Dissertations / Theses: 'Comparative linguistics'

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Nussbaum, Miriam Claire. "Subset comparatives as comparative quantifiers." Thesis, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2017. http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/113771.

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Thesis: S.M. in Linguistics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Linguistics and Philosophy, 2017.
Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.
Includes bibliographical references (pages 42-44).
This paper motivates and presents a novel analysis of the "subset comparative" construction (e.g. John saw more phonologists than just Mary; John drank more than just coffee). I build on Hackl (2000) and Alxatib (2013)'s analyses of comparative quantifiers (more than three) to develop a unified account for both. This analysis entails that subset comparatives are formed via ellipsis of a clausal source; I provide evidence for this claim and against previous analyses that give subset comparatives a phrasal analysis.
by Miriam Claire Nussbaum.
S.M. in Linguistics

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Hackl, Martin 1968. "Comparative quantifiers." Thesis, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2000. http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/8765.

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Thesis (Ph.D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Linguistics and Philosophy, February 2001.
Includes bibliographical references (leaves 187-193).
The main goal of the thesis is to present a novel analysis of comparative quantifiers such as more than three students. The prevalent view on such expressions advocated in Generalized Quantifier Theory is that they denoted generalized quantifiers ranging over individuals - entirely on a par with expressions like every student, some student(s), etc. According to this view, more than three is a determiner (like every) that is, even though morpho-syntactically complex, semantically a simplex expression that can be viewed as denoting a relation between sets of individuals. The proposal that will be developed in this thesis on the other hand maintains that expressions like more than three are also semantically complex. More specifically, an analysis of comparative quantifiers will be given that is fully compositional down to level of the formation of comparative determiners. The proposal is based on concepts that are independently needed to analyze comparative constructions. Three main pieces will be argued to form the semantic and syntactic core of comparative quantifiers: a degree function expressed by many, a degree description given by the numeral (which will be analyzed as measure phrase) and the comparative relation expressed by the comparative morpheme -er. Importantly, each of the three pieces can be empirically shown to interact in predictably (and partially independent) ways with elements inside the quantifier as well as with elements in the matrix clause. These interactions are unexpected unless comparative quantifiers are built in the syntax. Giving a fully compositional analysis is therefore not just conceptually appealing but also required to explain new empirical generalizations. The more general enterprise that this thesis hopes pave the way is giving a uniform and fully compositional analysis of comparative quantificational structures that does not exist so far.
by Martin Hackl.
Ph.D.

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Müller, Torsten. "Football, language and linguistics time-critical utterances in unplanned spoken language, their structures and their relation to non-linguistic situations and events /." Tübingen : Narr, 2007. http://books.google.com/books?id=mlhiAAAAMAAJ.

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Haugen, Jason D. "Issues in comparative Uto-Aztecan morphosyntax." Diss., The University of Arizona, 2004. http://hdl.handle.net/10150/290110.

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This dissertation seeks to test recent important theoretical ideas in the Principles and Parameters and Distributed Morphology frameworks against data from the relatively under-studied Uto-Aztecan languages. In this work I focus on the morphology of reduplication, noun incorporation and related derivational morphology, and the diachronic development of the polysynthetic morphological type in one sub-branch of the family (Corachol-Aztecan). With respect to prosodic morphology, I argue that the comparative Uto-Aztecan evidence suggests that reduplicants should be viewed as morphological pieces, and I analyze them as Vocabulary Items inserted into syntactic slots at Morphological Structure. I also argue that the evidence of cognate reduplication patterns across Uto-Aztecan supports a prosodic view of morphology, as well as the constraint-ranking approach to morphophonology. With respect to noun incorporation and derivational morphology, I argue that the comparative Uto-Aztecan evidence supports the view that denominal verbs are a sub-class of noun-incorporating verbs. I survey the noun incorporation types in Uto-Aztecan and classify NI in these languages into four types: N-V compounding, syntactic NI, classificatory NI, and "object polysynthesis". I offer a unified syntactic account of these types, maintaining that each is formed via head-movement in syntax. I provide a novel approach to hyponomous objects, suggesting that these are in argument positions, and that they are derived via the Late Insertion of material that is not cognate to the incorporated noun, but which is inserted into the lower copy of a movement chain. Non-theme "nominal" roots incorporated into verbs, such as instrumental prefixes, are analyzed as adverbial elements Merged directly into the verbal position. Finally, I argue that this theoretical analysis of NI leads naturally to a diachronic account of the development of polysynthesis in Nahuatl. I show that the crucial aspects of polysynthesis, subject and object pronominal marking on the verb as well as syntactic noun incorporation, have analogues elsewhere in Uto-Aztecan, and I offer a reconstruction of the likely stages of the development of polysynthesis in Nahuatl, each of which have attestation elsewhere in the family.

