bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Toward communication
Authors: Nadel Jacqueline , Revel Arnaud , Andry Pierre , Gaussier Philippe
Published: September 2007

Adopting a functionalist perspective, we emphasize the interest of considering imitation as a single capacity with two functions: communication and learning. These two functions both imply such capacities as detection of novelty, attraction toward moving stimuli and perception-action coupling. We propose that the main difference between the processes involved in the two functions is that, in the case of learning, the dynamics is internal to the system constituted by an individual whereas in the case of communication, the dynamics concerns the system composed by the perception of one individual coupled with the action of the other.

In this paper, we compare the first developmental steps of imitation in three populations: typically developing children, children with autism, and robots. We show evidence of strong correlations between imitating and being imitated in typical infants and low-functioning children with autism. Relying on this evidence, the robotic perspective is to provide a generic architecture able not only to learn via imitation but also to interact as an emerging property of the system constituted by two similar architectures with a different history.
Orientation in relation to self and other
Authors: Meyer Jessica A. , Hobson R. Peter
Published: September 2007

With the aim of studying foundations for self-other relations and understanding, we conducted an experimental investigation of a specific aspect of imitation in children with autism: the propensity to copy self-other orientation. We hypothesised that children with autism would show limitations in identifying with the stance of another person. We tested 16 children with autism and 16 non-autistic children with learning difficulties, matched on both chronological and verbal mental age, for their propensity to imitate the self- or other-orientated aspects of another person’s actions. All participants were attentive to the demonstrator and copied her actions, but the children with autism were significantly less likely to imitate those aspects of her actions that involved movement in relation to her own vis-à-vis the child’s body. There were a number of children with autism who copied the identical geometric orientation of objects acted-upon. These results suggest that children with autism have a diminished propensity to identify with other people, and point to the importance of this mechanism for shaping self-other relations and flexible thinking.
Attributions and peer harassment
Authors: Graham Sandra
Published: September 2007

Attribution theory is used as a conceptual framework for examining how causal beliefs about peer harassment influence how victims think and feel about themselves. Evidence is presented that victims who make characterological self-blaming attributions (“it must be me”) are particularly at risk of negative self-views. Also examined is the influence of social context, particularly the ethnic composition of schools and classrooms. It was found that students who were both victims of harassment and members of the majority ethnic group were more vulnerable to self-blaming attributions. In contrast, greater ethnic diversity, that is, classrooms where no one group was in the majority, tended to ward off self-blaming tendencies. Studies of peer harassment are a good context for examining one of the main themes of the special issue, which is how the social context (e.g., peer groups, ethnic groups) influences the way individuals think and feel about themselves.
The shaping of individuals’ mental structures and dispositions by others
Authors: Hahlweg Kurt
Published: September 2007

Expressed emotion (EE) is a measure of the family environment that has been demonstrated to be a reliable, cross-culturally valid psychosocial predictor of relapse in patients with schizophrenia, mood disorders, and other — also somatic — illnesses. Assessed during the Camberwell Family Interview CFI, relatives are classified as being high in EE if they make more than a specified threshold number of critical comments or show any signs of hostility or marked emotional overinvolvement. In schizophrenia, the median relapse rate for patients returning after hospital discharge to a high EE environment is 48%, compared with 21% in a low EE-environment. In this article, the history of EE research will be outlined, and the evidence for the association between family EE and the course of schizophrenia and mood disorders will be presented. Conclusions about the treatment of major mental disorders are discussed as well as the directions of future studies.
First in, last out?
Authors: Code Chris
Published: September 2007

Current work in the evolution of language and communication is emphasising a close relationship between the evolution of speech, language and gestural action. This paper briefly explores some evolutionary implications of a range of closely related impairments of speech, language and gesture arising from left frontal brain lesions. I discuss aphasic lexical speech automatisms (LSAs) and their resolution with some recovery into agrammatism with apraxia of speech, an impairment of speech planning and programming. I focus attention on the most common forms of LSAs, expletives and the pronoun+modal/aux subtype, and propose that further research into these phenomena can contribute to the debate. I briefly discuss recent studies of progressively degenerating neurological conditions resulting in progressive patterns of cognitive impairments that promises to provide insight into the evolutionary relationships between speech, language and gesture.
The shaping of animals’ minds
Authors: Salwiczek Lucie H. , Wickler Wolfgang
Published: September 2007

