This book is the first systematic account of the syntax and semantics of names. Drawing on work in onomastics, philosophy, and linguistics John Anderson examines the distribution and subcategorization of names within a framework of syntactic categories, and considers how the morphosyntactic behaviour of names connects to their semantic roles. He argues that names occur in two basic circumstances: one involving vocatives and their use in naming predications, where they are notdefinite; the other their use as arguments of predicators, where they are definite. This division is discussed in relation to English, French, Greek, and Seri, and a range of other languages. Professor Anderson reveals that the semantic status of names, including prototypicality, is crucial tounderstanding their morphosyntax and role in derivational relationships. He shows that semantically coherent subsets of names, such as those referring to people and places, are characterized by morphosyntactic properties which may vary from language to language. His original and important investigation will appeal to scholars and advanced students of linguistics and philosophy.
The papers in this volume focus on notions which are central to the work of John M. Anderson - the founder of Dependency Phonology - and to phonological theory: the idea of structural analogy between phonology and syntax; the head/dependent relation; the idea that phonological representations are best conceived of in terms of a set of privative elements (rather than as binary-valued features); and the related notions of contrastivity and specification (and non-specification). An important issue dealt with is the relationship between specification and derivationality, and the question whether derivations are necessary in phonological theory. Many of the contributions provide sound empirical support for the appeal to elements and to headhood at all levels of phonological analysis. The book will be of interest to anyone interested in current issues in phonological theory.
This book addresses fundamental issues in linguistic theory, including the relation between formal and cognitive approaches, the autonomy of syntax, the content of universal grammar, and the value of generative and functional approaches to grammar. It focuses on the grammar of case relations, signalled by morphological case, prepositions, and word order. Part I offers a critical history of modern grammars of case, focussing on the last four decades and setting this in the context of earlier, including ancient, developments. The subjects considered include the evolution of ideas concerning deep structure and semantic and grammatical relations, and arguments for the maintenance of the traditional central position of case in the grammar. In parts II and III Professor Anderson examines the category of case and central unresolved issues in the grammar of case. The latter include questions relating to the idea of an ontologically-based grammar, particularly the degree to which syntactic categories and relationships are grounded in meaning, and the notion of linguistic creativity. This involves a consideration of the way in which cases may be identified and whether their distribution is determined through semantics. The book sheds new light on the interactions between meaning and grammar and on the structure and development of lexical and grammatical systems. The argument and its far-reaching consequences will be of wide interest to linguists, philosophers and others seeking to understand the workings of language.
A study of the different roles which nouns play in the event or state expressed by the verb or adjective with which they are associated. The book explores within the framework of transformational-generative grammar the 'localist hypothesis', which asserts that all the roles for nouns involve basically the notions of location and direction.
This book presents an innovative theory of syntactic categories and the lexical classes they define. It revives the traditional idea that these are to be distinguished notionally (semantically). The author proposes a notation based on semantic features which accounts for the syntactic behaviour of classes. The book also presents a case for considering this classification SH again in rather traditional vein SH to be basic to determining the syntactic structure of sentences.
The Domain of Syntax explores the consequences for syntax of assuming that language is grounded in cognition and perception. He considers whether this permits a lexicalist approach to syntax that would allow it to dispense not only with structural mutations but with universal grammar itself.
The three linked but independent volumes of 'The Substance of Language' collectively overhaul linguistic theory from phonology to semantics and syntax to pragmatics and offer a full account of how linguistic related to function. They comprise a powerfully coherent understanding of the nature of language.
Phonology-Syntax Analogies looks at the degree to which analogies between syntax and phonology result from their being representational subsystems within the overall system of language, at why they sometimes break down, and at how far semantic and phonetic properties limit such analogies.
John Anderson and Colin Ewen, two of the most notable exponents of 'dependency phonology', present in this book a detailed account of this integrated model for the representational of segmental and suprasegmental structure in phonology. Dependency phonology departs from traditional 'linear' models of phonology, and the more recent non-linear models of autosegmental and metrical phonology, in several respects. Unlike in these models, suprasegmental structure is derived directly from the segmental representations, and these representations are based on single-valued features, or components (rather than Chomsky and Halle-type binary features), linked by the dependency relation to form suprasegmental structures, with the exact nature of the dependency relations being directly determined by the properties of the segmental structure. Phonology is currently noteworthy for the diversity of views within the discipline, but no linguist or phonetician with a serious interest in phonology can afford to ignore this book or fail to be interested by it.
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