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Silvestri, Sara. "A Comparative Analysis of Donald Trump's and Hillary Clinton's Political Discourse." Bachelor's thesis, Alma Mater Studiorum - Università di Bologna, 2018. http://amslaurea.unibo.it/16545/.

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In this dissertation, I carry out an analysis of Hillary Clinton's and Donald Trump's political discourse in the 2016 US presidential campaign, in order to identify non-obvious meanings and patterns in their distinctive use of language. This comparison is carried out using a corpus-assisted approach, taking advantage of tools developed within corpus linguistics, such as the corpus query tool 'AntConc'. Based on the comparison of lists of keywords for both corpora, the analysis highlights aspects of their political rhetoric that would not be noticeable by simply reading the transcripts.

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Siddiki, Asma Azam. "Developmental and behavioural studies in English and Arabic inflectional morphology." Thesis, University of Oxford, 2002. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.269485.

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Loffredo, Eugenia. "The translator's voyage into madness : an experimental translation of Jeanne Hyvrad's MeÌ€re la mort." Thesis, University of East Anglia, 2002. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.268578.

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Morgan, Tricia. "A comparative study of hypernymic patterns for knowledge extraction." Thesis, National Library of Canada = Bibliothèque nationale du Canada, 2001. http://www.collectionscanada.ca/obj/s4/f2/dsk3/ftp04/MQ58487.pdf.

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Ozbeck, Nurdan. "Discourse markers in Turkish and English : a comparative study." Thesis, University of Nottingham, 1995. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.281623.

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Matsinhe, Sozinho Francisco. "Pronominal clitics in Tsonga and Mozambican Portuguese : a comparative study." Thesis, SOAS, University of London, 1997. http://eprints.soas.ac.uk/28507/.

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This thesis contrasts the system of pronominal clitics (also known as subject and object markers) in Tsonga, a Bantu language spoken in Mozambique, with that of European Portuguese; and seeks to establish how the co-existence of the two languages in the bilingual section of the community is reflected in the variety of Portuguese spoken by Tsonga native speakers, referred to here as "Popular Mozambican Portuguese (PMP)". The theoretical framework within which the languages are analyzed is Lexical Functional Grammar (LFG), which has been used extensively in the past for describing subject and object markers in Bantu languages. In addition, it has a mechanism for differentiating between grammatical and anaphoric agreement, which is a central issue in the syntax of Tsonga and European Portuguese pronominal clitics. Chapter 1 outlines the aims of the thesis, and the structure and administration of the questionnaire used to investigate the usage of pronominal clitics in PMP. It also discusses the position of Tsonga and European Portuguese in the Mozambican constellation of languages; and presents the main aspects of LFG relevant to the thesis. Chapter 2 discusses the Tsonga class and number system and the European Portuguese systems of number, gender and case, features of which are signalled by the pronominal clitics. Chapter 3 looks at the argument structure and syntax of verbs in both languages, focusing on the types of objects selected by different verbs, and on the ways such objects are marked in these languages. Furthermore, this chapter also considers Tsonga verbs which are derived by means of the applicative and causative affixes. Chapter 4 is the core of the thesis. For, while dealing with the subject and object pronominal clitics in Tsonga and European Portuguese, concentrating on the main distributional and functional differences between them, it seeks to determine the conditions under which the pronominal clitics mark anaphoric agreement and grammatical agreement in the two languages. It also provides an account of independent pronouns in Tsonga and European Portuguese, paying particularattention to their discourse functions. Chapter 5 discusses the Tsonga reflexive marker, comparing it with its counterpart in European Portuguese and considering its distribution and the effects on the verbs that host it. It also argues that while the situation of the reflexive markers in other Bantu languages remains unclear in the literature, the Tsonga reflexive marker is nothing more than a derivational suffix and, therefore, should be treated in conjunction with the applicative, causative, passive and reciprocal affixes. Chapter 6 discusses the pattern of grammatical variation found in the forms and function of the pronominal clitics in PMP, concluding with a general consideration as regards the future of the Portuguese language in Mozambique. Chapter 7 contains concluding remarks which highlight the the results of the thesis.

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E, Chen-chun. "The syntax of comparative correlatives in Mandarin Chinese." Thesis, The University of Arizona, 2014. http://pqdtopen.proquest.com/#viewpdf?dispub=3622174.