Mind is seen as a collection of abilities to take decisions in biologically relevant situations. Mind shaping means to form habits and decision rules of how to proceed in a given situation. Problem-specific decision rules constitute a modular mind; adaptive mind-shaping is likely to be module-specific. We present examples from different behaviour ‘faculties’ throughout the animal kingdom, grouped according to important mind-shaping factors to illustrate three basically different mind-shaping processes: (I) external stimuli guide the differentiation of a nervous structure that controls a given behaviour; (II) information comes in to direct a fixed behaviour pattern to its biological goal, or to complete an inherited behaviour program; (III) specific stimuli activate or inactivate a pre-programmed behaviour. Mind-shaping phenomena found in the animal kingdom are suggested as ‘null-hypotheses’ when looking at how human minds might be shaped.
Grounding symbols in the physics of speech communication
Authors: Worgan Simon F. , Damper Robert I.
Published: September 2007

The traditional view of symbol grounding seeks to connect an a priori internal representation or ‘form’ to its external referent. But such a ‘form’ is usually itself systematically composed out of more primitive parts (i.e., it is ‘symbolic’), so this view ignores its grounding in the physics of the world. Some previous work simulating multiple talking/listening agents has effectively taken this stance, and shown how a shared discrete speech code (i.e., vowel system) can emerge. Taking the earlier work of Oudeyer, we have extended his model to include a dispersive force intended to account broadly for a speaker’s motivation to increase auditory distinctiveness. New simulations show that vowel systems result that are more representative of the range seen in human languages. These simulations make many profound abstractions and assumptions. Relaxing these by including more physically and physiologically realistic mechanisms for talking and listening is seen as the key to replicating more complex and dynamic aspects of speech, such as consonant-vowel patterning.
Promoting a Multilingual Future for Aotearoa/New Zealand
Authors: East Martin , Shackleford Nick , Spence Gail
Published: September 2007

In the fifteen years from 1989 to 2003 considerable development has occurred in the area of international languages teaching in New Zealand’s schools. 1989 marked the beginning of serious moves to encourage the New Zealand government to develop a comprehensive national languages policy that would consider all aspects of language provision in an officially ‘bilingual’, and, in reality, multilingual and multicultural nation. 2003 witnessed a strategic step forward with a government supported recommendation that would make language learning an entitlement for all public school pupils of eleven to fourteen years of age. This paper examines this fifteen-year period, focusing on international languages of trade and tourism. It seeks to get in on the inside of understanding the policy process with a view to distinguishing what has been said from what has been done. We show that a situation that was uncoordinated and ad hoc prior to 1989 is, despite slow progress, taking more coherent shape.
“Let mee bee so bold to request you to tell mee”
Authors: Kohnen Thomas
Published: September 2007

Constructions with let me (e.g. let me see, let me tell you, let me think what to do next) are usually analysed as so-called periphrastic imperatives. This paper shows that most of the examples found in Middle English and Early Modern English corpora cannot be understood in this sense but must be seen as constructions with the full verb let with the meaning “permit” or “cause”. While these constructions are still imperatives and in most cases directives, they are different in that they are focused on the addressee and — apparently — on the addressee’s approval. The paper traces the spread of these let-me constructions, their functions as strategies of politeness and their relationship to other so-called indirect directives in the history of English.
Power and politeness
Authors: Tiisala Seija
Published: September 2007

The power structures in northern Baltic Europe in the Middle Ages can be studied through the correspondence between the Swedish authorities and the Hanseatic Councils. The letters were written in three languages: Latin, Low German and Swedish. Low German was the dominant language in the correspondence from the fifteenth century onwards. The aim of the paper is to examine the ways in which power relationships are manifested, including choice of language, conventional expressions of politeness, use of laudatory adjectives when addressing the recipient, use of adverbs to express deference or hedging, and elaborations in orthography.

Medieval letter-writing followed models described in various instruction books called summae dictaminis. These reflect the hierarchy of medieval society by classifying senders and recipients of letters according to their social position, and giving instructions for address of one group by another. The European tradition of rules for letter writing can be traced back in an unbroken line to the Roman Empire, and in spite of certain local differences most rules concerning the form of the letter and expressions of politeness were shared all over the continent.
Inside and out
Authors: Nevala Minna
Published: September 2007

This article focuses on socio-pragmatic aspects of address forms in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century personal letters in the Corpus of Early English Correspondence (CEEC) by comparing the forms found inside and on the outside of a letter. In addition to providing a wider social perspective, the research questions concern the private and public aspects of address formulae and the influence of different participant roles of the writer and the recipient. Address forms are analysed using Bell’s (1984, 2001) audience design model, as well as Brown and Levinson’s (1987) theory of politeness. The study shows that formulae inside a letter are mainly governed by relative power in the relationship between the writer and the recipient. Address in superscriptions, on the other hand, seems to be the result of taking into consideration both the addressee and the audience with its possible opinions and reactions.
“We had like to have been killed by thunder & lightning”
Authors: Kytö Merja , Romaine Suzanne
Published: September 2007

