LINGUIST List 10.1496

Mon Oct 11 1999

Qs: Dative shift in LFG, Quotation marks

Editor for this issue: Jody Huellmantel <jodylinguistlist.org>

Directory

1. Martin Salzmann - gmx, Dative shift in LFG
2. Stig W. Joergensen, Quotation marks

Dear Linguists,

Could anyone tell me how dative shift (e.g. in English) is treated in
LFG - by a morpholexical operation (or: a lexical option) forcing the
goal argument to have the necessary intrinsic classification so it
will be mapped onto the unrestricted function or by some specification
in the lexical entry that allows certain ditransitive verbs to have
alternative intrinsic classification?

I'd be very grateful for some help and references.


Martin Salzmann

Dear Linglist Subscribers,

In recent years, linguists have become increasingly aware of
punctuation as a legitimate object of research. Could anybody supply
me with references to studies that focus on the use of quotation
marks?

>From a normative point of view, an abundance of quotation marks is
one of most frequent examples of bad writing by lay-people as well as
professional writers. However, there is no doubt that the unnecessary
use of quotation marks, though occasionally puzzling and distracting
to the reader, has distinctive communicative functions. Examples,
besides the orthodox purposes of identifying irony and actual
quotations, would include: 1) Quotation marks used to express that the
writer is not sure about his or her choice of words; 2) Quotation
marks used to signify that an expression is metaphorical, even if it
is a standard metaphor (a use that can easily lead to a very large
number of quotation marks in the text); 3) Uses expressing various
degrees of dissociation from the choice of words (for instance, I
could have put "bad writing" and "unnecessary use" in quotation marks
above, and thus emphasize that though these are good expressions of
the normative point of view, my personal interest is of a different
nature).

I have primarily noticed this development in my native language,
Danish, but references to studies in any language will be of
interest. I would also be interested in papers that relate this to the
gestural quotation marks (performed with the index and middle fingers)
used by many people in face-to-face conversation.

Stig
________________________________________________________

Stig W. Jorgensen, Assistant Research Professor
Dept. of Computational Linguistics,
Copenhagen Business School
Bernhard Bangs Alle 17B, DK-2000 Frederiksberg
phone: +45 38 15 31 30, email: swj.idcbs.dk
http://www.cbs.dk/departments/dl/engweb/staff/e-stig.htm