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This dissertation is an analysis, assuming the framework of Government and Binding Theory, of the syntactic derivation of comparative correlative constructions (hereafter CCs for short) in Mandarin Chinese. It attempts to evaluate the theoretical adequacy of extant treatments of CCs and propose an alternative analysis to the prevailing adjunct approach.

CC constructions exist crosslinguistically. An English example is The more chocolate I eat, the happier I feel. In Chinese, a simplex CC sentence consists of two non-coordinated clauses; the lexical word yue, which indicates degree, is obligatory in both clauses, as illustrated in (1): (1) tianqi yue₁ re, dian-fei yue₂ gao. weather [ YUE₁ hot], electricity-fee [YUE₂ high] 'The hotter the weather is, the higher the electricity fee is.'

Unlike the English comparative phrase, which has been shown to undergo A-bar movement in earlier studies, the yue-constituent remains in situ. I argue that yue is generated in [Spec, DegP] and behaves as an indefinite in-situ degree element on a par with an in-situ wh-element (Li 1992; Tsai 1994; Cheng and Rooryck 2000; Cheng 2003a, 2003b). The yue-variable in each clause is unselectively bound (Lewis 1975, Heim 1982, Cheng and Huang 1996) by an implicit CORRELATIVITY OPERATOR and does not undergo A-bar movement.

In addition to the idiosyncratic in-situ yue-phrase, another property of CCs is the syntactic interdependency between the constitutive clauses. Earlier studies (Dikken 2005, Taylor 2006, 2009, Tsao and Hsiao 2002) treat the preceding clause as an adjunct. However, an adjunct approach cannot account for the property of syntactic interdependency. As an alternative, I assume Rizzi's (1997) work on the Split CP Hypothesis, arguing that Chinese CCs implicate the information structure in the left periphery and that they are a type of Focus construction. A Chinese CC sentence like (1) is projected by a null functional head Foc⁰. The first clause is focused and base-generated in [Spec, FocP] and the second clause is the complement of the null Foc⁰. The [+focus] feature in Foc⁰ licenses the co-occurrence of yue₁ and yue₂. This alternative analysis can capture not only crosslinguistic commonalities but also the language-internal property of topic-prominence in Chinese.

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Rodriguez, Gabriel R. "The Enregisterment of Dialects in Japanese YouTube Comments| A Comparative Analysis." Thesis, Georgetown University, 2018. http://pqdtopen.proquest.com/#viewpdf?dispub=10788816.

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This study contextualizes the explosive valorization and commodification of dialect in Japan since the 1980s, known as the “dialect boom”, in terms of Japanese social and economic issues and the growing public interest in diversity within Japan. While the dialect boom has been widely studied in sociolinguistics, little work has related it to the growing valorization of diversity, and most recent work has focused primarily on the Kansai dialect. To these ends, I analyze the enregisterment of six Japanese dialects, those of Osaka, Hakata, Nagoya, Aomori, Okinawa, and K?sh?. I analyze a corpus of YouTube comments responding to videos of dialect usage, using stance (DuBois 2007) to break down the social acts that produce enregisterment (Agha 2003). I draw on the theories of indexicality (Johnstone and Kiesling 2008, Eckert 2008) and the discourse analytic concept of dialect performance (Schilling-Estes 1998, Coupland 2007) as guides to interpreting the micro-social interactions I observe, connecting them to a macro-social context through the theories of Standard Language Ideology (Lippi-Green 1997), identity construction (Bucholtz & Hall 2005), and folklorization (Fishman 1987).

I examine evaluations of dialect based on attractiveness, humorousness, intelligibility, folklorization, and country-ness, evaluate their relative prestige by investigating the willingness of speakers to debate dialect performances’ fidelity, and finally examine the political conflicts dialects are implicated in by looking at how they are related to questions of diversity and nationalism. The similarities between evaluations of the dialects of Okinawa and Aomori, particularly in the category of folklorization, suggest that the dialects of Aomori have accrued affective traits of an Indigenous language (such as nostalgia or sentimentality) despite being spoken by members of the ethnic majority. However, the conflicts that arise over the cases of Okinawa and Osaka suggest that the use of dialect as a marker of regional identity is now being integrated into a nationalist Japanese self-image as a country with rich internal diversity. This provides a means by which Japan can engage with the discourses of liberal multiculturalism and diversity without seriously threatening the hegemony of Japanese ethno-nationalism, suggesting a need to reevaluate the past focus on nihonjinron in building critiques of Japanese nationalist ideology.

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Quwaider, Hussain M. "Idiomaticity in Arabic : towards a comparative exploration in English Arabic idiomaticity." Thesis, University of Bath, 1997. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.299689.

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Zaixi, Tan. "A comparative study of the Chinese and Western traditions of translation." Thesis, University of Exeter, 1998. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.264610.