This article discusses the semantic and pragmatic history of a grammatical construction consisting of a form of Be/Have + like followed by an infinitival verb form, which became obsolete in Standard English in the nineteenth century, but still survives in some regional varieties of British and American English, e.g. she liketa had a heart attack. It provides an example of a grammatical category that Kuteva (1998) has called “action narrowly averted” (ANA or avertive) with the meaning ‘on the verge of V-ing, but did not V’. Using a corpus of texts covering the last six centuries, we document the historical circumstances under which the avertive meaning emerged via invited inferences of counterfactuality drawn in the specific discourse context of predictive conditional constructions.
The moral panic about bad language in England, 1691–1745
Authors: McEnery Tony
Published: September 2007

In this paper I use a corpus of the writings of the Society for the Reformation of Manners to look at the discursive construction of attitudes to bad language in English. Using this corpus of texts as an example of a moral panic about language I use keywords to explore moral panic rhetoric, the formation of spirals of signification and the impact of both on attitudes to bad language in English in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries.
Impoliteness in Early Modern English courtroom discourse
Authors: Kryk-Kastovsky Barbara
Published: September 2007

The paper investigates whether the notion of impoliteness worked out for synchronic pragmatics is also applicable in diachronic pragmatics. An analysis of two Early Modern English court trial records demonstrates that the answer is positive provided some new dimensions are added. My model of impoliteness cuts across the following axes: structural, semantic, and pragmatic. Structural impoliteness ranges from words and phrases to portions of texts, thus the syntactic dimension cuts across the complexity dimension. The semantic/pragmatic dimension includes numerous non-literal meanings of impoliteness. An utterance can be judged as impolite on the basis of its surface representations (“overt impoliteness”), or the impoliteness of an expression has to be inferred and takes the form of an implicature (“covert impoliteness”). Thus, the final interpretation would depend both on the speaker’s intention when producing an utterance, its (perlocutionary) effect(s) on the addressee, and the overall context. Finally, all these variables cut across the socio-historical dimension.
The use of videlicet in Early Modern slander depositions
Authors: Moore Colette
Published: September 2007

Trial proceedings and depositions are textual genres that create particular demands for speech marking in discourse. This study examines the use of the expository apposition marker videlicet in both a sample of Early Modern depositions of defamation and several electronic corpora. It finds that videlicet developed a grammaticalized quotative sense concurrent with its borrowing into English and, further, that this grammaticalized sense developed only in legal records. Considering the evolution of videlicet shows us how functionality evolves to fit a particular set of generic needs. Videlicet provides a case of grammaticalization restricted to a single register, and can therefore be instructive about the diffusion of grammaticalized forms across genres and about the intersection of grammaticalization and code-switching.
A politeness-theoretic approach to pragmatico-semantic change
Authors: Beeching Kate
Published: September 2007

This paper posits that certain “qualificatory” semantic primes are recruited to serve face-management needs in a metonymic Meaning1>Meaning2 relationship at what Traugott and Dasher (2002) have called the inter­subjective, non-truth-conditional, procedural, scope-over-discourse end of the trajectory of pragmatico-semantic change. Terms expressing smallness, approximativeness, demurral/correction, adversativeness/concession and interrogation are applied in an attenuating manner in a number of languages. The paper draws on Brown and Levinson’s politeness theory, Sweetser’s (1990), Geeraerts’ (1997) and Kövecses and Radden’s (1998) cognitive and metaphorical/metonymic approaches to etymology, Traugott and Dasher’s (2002) Invited Inferencing Theory of Semantic Change, Haspelmath’s (1999) notions of irreversibility and Kerswill and Williams’ (2002) sociolinguistic concept of “salience”. It is suggested that politeness theory, with its dual conceptualisation to do with conflict-avoidance and social indexing, has strong explanatory power in the two phases of semantic change: innovation and propagation. A new form–function configuration emerges in inter­action to manage rapport and is diffused, provided it is given positive social ­evaluation.
The semiotics of metaphor
Authors: Wee Lionel
Published: September 2007

This article investigates the role of metaphor in the production and reproduction of language ideologies. It does this by focusing on official discourses concerning the language policy of Singapore, where recurrent appeal is made to the conduit metaphor (Reddy 1993) in articulating various claims and beliefs about language and its relation to questions of identity and values.

