Highlighting the close relationship between linguistic explanation and learnability, Bruce Tesar and Paul Smolensky examine the implications of Optimality Theory (OT) for language learnability. They show how the core principles of OT lead to the learning principle of constraint demotion, the basis for a family of algorithms that infer constraint rankings from linguistic forms.Of primary concern to the authors are the ambiguity of the data ...

Pidgins and Creoles have always attracted a great deal of interest - academic and otherwise - but in recent decades they have become increasingly important as a field of linguistic inquiry. Placing pidgins and creoles in the wider setting of linguistic theory, this book bridges the gap
between introductory material and primary material, revising students' knowledge of the field as well as acquainting them with key areas of debate in pidgin ...

Getting a computer to understand our everyday language may be a long way off; the computer has to know how to think as well as follow the rules of a particular language. This book makes an important contribution to the study of pragmatics and discourse by presenting an explicit and precise computational approach to the complex problem of the structure of discourse.As Professor Stephen Pinker of MIT notes, "Reichman has laudably chosen to inject ...

Recent developments in linguistic theory have led to a reconsideration of the role of optimality in the overall architecture of the grammar. Emerging from this research is the idea that different components of the grammar interact to yield the best choice from a set of candidate derivations. This idea departs from traditional approaches to the output of linguistic levels in generative grammar, in which rules, principles, and constraints interact ...

What is the Ruthenian language? A simple answer is that it was the precursor to modern Ukrainian and Belarusian. But the history and synchronic realization of this language are much more complex. During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries Ruthenian was the language of the Orthodox and Uniate inhabitants of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. It enjoyed a culture and prestige greater than that of its Muscovite (Russian) neighbor to the east, ...

The challenges to library education are great and its academic setting is a mixed blessing. Stieg sorts out the issues and suggests ideas for revitalizing library education that are consistent with professional practice and academic responsibilities. ...

<P>Have you been flamed recently? Or pinged? Or felt 404? This exciting glossary provides all the answers. It includes an A to Z of the jargon entering the English language with the rise of the Internet and cell phone technology, and it gives a dictionary-style treatment of those Internet terms that have begun to change their meaning in colloquial speech. Entries include illustrations showing contemporary usage, helping you to ...

This book provides both theoretical and practical guidance for students and researchers who need to transform the massive amounts of data collected through qualitative fieldwork into a coherent manuscript. Organized around the metaphor of "story," Composing Qualitative Research illuminates the importance of crafting data into a framework that appeals to the intended audience. Each chapter covers a different aspect of creating a story: disclosing, ...

Focuses on the development of precisely formulated grammars whose empirical predictions can be directly tested. ...

This book builds on the success of Glanville Price's "The Languages of Britain," published in 1984, which was widely acclaimed as the most lively, reliable and comprehensive survey of the great number of languages that have at one time or another taken root in Britain.
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