LINGUIST List 14.946

Mon Mar 31 2003

Qs: Syntax, Morphology

Editor for this issue: Renee Galvis <reneelinguistlist.org>

FUND DRIVE 2003 To give you an incentive to donate, many of our Supporting Publishers have generously donated some amazing linguistic prizes. As a donor you are automatically entered into this prize draw. To find out what's on offer and the rules etc., visit: http://linguistlist.org/prizedraw.html We still have a long way to go, however, to reach our target of $50,000. Please make a donation at: http://linguistlist.org/donation.html The LINGUIST List depends on the generous contributions from subscribers like you; we would not be able to operate without your help. The moderators, staff, and student editors at LINGUIST would like to take this opportunity to thank you for your continuous support. We'd like to remind readers that the responses to queries are usually best posted to the individual asking the question. That individual is then strongly encouraged to post a summary to the list. This policy was instituted to help control the huge volume of mail on LINGUIST; so we would appreciate your cooperating with it whenever it seems appropriate. In addition to posting a summary, we'd like to remind people that it is usually a good idea to personally thank those individuals who have taken the trouble to respond to the query. To post to LINGUIST, use our convenient web form at http://linguistlist.org/LL/posttolinguist.html.

Directory

  1. Tim Baldwin, Syntax: web-based verb-particle experiment
  2. Dan Villa, Morphology: Translation of Modality, Spanish to English

Message 1: Syntax: web-based verb-particle experiment

 Date: Fri, 28 Mar 2003 23:10:29 -0800
From: Tim Baldwin <tbaldwincsli.Stanford.EDU>
Subject: Syntax: web-based verb-particle experiment

Hi,


I am involved with joint research on the semantic compositionality of
English verb-particles, and looking for willing participants for a web
experiment. The experiment involves judging for each of a number of
English verb-particles, whether sentences which contain the
verb-particle always imply the verb and/or the particle. This is best
explained by some examples. "John put the picture up" tells us that
John put the picture somewhere and as a result of this action the
picture was up. There are no conceivable circumstances in which we say
that person put something up where it is not implied that that person
put that object and as a consequence that object was up. This might
seem obvious, but if we look at the other sentences then we can see
that these kinds of phrases are not always this
straightforward. "Barbara and Simon made out" tells us that Barbara
and Simon made out, but it does not tell us that they made anything,
or that before, during, or after the event, anything or anyone was
out. "Susan finished up her paper" tells us that Susan finished the
paper, but it doesn't tell us that anything was up. And in "Philip
gunned down the intruder", we can easily see that as a result of
Philip's action the intruder was down, but we would probably not want
to say that Philip gunned.

If you are interested in learning more about the experiment or
participating, you should enter http://www.language-experiments.org
into your web browser. You should then click on the "Word Meaning
Experiment" link in the list of studies, and this will take you to a
page containing detailed instructions on how to continue. Any comments
on the experimental set-up or data are also very welcome.




Tim
Mail to author|Respond to list|Read more issues|LINGUIST home page|Top of issue

Message 2: Morphology: Translation of Modality, Spanish to English

 Date: Sat, 29 Mar 2003 21:20:41 -0700 (MST)
From: Dan Villa <dvillacrl.NMSU.Edu>
Subject: Morphology: Translation of Modality, Spanish to English

I would like elicit responses on the translation of the Spanish modal
_deber_, specifically as inflected in the future tense, into
English. The context for the translation is as follows:

Todos los alumnos _debera'n pasar_ un examen comprensivo al final del
cuarto semestre.

(I intentionally omit the orthographic accent over the _a_ in the
auxiliary verb, as not all code pages will represent it correctly.) I am
interested in the reading of this usage as an agent-oriented modal (cf
Bybee et al 1994). Please reply to me directly; if there is sufficient
interest, I will post a summary of results. Thank you!

Daniel Villa
New Mexico State University
Mail to author|Respond to list|Read more issues|LINGUIST home page|Top of issue