The analytic framework adopted here treats language ideologies in terms of three semiotic processes: iconization, recursion, and erasure (Gal and Irvine 1995). By tracking a single metaphor through a variety of discourses, the article illustrates how these semiotic processes come together when metaphor is used in the service of ideology. The article also suggests the introduction of a fourth semiotic process, performativity, which draws attention to the various lexical realizations of the conduit metaphor.
War and peace
Authors: Krouglov Alexander
Published: September 2007

The closing years of the 20th century provided increasing evidence of how changes in the political and socio-economic structures influence or sometimes even determine linguistic structure and/or behaviour. For this purpose the linguistic situation in Ukraine and the position of Ukrainian and Russian are examined in the period since the independence of the country in 1991 when rapid shifts in political, economic and cultural spheres have made a significant impact on language planning.

Language politics of post-Perestroika and post-Communist era in Ukraine has resulted in deliberate changes in both status and corpus planning leading to the elevation of Ukrainian as the only official (“state”) language and downgrading Russian which, however, remains functional in many regions of the country. The linguistic picture would be incomplete without analysis of a mixed Russian-Ukrainian varietySurzhyk,which is not something stable and permanent. It is undergoing significant changes in the present linguistic environment as it is becoming the oral and even written language not only of Ukrainophones but also of Russophones.
Representations of the European Union and the nation(-state) in Italian party discourse
Authors: Kosic Ankica , Triandafyllidou Anna
Published: September 2007

Research on party attitudes towards European integration has concentrated on the relationship between party ideology and positions related to European integration as an economic and/or political process, ignoring the representational aspect of party discourse. This study aims to contribute towards filling this gap by examining how Italian parties represent the European Union, the nation(-state) and the relationship between the two in their electoral platforms and parliamentary debates. We shall therefore analyse critically how parties use specific representations of Europe, the EU and the nation to frame and support their ideologies and positions and how they shape these representations in different ways depending on the challenge they are confronted with. We shall also look beyond presumed clear-cut relationships between party ideology and party attitudes towards European integration, exploring the complexities and ambiguities of party discourse and highlighting how specific EU or nation representations are used as legitimisation strategies by parties in combination to their left- or right-wing ideology.
Language policies in the successor states of former Yugoslavia
Authors: Bugarski Ranko
Published: September 2007

Former Yugoslavia followed an internationally acclaimed language policy of constitutional and legal equality of its numerous languages. Anticipating or accompanying the disintegration of this federation, the new states arising on its territory published their constitutions in the period 1990–1993. This paper briefly surveys the basic provisions concerning the official use of languages in each of them and attempts, on the basis of the often scant evidence available, to assess their actual implementation. It is concluded that, whereas language policy in former Yugoslavia was fairly consistent, its successor states display more variety. The inherited spirit of tolerance and language rights still survives in some respects, but there are also clear indications of favouring the linguistic means associated with the “state nation”, at the expense of old and new minorities. The administrative multiplication of the former federation’s largest language, Serbo-Croatian, is likewise noted, as is the general need to complement internal measures of language policy with external ones in preparation for life in tomorrow’s world.
The “conversation on Austria”
Authors: Gruber Helmut
Published: September 2007

In February 2000, the Austrian Christian conservative People’s Party ÖVP and the right wing nationalist Freedom Party (under its notorious leader Jörg Haider) formed a new government in Austria. This political change resulted not only in heavy political protests in Austria, but also caused bilateral sanctions of the other 14 EU member states against the new government. In March 2000, Austria’s public broadcasting company organised a media discussion between representatives of the then government, opposition politicians, representatives of the Austrian civil society and ‘ordinary people’ to establish a ‘national consent’ towards the sanctions. Drawing upon insights from appraisal theory, social semiotics and critical discourse analysis, this paper demonstrates how non-verbal situational aspects as well as discursive features of this program are used by the programme makers to create an overall impression of ‘Austria as a victim’ and how dissenting voices are silenced.
Hegemonic struggles or transfer of knowledge?
Authors: Birkner Karin
Published: September 2007

Job interviews are an important means for the selection of employees in Western industrialised countries. Thus, they may be decisive with regard to the future of the person seeking work, making the difference between successful social participation or marginalisation. After the German reunification, East Germans had to prove themselves in a communicative genre marked by West German standards hitherto unknown to them.

The article analyses verbal sequences taken from job interviews between West German interviewers and East German job applicants in which genre specific knowledge is negotiated. It is shown that East German concepts of this genre are treated as knowledge deficits by the West German interviewers.

