LINGUIST List 12.659

Sun Mar 11 2001

Qs: Entity Reference, Online Phonetic Transparency

Editor for this issue: Karen Milligan <karenlinguistlist.org>

Directory

1. Gregory Ward, Entity reference/nominal expressions
2. Chris Wen-Chao Li, online phonetic transparency

LINGUISTListers,

I am looking for examples from any language of nominal (or nominal-like)
referring expressions (e.g. definite descriptions, demonstratives,
pronouns, proper names) that mark reference to specific fictional or
mythical entities differently than reference to "real world" entities. I
am only interested in entity reference (vs. event reference) and in
nominal expressions (vs. modals/verbs/predicates). Thanks!

I will be happy to post (what I expect will be) a (very short) summary.

Gregory

_____
Gregory Ward
Professor and Chair

Department of Linguistics
Northwestern University
2016 Sheridan Road
Evanston IL 60208-4090

e-mail: gwnorthwestern.edu
tel: 847-491-8055
fax: 847-491-3770
www: http://www.ling.northwestern.edu/~ward

I am looking for literature documenting or explaining the tendency for 
online writing (email, chat, instant messaging) to be phonetically more 
transparent, e.g., to favor phonetically-transparent non-standard forms 
over standard conventions, and to record pragmatic hedges and non-word 
vocalizations where they would normally be left out in traditional writing. 
This appears to be a tendency that holds across languages, regardless of 
the nature of the writing system. I would appreciate any references to 
published material on this topic, preferably within the last 3 years.

Thank you,

Chris Wen-Chao Li
San Francisco State University
wenchaosfsu.edu