Many linguists have maintained that the pronouns "he,""his," and "him" and the noun "man," when used in the generic sense, legitimately refer to both males and females and effectively cue readers to think of both. Others have argued, however, that the generic terms cause readers to "filter out" or…

This research suggests a possible diachronic explanation for the emergence of OVS (Object-Verb-Subject) as basic sentence word order in Carib languages. The application of afterthought grammaticalization patterns to explain diachronic change in the position of subject necessitates some modification of Hyman's and Venneman's hypotheses. Neither…

Right dislocations are expressions of the following form: (1) "They told the Grand Jury a number of lies, the Nixon men." (2) "We find we have to limit our social schedule, my husband and I." (3) "Mary always wears a frown, the ugly witch." They are found also almost exclusively in the spoken language. This paper…

This paper describes and gives the results of a psycholinguistic experiment investigating the impact of certain surface syntactic structures on the perception and memory of language. The basic assumption is that the content of an utterance must be its most salient aspect in memory. The for of an utterance, its surface grammar and phonology, must…

This paper defines the grammatical role of a particle in Swahili in terms of the semantic information which it contributes to all utterances in which it occurs. The particle -A occurs in the syntactic configuration Noun 1 -A Noun 2 and has been traditionally described as reflecting relations of possession and attribution between the two nouns in…

This paper argues that the hypothesis that all languages have a definitization process is empirically refutable, and that use of the terminology "definite" and "indefinite" is justified in that it reflects intuitions of grammarians and linguists. The following statements are tested against evidence from samples of different languages: (1) all noun…

Discusses nominal-pronominal reduplication (NPR) in the language of children ages seven and nine in four situations. Younger children produced more NPR; all children produced little NPR talking to their peers and increasing amounts talking to adults. Examples are given and analyzed. (EJS)

Discusses the use of prepositional phrases as subjects and objects through consideration and analysis of: (1) characteristics of such phrases; (2) category status of prepositional phrases in typical noun phrase positions; and (3) sentences containing prepositional phrases in typical noun phrase positions. (CB)

Adult females recalled lists of six words, including some plural nouns, presented visually in sequence. A frequent error was to detach the plural from its root. This supports a morpheme-based as opposed to a unitary word code. Evidence for a primarily phonological coding of the plural morpheme was obtained. (Author/RD)

Reports on an investigation into the patterns of the learning of French grammar in French primary schools. Specifically the learning of form classes (verb, adjective, noun), syntax, and morphological markers was studied. (AM)

Presents an analysis of noun phrases in which the definite article is used and omitted. Several studies are reviewed and two types of occurrences are distinguished: direct (agent, instrument, object) and oblique (locative, dative). The relationships, perceptible in the deep structure, are blurred in the transformations leading to surface…

Normal and Specific Language Impaired (SLI) children were tested for evidence of the binding domain and orientation properties of their grammars. Results suggest that normal children acquiring English pass through a long-distance binding stage, whereas SLI children behave like very young normal children in requiring the nearest available noun…

Investigates the fate of "u"-stem endings in Slavic languages. Findings indicate that the collapse of a paradigm is gradual and that the morphemes involved do not lose their grammatical meanings, although they may develop additional ones at later stages. The development of additional grammatical meanings is carried out in concert with…

Investigates the linguistic abilities of a subgroup of grammatical specific language impaired (SLI) children, focusing on the use of referential expressions in a narrative discourse and providing insight into the underlying nature of grammatical SLI. Findings support the hypothesized modular nature of grammatical SLI children's underlying…

Addresses phenomena exhibited by young children such as suffixed and free articles, double definiteness, genitives, pronouns, and "nominal style." Shows that analysis of these early data must invoke at least one functional projection above the noun phrase. Findings argue against any claim about the universal absence of functional…