There is a positive outcome in this, since this allows for a transfer of socially relevant knowledge. And from an analytical point of view, these sequences provide us with data showing how institutional agents pass procedural knowledge on to their clients. Nevertheless, these sequences often take an asymmetrical course which is linked with a high risk for the individual’s positive self presentation in the job interview. The fact that West German agents set their genre knowledge as being universally valid is based on their hegemonic claim.
The use of exclusionary language to manipulate opinion
Authors: Clyne Michael
Published: September 2007

This article explores the role of language used by the Australian prime minister and other politicians in swaying Australian public opinion against ‘boat people’, focusing especially on particular lexical items. The article contextualizes the representation and treatment of asylum seekers and the language used to do this, both generally in the contemporary period and in the history of Australia as a British outpost in the Pacific. It relates this to other issues expressed linguistically concerning national identity.
A corpus-based approach to discourses of refugees and asylum seekers in UN and newspaper texts
Authors: Baker Paul , McEnery Tony
Published: September 2007

A corpus-based analysis of discourses of refugees and asylum seekers was carried out on data taken from a range of British newspapers and texts from the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees website, both published in 2003. Concordances of the terms refugee(s) and asylum seeker(s) were examined and grouped along patterns which revealed linguistic traces of discourses. Discourses which framed refugees as packages, invaders, pests or water were found in newspaper texts, although there were also cases of negative discourses found in the UNHCR texts, revealing how difficult it is to disregard dominant discourses. Lexical choice was found to be an essential aspect of maintaining discourses of asylum seekers — collocational analyses of terms like failed vs. rejected revealed the underlying attitudes of the writers towards the subject.
Ideology and affect in discourse in institutions
Authors: Warner Michael J.
Published: September 2007

This paper explores the discursive relationships of power, ideology, and affect that are instituted — and reproduced, resisted, or modified — in the functional pragmatics of talkback radio. In particular, I develop a critical analysis of the psychodynamics of subjectivity based on a case study of talkback in Northern Ireland in which the main topic of discussion deals with community responses to the Drumcree Protestant church parade. The functional pragmatics approach builds on the contributions of critical discourse analysis and conversation analysis to the study of ideology and affect in discourse in institutions. I develop a wider context for the analysis of discourse in the talkback institution by addressing the meta-linguistic implications of talk about talk through cognitive-developmental paradigms and psychoanalytic social theory. It is anticipated that such a motivated analysis will reveal the emancipatory interests concealed within ideologically bound — while not necessarily moribund — institutional frameworks of communicative action.
The debate on truth and reconciliation
Authors: Verdoolaege Annelies
Published: September 2007

This article gives an overview of a large part of contemporary TRC literature. Hundreds of publications have appeared on the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. With a view to proper academic reflection it would be useful to classify this literature. Various classificatory criteria could be used. In this text a topical perspective is taken, so the TRC literature is subdivided on the basis of the thematic focus of the author. Perspectives on the SA Truth Commission have many different thematic interests, such as legal, religious, political, psychological, anthropological and linguistic. This paper tries to bring some cohesion and meaningful organization to this multitude of books, articles and dissertations. Within each thematic category representative examples are pointed out. Finally, reference is made to some lacunae and overlaps which are evident from looking at the body of TRC literature. As a result, this article can be seen as an investigation into the characterizing features of the debate on the TRC.
History in the making/The making of history
Authors: Wodak Ruth
Published: September 2007

This paper considers narratives about traumatic pasts, using interviews with visitors of the two exhibitions about the war crimes of the GermanWehrmacht, shown in Germany and Austria 1995 and 2002, as examples. Numerous justification and legitimization strategies are involved in public and private discourses. The study claims that official genres, such as school books or TV documentaries, still launch narratives which exculpate the GermanWehrmachtas institution, although the evidence provided by historians and the exhibitions is overwhelming. Thetopoiused (such as ‘doing one’s duty’; ‘all wars are the same’; and so forth) are to be found in similar debates in other countries as well. Hence, this case study illustrates patterns of argumentation which occur much more generally than only in the specific national contexts studied in detail here.
Regional or Minority Languages on the WWW
Authors: Wright Sue
Published: September 2007

This paper reports on research sponsored by Unesco to provide reliable data on the extent to which the WWW is becoming a means for minority language groups to publish information and reach the general public. These are the first findings of what is intended to be a world wide enquiry. We report on the Web presence of a group of European languages, all of which have minority status in the states in which they are spoken. They are various dialects of Occitan3 in France, Sardinian, Piemontese and Ladin in Italy and Frisian in the Netherlands. The research confirms that these languages are used extensively on the Internet. However, it also finds that the domains in which they are used are quite restricted and mirror to a large degree the situation in traditional print publishing. Thus the WWW may only be having an influence on volume of publishing and is not necessarily extending the use of the languages to new areas. Thirdly, it records substantial publishing by private individuals and finds that there are possible consequences here for standardisation of minority languages. The research is comparative and ongoing and will explore whether the European situation is typical or exceptional.
Irish on the World Wide Web
Authors: Kelly-Holmes Helen
Published: September 2007

