Recent developments in syntactic theory suggest that phrase structure is cross-linguistically more uniform than assumed so far, and that the order spec-head-complement may be the only permissible one. The present article takes issue with this view, showing that the derivation of final complementizers from initial ones by means of IP-raising faces serious difficulties. The discussion focuses on Bengali and similar languages which may be called ‘hybrid’ because both orders, IP-C as well as C-IP, are attested. Five arguments are raised which indicate that these orders are not derivationally connected. The discussion bears results which may also be of interest for linguistic typology, language change and acquisition.

This article challenges the commonly-held assumption that words, feet and syllables fit into a single phonological hierarchy, and in particular that feet are always sub-units of words. A number of facts of English rhythm are cited which cannot be accounted for unless words and feet are taken to be units of different hierarchies: many of the differences of rhythm between phrases of otherwise similar phonological structure which are noted by Abercrombie (1964) are accounted for most naturally by differences in placement between, on the one hand, word- and stress-group-boundaries, and, on the other, foot-boundaries.

Elements necessary for a proper interpretation of a sentence can sometimes be missing from the ‘surface’ representation involving coordination (ellipsis, gapping, etc.). Though different methods have been proposed to recover missing elements, it is not clear how such recovery can be accomplished when they correspond to bound morphemes. Assuming lexicalism, this paper shows how such missing elements are recovered semantically without employing empty place holders, abstract functional categories or invisible movement. Bound verbal morphemes in Japanese introduced here give rise to morpho-semantico bracketing paradoxes which prove to be problematic for a syntactic view of morphology.

This paper considers how the notion of phatic communication can best be understood within the framework of Relevance Theory. To a large extent, we are exploring a terminological question: which things which occur during acts of verbal communication should the term ‘phatic’ apply to? The term is perhaps most frequently used in the phrase ‘phatic communication’, which has been thought of as an essentially social phenomenon and therefore beyond the scope of cognitive pragmatic theories. We suggest, instead, that the term should be applied to interpretations and that an adequate account of phatic interpretations requires an account of the cognitive processes involved in deriving them. Relevance Theory provides the basis for such an account. In section 1, we indicate the range of phenomena to be explored. In section 2, we outline the parts of Relevance Theory which are used in our account. In section 3, we argue that the term ‘phatic’ should be applied to interpretations, and we explore predictions about phatic interpretations which follow from the framework of Relevance Theory, including the claim that phatic interpretations should be derived only when non-phatic interpretations are not consistent with the Principle of Relevance. In section 4 we consider cases where cognitive effects similar to those caused by phatic interpretations are conveyed but not ostensively communicated.

This is a response to Carston's critique of my account of presupposition-cancellation. While accepting her demonstration that (contra ‘On Horn's dilemma’) presupposition-cancellation does not involve a linguistically encoded contradiction, I show that this is nevertheless consistent with the account of presupposition proposed in Burton-Roberts 1993/7. In fact, Carston's and my accounts of presupposition-cancellation both treat it as involving a pragmatically derived contradiction. I also reconsider the nature of so-called ‘metalinguistic negation’, arguing against Carston that there is a special use of negation (!MN) which involves a use-mention mix and a pragmatically derived contradiction, and is non-truth-functional. I show that, although !MN is echoic, not all echoic negations are examples of !MN.

Metalinguistic negation (MN) is interesting for at least the following two reasons: (a) it is one instance of the much broader, very widespread and various phenomenon of metarepresentational use in linguistic communication, whose semantic and pragmatic properties are currently being extensively explored by both linguists and philosophers of language; (b) it plays a central role in recent accounts of presupposition-denial cases, such as ‘The king of France is not bald; there is no king of France’. It is this latter employment that discussion of metalinguistic negation has focused on since Horn (1985)'s key article on the subject. While Burton-Roberts (1989a, 1989b) saw the MN account of presupposition-denials as providing strong support for his semantic theory of presupposition, I have offered a multi-layered pragmatic account of these cases, which also involves MN, but maintains the view that the phenomenon of presupposition is pragmatic (Carston 1994, 1996, 1998a).

J. Abe & H. Hoshi: A generalized rightward movement analysis of antecedent contained deletion

S. Bates, J. Harris & J. Watson: Prosody and melody in vowel disorder

S. Iwata: On the status of implicit argument in middles

J. C. Moore: Judgement types and the structure of causatives

O. Orie: Syllable asymmetries in comparative Yoruba phonology

G. Ward & L. Horn: Phatic communication and pragmatic theory: a reply to Žegarac & Clark

V. Žegarac & B. Clark: Phatic communication and pragmatic theory: a reply to Ward & Horn

F. Ackerman: Review article – M. Shibatani & S. Thompson, Grammatical constructions: their form and meaning

M. Haspelmath: Are there principles of grammatical change? Review article – D. Lightfoot, The development of language: acquisition, change, and evolution