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Alsulami, Abeer S. "Comparative constructions in Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) : an HPSG approach." Thesis, University of Essex, 2018. http://repository.essex.ac.uk/22326/.

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The aim of this thesis is to provide a description of comparative constructions in Modern Standard Arabic (henceforth MSA) and develop an analysis for some of the facts framed within Head - driven Phrase Structure Grammar (henceforth, HPSG). To the best of my knowledge, MSA comparative constructions have not been addressed before but present an interesting challenge for Arabic and general linguistics. MSA has simple and complex comparatives, which look rather like their counterparts in many other languages. Simple comparatives are indeed like those of other languages, in that it involves adjectives with a distinctive form and semantics and an extra PP complement. Complex comparatives, however, are quite different. They involve an adjective with a nominal complement, which may be an adjectival maṣdar (known in English as adjectival noun) or an ordinary noun, and are rather like so-called 'adjectival constructs'. Complex comparatives in English and many other languages might be analysed as involving periphrasis, where a slot in a paradigm is filled not by a single word but by a pair of words. My analysis, however, argues that MSA complex comparative construction is not a case of periphrasis. Instead, it is an independent construction that expresses the meaning that would otherwise be expressed by certain missing forms. Simple comparatives, complex comparatives, and adjectival constructs can all be analysed with lexical rules within HPSG. With a 'real' nominal comparative that quantifies a noun, the thesis shows that in MSA kutubun ʔakṯar 'more books' and kutubun ʔaḥsan 'better books' are syntactically essentially the same in which we have nouns with an attributive adjective. The thesis also shows that MSA has both ordinary clausal comparatives and phrasal comparatives. The former is introduced only by maa and involves adjectival and nominal gaps and adverbial gaps in subcomparative cases and the latter is introduced by free relatives maa , man and allḏai and have either nominal gaps or resumptives. It was also shown that maa comparatives with nominal gaps are ambiguous and can be either a clausal or a phrasal complement.

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Mtenje, Atikonda. "A comparative analysis of the phonology and morpho-syntax of Cisukwa, Cindali and Cilambya." Doctoral thesis, University of Cape Town, 2016. http://hdl.handle.net/11427/22877.

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This PhD thesis describes and compares the grammars of Cisukwa, Cindali and Cilambya (SuNdaLa) - three closely related varieties spoken in the northern region of Malawi. The analysis of the language data collected in this research project focuses on the phonological and morpho-syntactic systems of the SuNdaLa varieties by examining variation among them and by identifying the shared linguistic features. Within this research project, the linguistic distance among the three varieties has been analysed and suggestions have been made as to whether the SuNdaLa varieties should be considered as being three dialects of one language or as constituting three distinct languages. The study also places the SuNdaLa cluster into a wider context of the Bantu languages spoken in the region and more generally. Quantitative and qualitative language data was collected in the field from "native" speakers of all three varieties. The SuNdaLa survey included the collection of a comparative word list by using a questionnaire that was designed based on existing wordlists, such as „Swadesh 100 word list‟ (Swadesh 1955) as well as the SIL Comparative African Wordlist (Snider and Roberts 2006). Language data on the morpho-sytax and phonology was collected in elicitation sessions as well as by recording natural conversations among the key language consultants as well as their conversations with other community members.

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Schwarz, Anne. "QUIS data from Buli, Kɔnni and Baatɔnum with notes on the comparative approach." Universität Potsdam, 2011. http://opus.kobv.de/ubp/volltexte/2011/5141/.

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Contents: 1. Introduction 2. Selection of QUIS Data for Comparative Goals 2.1 Fairy Tale (Topic and Focus in Coherent Discourse) 2.2 Focus Translation Extract 3. On the Presentation and Comparison of the Data 4. Buli 4.1 Tomatoes Fairy Tale in Buli 4.2 Focus Translation Extract in Buli 5. Kɔnni 5.1 Tomatoes Fairy Tale in Kɔnni 5.2 Focus Translation Extract 6. Baatɔnum 6.1 Tomatoes Fairy Tale in Baatɔnum 6.2 Focus Translation Extract in Baatɔnum

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Collins, Clifford John. "Homonymous verbs in biblical Hebrew : an investigation of the role of comparative philology." Thesis, University of Liverpool, 1988. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.328118.

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Cowles, Heidi Wind. "Processing information structure : evidence from comprehension and production /." Diss., Connect to a 24 p. preview or request complete full text in PDF format. Access restricted to UC campuses, 2003. http://wwwlib.umi.com/cr/ucsd/fullcit?p3100373.