This paper reports on the process of searching with Irish words on the Irish language version of the Google Internet search engine. Five words from ‘typical’ and ‘non-typical’ domains for Irish are used, and the results are analysed in terms of the “authenticity” of the search process and results, the language usage in the sites found through the search process, and the domains represented by the results. The study identifies a number of problems encountered when searching for results in a ‘small’ language. It also indicates that the ‘official’ sector and other sectors closely related to language policy and planning are the main providers of monolingual Irish texts on the Internet, with a variety of mixed Irish and English approaches favoured by other providers.
The role of mythical European heritage in the construction of Colombian national identity
Authors: Ruiseco Gisela , Slunecko Thomas
Published: September 2007

Following the discourse-historical approach to Critical Discourse Analysis (Wodak, de Cilia, Reisigl and Liebhart 1999; Wodak 2001), we analyze the inaugural speech of the actual president of Colombia, Álvaro Uribe Vélez, which he delivered on August 7th, 2002 in Bogotá. We take this speech as an illustration for the construction of national identity by the Colombian elites. In our analysis, we are particularly interested in Uribe’s strategy of referring to the European heritage and in his ways of appeasing the cultural and ethnic differences of the population.
Cultural status and language selection in translation
Authors: Xianbin He
Published: September 2007

This paper is an attempt to testify with Chinese historical data that the cultural status of a language (or dialect) directly affects the translation flow, legal power of parallel texts, orientations of translators, selection of a TL temporal dialect, etc. It has been discovered that when the actual power of a language and its acknowledgement by translators contradict, the cultural positioning of translators seems more decisive. A distinction must be made between translators as a cultural collectivity and as individuals. Ideology may also interfere with language selection in translation.

TL choice is often influenced by the power of a temporal dialect and its users. Varying with the context, translation for the elites may involve selection of the classical dialect or highly literal and modernizing forms. A language becomes dominant when it is considered the vehicle for advanced technology and thought. Its interaction to translation is hence dynamic.
Future of Europe
Authors: Stråth Bo
Published: September 2007

The nineteenth and most of the twentieth century of Europe were dominated by the perspective of the nation-states. At the core of the European nation building was the social question. The (West) European unification project after 1950 was a rescue operation of the Western national welfare states under the conditions of the Cold War. The European rescue operation dealt with the maintenance of the welfare states. These attempts became problematic in the 1970s when the international order established after 1945 collapsed. EEC tried to respond to the experiences of crisis by a transfer of the social commitments to the Community level. The conceptualisation of such a transfer failed, however. The article analyses the failure of three subsequent key concepts in the European unification project: integration, identity and constitution. The analysis emphasises the connection between politics and language.
Universal constraints and local conditions in Pidginization
Authors: Foley William
Published: September 2007

This paper looks at the processes involved in the genesis of three pidgins of New Guinea. I will argue that the main principle at work in the formation of the morphosyntax of pidgins is a general human capacity for language simplification, but that these processes of simplification are subject both to the effects of specific linguistic features in the local multilingual contact situation that gives rise to the pidgin and to constraints resulting from a universal linguistic endowment. By a comparative look across a range of morphosyntactic features at the processes of simplification that produced three unrelated pidgins of New Guinea, Yimas Pidgin, Hiri Motu and Tok Pisin, the article exemplifies some of the types of structures that can result in pidgins from this general human capacity for language simplification, sifted through both local conditions and universal constraints.
On the properties of Saramaccan FU
Authors: Lefebvre Claire , Loranger Virginie
Published: September 2007

