THIS PAPER DISCUSSES THE HINDI LANGUAGE SYNTAX OF PERFECTIVE PARTICIPIAL FORMS AS ADJECTIVES AND AS PARTICIPLES OF SEVERAL VARIETIES. THE FIRST PART OF THE REPORT DISTINGUISHES AND DESCRIBES EIGHT KINDS OF PARTICIPIAL USAGE AND SUGGESTS MORE GENERAL RULES FOR ANALYZING THESE USES. THE SECOND PART OFFERS A GENERATIVE DESCRIPTION OF THE SAME DATA.…

A CONSTITUENT STRUCTURE OF HINDI WAS FORMULATED TO ACCOUNT FOR THE PHENOMENA OF COMPOUND AND CONJUNCT VERBS IN THE LANGUAGE. THE TRADITIONAL CLASS OF CONJUNCT VERBS OR THE COMPOUND VERBS, CONSISTING OF NOUN OR ADJECTIVE PLUS VERB, WAS REINTERPRETED IN THIS ANALYSIS. THE FOUR SECTIONS OF THE TEXT DEALT WITH (1) THE SUBJECT-PREDICATE KERNEL…

Considers the current debate on the initial state of second language (L2) acquisition and presents critical empirical evidence from Hindi learners of English-as-a-Second-Language that supports the claim that the complementizer phase (CP) is initially absent from the grammar of L2 speakers.(Author/VWL)

A study investigated the acquisition of the phonemic feature/voice/ and, more specifically, voice onset time (VOT), in Hindi and English. Subjects were 20 monolingual children aged 2 to 6 from each of the 2 language groups, divided into 5 age groups, and 10 adults from each language group. Flash cards depicting minimally contrasting sets of words,…

SINCE LINGUISTS HAVE ONLY RECENTLY TURNED FROM GRAMMATICAL ANALYSIS TO CONSIDER THE ROLE OF LANGUAGE IN SOCIETY, THE STUDY OF MODERNIZATION HAS BEEN LEFT LARGELY TO SOCIAL SCIENTISTS WHO CAN HARDLY BE EXPECTED TO DEAL WITH LINGUISTIC QUESTIONS. LANGUAGE PROBLEMS, HOWEVER, ARE KNOWN TO PLAGUE DEVELOPING SOCIETIES. IN POST-INDEPENDENCE INDIA,…

This dictionary covers approximately 28,277 verbal expressions in modern standard Hindi and their rendered English equivalents. The study lists longer verbal expressions which are generally matched by single verbs in English. The lexicographer notes that the majority of entries in this dictionary do not appear in their present form in most other…

Addresses questions about infant perceptual ability and the possibility of its decline as a function of development in the absence of specific experience. Compares English-speaking adults, Hindi-speaking adults, and 7-month-old infants on their ability to discriminate two pairs of natural Hindi (non-English) speech contrasts. (Author/RH)

Papers from the conference on semantics and linguistic theory include the following: "Definiteness, Existentials, and the 'List' Interpretation" (Barbara Abbott); "Strong and Weak Novelty and Familiarity" (Cleo Condoravdi); "The Singular-Plural Distinction in Hindi Generics" (Veneeta Srivastav Dayal);" Adverbial…

Studies patterns of frequent mistakes in the use of articles in English by speakers of Hindi/Punjabi. The control over the definite and indefinite article is examined in relation to their forms and functions. The use of articles is also considered in complex noun phrases and different syntactic structures, and an attempt is made to establish a…

A discussion of two aspects of Hindi phonology, schwa deletion and vowel nasalization, compares two theories concerning the processes behind these phenomena. A non-linear analysis is compared with a more traditional, linear notation. Results indicate that in most cases, both sets of rules work equally well but in some, the linear explanation is…

Discusses the style repertoire in the context of Hindi literature, the functions of code mixing varieties in Hindi literary works, and the implications for sociolinguistics of such investigations from linguistic and stylistic perspectives. Hindi poetry from the last three decades is examined to determine the effects of language mixing involving…

In this paper, an attempt is made to explicate the notion "equivalence" in contrastive analysis. It has been suggested that a learner formulates successive hypotheses about the nature of the target language at least partially on the basis of his knowledge of the native language. A deep contrastive study of the two language systems will…

This study examined adult and child word-initial voice onset time productions in English and Hindi to determine the age of acquisition of the phonemic voice contrast. Cross-linguistic differences in patterns of acquisition were found, but these were not necessarily traced to the different phonological systems. (JL)

More than 250,000 of Fiji's citizens are descendants of Indian indentured laborers of diverse origins. There are still distinct social groups based on language, religion, and place of origin. However, nearly all Fiji Indians speak one language called Fiji Hindustani. Other languages, such as Gujarati, Panjabi, Tamil, and Telugu, are still spoken,…

Examines a code mixed variety of English and Hindi called Filmi English, which reflects the linguistic influence of the Indian film industry. A corpus of more than 2,000 intrasentential code-mixed sentences drawn from a film magazine, "Stardust," is analyzed. (Author/OD)