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Mitchell, Alison. "Failure of substitutivity in intensional contexts : a linguistic solution." Thesis, McGill University, 1990. http://digitool.Library.McGill.CA:80/R/?func=dbin-jump-full&object_id=59418.

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In this thesis, I attempt to provide a linguistic solution to the problem of failure of substitutivity in intensional contexts, with specific emphasis on sentences containing verbs of propositional attitude, for example, "believe", "say", "think", "realize", etc. Many solutions to this problem have been proposed in the philosophical literature (the major ones will be reviewed in this thesis) and most of the linguistic analyses to date have been based upon the logical concepts invoked in the former. Using the pragmatic notion of "point of view" as defined by Reinhart (1975), I provide an alternate solution that takes into account the intuitions of speakers of natural language. My solution is based on the fact that different points of view can result in different referents for an expression, and that this difference is essential to the semantic interpretation and truth value of intensional sentences. I also discuss so-called identity statements of the form 'a = b' (where 'a' and 'b' stand for coreferential expressions), arguing that there is both semantic and syntactic evidence for the claim that natural language utterances of this form do not express identity.

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Bhatti, Joanna. "The communication of emotions in England and Poland : compliments and refusals." Thesis, University of Bedfordshire, 2014. http://hdl.handle.net/10547/575283.

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Previous research has shown some significant differences in the way speech acts are made and responded to in different cultures and languages. This study investigates two speech acts in particular, compliments and refusals, in two specific cultures, England and Poland. The project investigates the role of emotions in communication and social interaction with reference to these speech acts, which are particularly interesting due to their opposite emotional valence: compliments are perceived as positive and refusals are negative. English and Polish compliments and refusals are investigated as the two cultures are often perceived as proximate, which suggests that the observed differences will be particularly interesting as they have the potential to shed light on important and yet intractable distinguishing features of the two cultures. The research has two lines of investigation: theoretical and empirical. The theoretical aspect of research aims to bring together insights on the role of emotions in communication and a cognitive perspective on communication to explain the functions of compliments and refusals in social interaction and the relation between the cognitive and affective aspects of the production and reception of these speech acts. The empirical part of the research is based on an original study that presents new insights into complimenting and refusing behaviour in English and Polish culture. The comparison of English and Polish findings reveals many similarities in complimenting behaviour and some striking differences in refusing behaviour (most notably, Polish speakers tend to be less congruent than English speakers when making refusals and their refusals tend to be more detailed and more elaborate). The pragmatic analysis of the data has some interesting implications for the classification of compliment responses, suggesting that the classification should be based on appreciation, rather than on acceptance or rejection.

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MATUS, LAUREN A. "SCOTS GAELIC AND WELSH: A COMPARATIVE CASE STUDY IN LANGUAGE SURVIVAL." University of Cincinnati / OhioLINK, 2005. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ucin1132347017.

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Al-Ageli, Hussein M. "Syllabic and metrical structure in Tripolitanian Arabic : a comparative study in standard and optimality theory." Thesis, University of Essex, 1995. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.294669.

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Reiter, Rosina Marquez. "'Polite' and 'impolite' requests and apologies in British English and Uruguayan Spanish : a comparative study." Thesis, University of Sheffield, 1999. http://etheses.whiterose.ac.uk/14780/.

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The research hereby presented provides an analysis and interpretation of the realisation patterns of requests and apologies by female and male native speakers of British English and Uruguayan Spanish. The speech acts in question have been analysed following Brown and Levinson's (1978, 1987) 'negative' and 'positive' politeness distinction. The data for the study were collected in Uruguay and England by means of a non-prescriptive open role-play designed for the present study and performed by university students in both countries. The results obtained show that the performance of the above speech acts is motivated by the same social variables in Uruguayan Spanish and British English. The level of (in)directness in requests correlates negatively with the social distance between the interlocutors. In other words, the smaller the social distance between the participants the more direct the request will be. The performance of apologies, on the other hand, is motivated by an interaction between the severity of the offence and social power in that the less social power a speaker has in relation to his/her addressee and the more severe the offence, the more likely s/he is to apologise. The results also show that higher levels of indirectness together with heavily modified requests are appropriate in British English but not in Uruguayan Spanish where a preference for less tentative requests is expected. In terms of the apologies, this study shows the British employing a much higher number of intensified as well as non-intensified apologies than the Uruguayans. With respect to the distinction between 'positive' and 'negative' politeness this study shows that both forms of politeness interpreted as the want for association and dissociation respectively, are present in both British and Uruguayan culture with the British showing a tendency to pursue 'negative' politeness more than the Uruguayans. This pattern was also found to be present in the linguistic behaviour British and Uruguayan females when compared to their male counterparts.