The formfu(variantu) fulfills several functions. It is a preposition selecting NPs and clauses, tensed or infinitival. It is a mood marker occurring either between the subject and the verb, or before the subject. It is a complementiser selected by predicates of thewant-class; as such it is in a paradigmatic relationship with other complementisers in the language. Finally, in some contexts,fuappears to function as a case marker, rather than as a preposition, as it may be associated with several thematic roles. The first objective of the paper is to provide a detailed inventory of all the functions offuand a detailed description of its properties for each of its functions. This will be done mainly on the basis of published sources. The proposal thatfucan head various syntactic projections (P, Force, Fin, Mood, Kase) will be shown to account for its multifunctional character. The second objective of the paper is to discuss the origin of the properties offu. First, we consider the grammaticalisation scenario proposed in the literature. In this scenario, the prepositionfuwould have been reanalysed as a complementiser. We argue that this scenario is not an optimal one. Second, we consider a relexification scenario along the lines of Lefebvre (1998b). Although the form of the lexical item in question is derived from Englishfor, as has been noted by several authors, most of its other properties cannot be derived from this lexical item. A comparison of the properties offuwith those of corresponding lexical items in one of the substratum languages of Saramaccan, Fongbe (e.g. Smith 1987), yields a different conclusion: while the form of the Saramaccan lexical entry is derived from English, the bulk of its semantic and syntactic properties are derived from those of corresponding substratum language lexical entries. The properties of the creole lexical entry thus appear to follow from the re lexification account of creole genesis. In this case, however, two substratum lexical entries (nú, preposition and complementiser, andní, mood marker and complementiser) appear to have been relexified on the basis of a single superstratum formfor, yielding the creole lexical entryfucumulating all the functions of the two substratum entries. Some details distinguish the creole lexical entry from the two substratum ones. It will be shown that the make up offuhas also involved some reorganisation of the original lexicon, and some innovation.
Some anthropological musings on Creolization
Authors: Price Richard
Published: September 2007

This paper traces the move of the concept of “creolization” from the

discipline of linguistics to those of anthropology and history during the

second half of the twentieth century, focusing on its uses in New World

slavery studies. Two positions are contrasted in recent studies of North

American slavery, those of African-Centrists and those of creolists, with

the first stressing the continued importance of African heritage and

identities in the New World and the second emphasizing the newness of the

institutions that enslaved Africans and their descendants created in the

Americas. Several exemplary studies of creolization in different parts of

the Americas are reviewed. The paper suggests that ideology and subject

position often drive historical analyses and that only strict

historicization will permit further advances in understanding the complex

processes that we call “creolization.”
On the interpretation of multiple questions
Authors: Bošković Željko
Published: September 2007

The paper shows that crosslinguistically, overt movement of a wh-phrase to SpecCP results in the loss of the single-pair interpretation for multiple questions, i.e. it forces the pair-list interpretation. It is shown that the damaging effect of overt movement to SpecCP on the availability of single-pair answers can be accounted for with an extension of Hagstroms (1998) semantics of questions to languages with overt wh-movement. More precisely, the effect is argued to follow from Relativized Minimality: In questions with a single-pair interpretation, the Q morpheme, which is base-generated below C, induces a relativized minimality effect when a wh-phrase crosses it on its way to SpecCP.
A minimalist approach to the re-grammaticalization of morphology
Authors: Wu Zoe
Published: September 2007

This paper examines variation in the interpretation of the Chinese verbal suffix ‑le and attributes it to a process of ongoing change in which an original aspectual system is gradually developing into a new tense system. The paper argues that the incremental pattern of re-grammaticalization can best be captured in a minimalist feature-based approach to the licensing of morphology, which factors clines of development into formally discrete, individual steps.
Physical metaphors for the mental lexicon
Authors: Turvey M.T. , Moreno Miguel A.
Published: September 2007

A variety of metaphors inspired by contemporary developments and issues in physics are identified as potentially helpful to theory and experiments directed at the mental lexicon. The developments are very much in respect to systems regarded as complex from the perspective of established physical explanation. The issues are primarily those associated with the context dependencies of properties and functions broadly evident in natural systems at both macroscopic and microscopic scales. Ideally, the metaphors may bring new questions, methods, principles, and formalisms to bear on the investigation of the mental lexicon. Minimally, they should enhance appreciation for the scientific challenges posed by the mental lexicon’s diverse structures and functions.
Obligatory decomposition in reading prefixed words
Authors: Taft Marcus , Ardasinski Sam
Published: September 2007

The reported experiment examines the impact of stem frequency on lexical decision responses to prefixed words. Both when the nonword distractors had nonsense stems (e.g., recodge) and real-word stems (e.g., relaugh), words with high frequency stems (e.g., unreal) were recognized more quickly than words with low frequency stems (e.g., refuel) when matched on surface frequency. This was taken as evidence that a whole-word representation exists for prefixed words, but that activation of this representation is always mediated by a representation of the stem, unlike the claims of a Dual Pathways model.
Are word meanings corresponding to different grammatical categories organised differently within lexical semantic memory?
Authors: Arciuli Joanne , Cupples Linda , Vigliocco Gabriella
Published: September 2007

