit. Each such grammatical unit consists of one or more of the units next below it in the hierarchy.

This article attempts to reconstruct the plausible evolution of inflectional and free-standing morphemes in three historically related lusophone creoles (Cape Verdean Creole, Guinea-Bissau Creole, Papiamentu), and compares their morphological properties to Angolar, believed to have followed an independent developmental path. I examine their synchronic morphological properties and seek insights into their origins by studying Black speech in Portuguese 15th- and 16th-century literature. This reconstruction seeks to address several questions. Within the historically related creoles, is it possible to identify a set of formally and functionally common morphemes? If so, what is their source? Are they likely to have been inherited through diffusion? Are the common morphemes in the three related creoles distinct from those of Angolar or do they overlap?

What is a Canadian? Have we who call ourselves Canadians a distinctive culture, a distinctive way of life and thought? Or are we “American” or “British”? Or are we perhaps in the unhappy position of being nothing but reflections of two great, yet different, nations? These questions are exercising the minds of a great many people today, and not just within our own borders. To be sure, the historian and the geographer have their answers: the economist has his. And the ethnologist has yet another. But none of them are quite satisfactory. Perhaps the best answer will soon be provided by another scholar—the linguist. And his will embrace those of other scholars and be better than theirs because it will be based on better evidence.

A linguistic theory can be considered to have explanatory force if it may be extended to a body of facts considerably beyond the domain for which it was originally conceived. In general, the further the new domain is from the original, the greater the support that accrues to that theory. In this paper, a number of developments within current morphological and phonological theory will be utilized in the analysis of an extraordinary form of vocal behaviour, the katajjait (sg. katajjaq) or throat games of the Canadian Inuit. The result will be a revealing account of the structures of these katajjait, as well as a remarkable confirmation of principles of linguistic theory from a domain which has been hitherto unreported in the linguistic literature.