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Hasan, Ali S. "Variation in spoken discourse in and beyond the english foreign language classroom : a comparative study." Thesis, Aston University, 1988. http://publications.aston.ac.uk/14816/.

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This study is concerned with one of the most interesting and the least well-researched areas in contemporary research on classroom interaction: that of the discourse variability exhibited by participants. It investigates the way in which the language of native speakers (NSs) as well as that of non-native speakers (NNSs) may vary according to the circumstances under which it is produced. The study, therefore, attempts to characterise the performance of both NSs and NNSs (with particular emphasis placed on the latter) in various types of interaction in and beyond the EFL classroom. These are: Formal Interview (FI), Formal Classroom Interaction (FCI), Informal Classroom Interaction (ICI), Informal Classroom Discussion (ICD), and Informal Conversation (IC). The corpus of the study consisted of four NSs and fifteen NNSs. Both a video and a tape recording was made for each type of interaction, with the exception of the IC which was only audio-recorded so as not to inhibit the natural use of language. Each lasted for 35 minutes. The findings of the study mark clearly the distinction between the `artificiality' of classroom interaction and the `naturalness' or `authenticity' of non-classroom discourse. Amongst the most interesting findings are the following: Unlike both FCI and ICI, in the FI, ICD, and IC, the language of NNSs was characterised by: greater quantity of oral output, a wider range of errors, the use of natural discourse strategies such as holding the floor and self-correction, and a greater number of initiations in both ICD and IC. It is suggested that if `natural' or `authentic' discourse is to be promoted, the incorporation of FI, ICD, and IC into the EFL classroom activities is much needed. The study differs from most studies on classroom interaction in that it attempts to relate work in the EFL classroom to the `real' world as its prime objective.

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Levi, Susannah V. "The representation of underlying glides : a cross-linguistic study /." Thesis, Connect to this title online; UW restricted, 2004. http://hdl.handle.net/1773/8406.

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Huang, MeiYen. "A comparative study of editorials in Chinese and English." CSUSB ScholarWorks, 2006. https://scholarworks.lib.csusb.edu/etd-project/3054.

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The study reveals national cultures may influence the use of politeness strategies and organizational patterns in editorials written in the two languages, English and Chinese. Due to a newspaper's political orientation and its regional and national background, the rhetorical form of linguistic features in editorials might vary among cultures.

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Kabinga, Moonde. "A comparative study of the Morphosyntaz and Phonetics of Town Bemba and Standard Bemba of the Copperbelt Zambia." Master's thesis, University of Cape Town, 2010. http://hdl.handle.net/11427/3612.

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For many years now, the status of Town Bemba (TB) has been fuzzy in its descriptions, as no specific framework has been used in characterising the language variety. TB has been regarded as an urban variety spoken in the townships of the Copperbelt province, Zambia. It had also been perceived as a 'secret language' or 'mixed jargon' used by male migrant workers on the mine, but today, it is used by males and females across the board, and also tends to be used as first language (L1) for offspring raised there. This research attempts to investigate the status of TB. It will also make observations of any significant differences between TB and Standard Bemba (SB) through linguistic markers and style of speech by the informants. The comparative analysis will help in assessing the extent to which TB has deviated from SB. The data for morphosyntax, socio-phonetic and lexical analyses was collected through one-on-one interviews and two TB music lyrics. Twenty speakers of TB and SB were interviewed in this research. For data analysis three theoretical frameworks were used namely; Myers-Scotton's Matrix Language Frame Model (MLF) for the morphosyntax data; socio-phonetics using Praat and Normalisation of vowels for phonetic data; and a linguistic characterisation of language varieties were used to characterise TB and establish its status. The results show that TB is quite similar to the base language SB and exemplifies general characteristics that are more similar to Tsotsitaal. The difference is that the former (TB) uses one base language (SB) with heavy borrowing and assimilations from English mainly and a bit from local languages like Nyanja, and Afrikaans; the variety is used by people of different ethnic backgrounds, its commonly used in everyday life among educated and non-educated male and female speakers. TB also has been able to preserve many forms associated with more traditional Bemba and at the same time shows changes in some of its lexical and grammatical forms, mainly simplification. Tsotsitaal in comparison is associated with many base languages but behaves similarly to TB in other ways. In this regard, I suggest that TB be referred to as another type of an urban variety that is moving towards being a new language because it is more than a 'style' (Hurst 2008) like Tsotsitaal.

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Teso, Elena. "A comparative study of gender-based linguistic reform across four European countries." Thesis, Liverpool John Moores University, 2010. http://researchonline.ljmu.ac.uk/5952/.