We report on two experiments that examined lexical semantic memory. Experiment 1 included semantically related word-pairs (similarity of meaning) and unrelated word-pairs from three grammatical categories (nouns, verbs, adjectives). Experiment 2 included semantically related word-pairs (contrasting meaning) and unrelated word-pairs from the same three categories. Results of both experiments showed similar levels of semantic priming across same versus different grammatical category word-pairs (e.g., verb–verb pairs vs. verb–adjective pairs). Additional analyses of each experiment showed similar levels of priming within each of the three grammatical categories (i.e., noun–noun vs. verb–verb vs. adjective–adjective pairs). These findings suggest that there are no sharp architectural distinctions amongst words from different grammatical categories within lexical semantic memory.
Semantic property activation during the interpretation of combined concepts
Authors: Spalding Thomas L. , Gagné Christina L.
Published: September 2007

Interpreting a novel conceptual combination often involves selecting and using a relation to link the constituent concepts (e.g., interpreting a plastic pot as a pot made of plastic). In two experiments, we presented the head noun along with a property that, while always at least plausibly true of the head noun, may be more or less consistent with a particular relational interpretation of the combined concept. We then asked the participants to verify particular relational interpretations of the target combination. The results indicate that manipulating what is currently active about the head noun in this way affects the acceptability of different relational interpretations of the combined concept.
The Role of Personal Narrative in Bringing Children into the Moral Discourse of Their Culture
Authors: Walton Marsha D. , Brewer Christie
Published: September 2007

This study examined personal narratives written by 364 inner-city 4th–6th graders about an experience with interpersonal conflict. Stories were coded for three sets of variables based on Bruner’s 1990 work on narrative thought. The co-occurrences of these variables lent support to the notions that (a) establishing a moral voice involves noting what is culturally non-canonical and providing culturally recognizable explanations, (b) taking an epistemological stance that recognizes the importance of what the protagonists know and think and of what can count as a true or meaningful representation of events, and (c) making moral evaluations and positioning the self relative to what is construed as good or bad. Comparisons between children from a high-crime, high-poverty neighborhood to those from a less dangerous environment raised questions about how we bring children into the moral discourse of a culture, and how their appropriation of interpretive repertoires to explain their own experiences may contribute to cultural change.
The Play of Identities in Cypriot-Australian Family Storytelling
Authors: Petraki Eleni
Published: September 2007

This article adopts a microanalytic approach to examine storytelling as a co-construction by family members in a Cypriot-Australian family. Previous studies on family storytelling have focused on the various roles of family members in storytelling with a means of studying family socialization (Miller et al., 1990; Ochs & Taylor, 1992; Blum-Kulka, 1997). These studies used critical discourse analysis, sociocultural theories, performance and pragmatic approaches to storytelling. This article offers a distinctive approach to family storytelling by examining the discourse and social identities that family members display during the storytelling. The data originate in a study that involves interviews with three generations of Greek-Australian and Cypriot-Australian women regarding their relationships with each other. In this paper we investigate the contributions of the father and the daughters in the course of the mother’s turn at storytelling. The first part of the analysis focuses on the husband’s discourse identities as a contributor, initiator and elicitor of his wife’s storytelling. During the storytelling we also observe the production and exchange of different social identities between the husband and the mother, such as the ‘unwilling suitor’, the ‘embarrassed schoolgirl’ or the ‘forceful but teasing husband’. The second part describes how the daughters take part in their mother’s storytelling, producing a variety of identities such as the ‘impatient mother’, the ‘complaining’, ‘happy’, or ‘good’ mothers and daughters. These investigations succinctly illustrate how narratives become a resource for members’ ‘display’ and ‘play’ of identities.
A Cautionary Tale: A Dialogic Re-reading of a Student Teacher’s Visual Narrative
Authors: Cavallaro Johnson Greer
Published: September 2007

In the past, narrative inquiry into teaching has relied mostly on written materials in the form of autobiographies, biographies and personal diaries and journals. This paper changes the focus from the written mode to the visual-verbal by examining one student-teacher’s hand drawn picture book as a representation of her becoming a teacher. The analytic aim is to produce a re-reading of one student teacher’s text that extends and critiques her “common-sense”interpretation. Rather than accepting the teacher-as-author’s intended reading as definitive, this paper seeks a different reading from a social interaction and a political perspective. The re-reading is produced by asking how and what membership categories are being constructed visually-verbally in the telling of the narrative and ultimately, whose interests are being served by the acceptance of a common-sense reading. The analytic aim is achieved by establishing a dialogue between various theories of narrative and membership categorization analysis and critical discourse analysis so as to arrive at an increasingly critical understanding of student teacher narrative reflection. (Narrative theory and analysis, Membership categorisation analysis, Critical discourse analysis, Teacher reflection, Visual narrative)