LINGUIST List 8.1799

Wed Dec 17 1997

Qs: Predicates/Referents,False Friends,Romance Ling

Editor for this issue: Martin Jacobsen <martylinguistlist.org>

Directory

1. Frederick Newmeyer, Squishy Predicates and Referents
2. Catarina Forslund FRA, False Friends
3. Jon Aske, Qn: Romance Linguistics Courses

I am interested in hearing about approaches to semantics that consider
'predicativity' and 'referentiality' as the extreme poles of a
continuum, as well as critiques (published or volunteered) of such a
notion. The only such approach that I am familiar with is John
Anderson's 'Notional Theory', in which syntactic categories are
defined by their position on the continuum. (Hence, modals are 100%
predicative, proper nouns are 100% referential, and everything else is
somewhere in between -- adjectives maybe 50% of each; infinitives more
or less 75% P & 25% R; common nouns more or less 85% R & 15% P; and so
on.)

Are there other similar approaches? 

Thanks,

Fritz Newmeyer
fjnu.washington.edu

I am a student of French at the University of Abo AKademi, Finland and
I am currently working on my M.A. thesis concerning false friends and
in particular French-Swedish false friends. I would be very interested
in knowing if any research has been done or if anyone has written
anything concerning French-Swedish false friends (besides von
Proschwitz and Brunet- Jailly in their book Bien ecrire bien
parler). I would also be interested in getting information on false
friends in general, for example information on problems concerning
this phenomenon, if this is a phenomenon concerning any two languages
in contact with each other all over the world, etc.

If anyone can help me in this matter, please contact me at this
address:

 Catarina.Forslundabo.fi

 Thank you in advance!

I find myself for the first time in the position of having to prepare
to teach an undergraduate Romance Linguistics course and would very
much appreciate the help of more experienced colleagues, especially
since I have not been particularly lucky in my search so far.

Ideas about different approaches and about current textbooks and their
relative merits, as well as any other relevant information would be
very much appreciated. Also, are there any lists or repositories on
the Internet for sharing this type of information?

Best wishes, Jon

- --------------------------------------
Jon Aske ** NEW ADDRESS: ASKEEarthLink.net **
http://home.earthlink.net/~aske/