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The overall aim of this investigation is to identify the strategies adopted for the implementation of gender-based linguistic reform in four European countries (France, Germany, Spain and the United Kingdom). In addressing this aim, firstly the study explores the recommendations to eliminate discrimination of women and men from language at supranational level in order to determine whether international recommendations have influenced legislation in the four countries. Secondly, the recommendations on non-sexist language in each national context have been reviewed taking into account the structural features of each language. The study shows the diverse linguistic resources that each of the four language systems has in order to achieve non-discriminatory language and identifies the key recommendations as well as the main promoters of gender-based linguistic reform in each country. The study has found that in all four countries a significant number of measures designed to combat linguistic sexism have been introduced. The investigation also' aims at providing evidence of the adoption of guidelines for the avoidance of sexist language as well as the stages of implementation in each country. To this end, a linguistic analysis of job offers in the four languages has been carried out. This longitudinal study has helped to identify patterns of language usage across the four socia-linguistic settings as well as the preferred strategy in each language. The main finding is that, although there is no consistent strategy regarding the feminisation of occupational nomenclature in the four languages, the common intention has been to make the language of communication gender-inclusive. The study offers a contribution to the existing work in the area of cross-cultural research. Furthermore, the review of similarities and differences between the recommendations for non-sexist language and their implementation in four linguistic settings aims to provide a framework for further research and practical application which can be drawn from the linguistic analysis of naturally occurring data.

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Fernández, Fuertes Raquel. "A comparative analysis of verb-movement effects in English and Spanish: Pollock and the Minimalist approach." Thesis, University of Ottawa (Canada), 1996. http://hdl.handle.net/10393/10128.

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Recent developments in linguistic theory carried out within the Principles and Paramater Model and the Minimalist Program provide an excellent framework for the comparison of languages. In this thesis we use said framework to analyze the Verb-movement phenomena of English and Spanish. We specifically concentrate on the Null Subject parameter and the Verb-movement parameter in order to provide a comparative account of word order differences and similarities between English, Spanish and French. We show that the $\lbrack+/-$ strong) agreement differences are responsible for: (1) the relationship between auxiliary verbs and participles in compound verbal constructions; (2) the placement of adverbs in these constructions, and (3) the movement relationships established in existential constructions and other constructions with auxiliaries.

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Zhuang, Chulin. "Female Masculinity in Rhetorical Encounters: The Juxtapositional Recontextualization of Tomboy and Nü Hanzi." Miami University / OhioLINK, 2017. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=miami1482431222336284.

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Omar, Shalina. "Being Japanese in English: The Social and Functional Role of English Loanwords in Japanese." Scholarship @ Claremont, 2015. http://scholarship.claremont.edu/scripps_theses/620.

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This thesis investigates native speaker attitudes towards English loanwords in Japanese and the ways in which these loanwords are used. The imperialism and hegemony of English can often cause anger or worry for the preservation of the cultural identity of the borrowing language. However, the results from a 9-page sociolinguistic questionnaire suggest that English loanwords are overwhelmingly seen as useful and necessary and are generally associated with positive attitudes. Additionally, many native Japanese speakers feel that loanwords provide more options for expression, both functionally and as a possible pragmatic tool for performing Japaneseness. On the other hand, overuse of loanwords—especially less common ones—can also exemplify the power imbalance between Japanese and the powerful and hegemonic English. The study also revealed how powerful the Japanese linguistic systems are at assimilating English into the Japanese language. With established and institutionally supported phonological and orthographic conventions in place, foreign-derived vocabulary can easily become nativized, assimilated, and considered to be Japanese in the minds of speakers.

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Yavari, Sonia. "Linguistic Landscape and Language Policies: A Comparative Study of Linköping University and ETH Zürich." Thesis, Linköpings universitet, Avdelningen för språk och kultur, 2012. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:liu:diva-86009.

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Examining the languages in the public space i.e. the linguistic landscape is an emerging field of sociolinguistics, and research focused on the relationship between the linguistic landscape (LL) and language policy has recently garnered particular interest. This paper aims to study the linguistic landscapes of two different universities (Linköping University and ETH Zürich) in two different countries (Sweden and Switzerland, respectively) with rather different language policies. The aim is to ascertain some of the striking differences, as well as, the similarities between the two universities in terms of the public use of languages. Apart from the study of LL, the paper investigates the relationship between LL and language policy, and uncovers any contrasts which take place between top-down (posted by the university staff) and bottom-up (not inscribed by the university personnel) forces. The study of LL in these two universities is particularly interesting; since they are home to many international students; it is thus quite likely that the national languages are not the only languages found in the linguistic landscape. Furthermore, as Sweden is a monolingual country (basically Swedish), and Switzerland is a multilingual country (German, French, Italian and Romansch), comparing the two could yield insightful results regarding the public use of different languages in these different linguistic settings. Moreover, because of the influence universities have on society, studying the university space is of importance. This study tries to answer to the following research questions: What are the visible languages in the linguistic landscape of LiU and ETH? How are languages distributed in different areas? What is the status of English in proportion to other languages in bilingual signs? How are languages distributed in top-down and bottom-up signs? What kinds of multilingual signs are present? What is a clear classification scheme for signs found in the LL, and how are languages distributed in this scheme? What are the language policies of these two universities? Are there any policies regarding the languages written on signs? Are the language policies reflected in patterns of language use on signs, and are they reflected in top-down signs more visibly than in bottom-up signs?

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Zushi, Mihoko. "Long-distance dependencies." Thesis, McGill University, 1995. http://digitool.Library.McGill.CA:80/R/?func=dbin-jump-full&object_id=28974.

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This thesis proposes a modification of Chomsky's (1992) theory of locality to deal with restructuring phenomena which allow an apparent violation of the locality condition on certain local processes. Various restructuring phenomena including long-distance NP movement exemplified by long-distance Object Preposing (Chapter 2) and long-distance head movement exemplified by clitic climbing (Chapter 3) are examined cross linguistically. Long-distance anaphora (Chapter 4) are also examined based on the view the locality on various types of anaphor-antecedent relationships follow from the theory of movement.
It is argued that the peculiar behavior of restructuring constructions in terms of locality follows from the lexical properties of restructuring verbs that allows a defective Tense to occur in the complement clause. The following effects result: (i) Case checking within the embedded clause becomes impossible; (ii) the defective Tense triggers incorporation of the infinitive verb into the matrix verb. As a result, the embedded element that requires Case is forced to raise into the matrix clause as a last resort operation, hence motivation long-distance movement.
In order to reconcile long-distance movement with the economy principle which requires chain links to be minimal, this thesis refines Chomsky's (1992) theory of locality. The proposed hypothesis claims that the locality condition on certain operations such as NP movement and head movement follows from the economy principle in such a way that an element can move to the closest position in which its morphological requirement can be satisfied. This notion of the shortest movement is further clarified in that the domain in which the shortest movement requirement is satisfied can be extended if there is an appropriate linked chain formed by head movement. The proposed system not only provides principled account for the phenomena of restructuring, but also has some important implications for the notion of economy of derivation.

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Guthrie, Anna Marie. "Quotative tense shift in American English authority-encounter narratives." CSUSB ScholarWorks, 1994. https://scholarworks.lib.csusb.edu/etd-project/916.

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Petersson, Katrin. "How closings are accomplished in talk show interviews : A comparative linguistic study." Thesis, Högskolan i Halmstad, Akademin för lärande, humaniora och samhälle, 2015. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:hh:diva-27645.

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This is a comparative linguistic essay aimed to investigate how closing sections construct social interaction in a number of talk shows, primarily The Daily Show and The Colbert Report. The talk show data is analyzed by means of Conversation Analysis (CA) which considers how language performs social interaction and the structures and norms which give the frames for this. The results of the analysis are compared to the results of a study carried out in 2003 by Esperanza Rama Martinez on the same subject matter. Martinez´ study is in fact the foundation for this study. In her study Martinez concludes that the closing phase is initiated by the interviewer and that there are always pre-closing components before the closing components begin. The results of this study are in line with Martinez´ study.

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Young, A. S. "Motivational state and process within the sociolinguistic context : an Anglo-French comparative study of school pupils learning foreign languages." Thesis, Aston University, 1994. http://publications.aston.ac.uk/14859/.

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The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of the socio-cultural environment upon the motivation school children have to learn foreign languages. Motivation was therefore considered from a sociolinguistic, rather than from a psycholinguistic perspective, giving primary importance to contextual, as opposed to personal factors. In order to examine the degree of relationship between motivational intensity and the contextual factors of parental attitudes, amount of foreign language exposure and the employment related value of foreign language learning (FLL), data obtained from school children living in two distinct sociolinguistic environments (Mulhouse, France and Walsall, England) were compared and contrasted. A structured sample drawn from pupils attending schools in Mulhouse and Walsall supplied the data base for this research. The main thrust of the study was quantitative in approach, involving the distribution of almost 1000 questionnaires to pupils in both towns. This was followed up by the use of qualitative methods, in the form of in-depth interviews with an individually matched sample of over 50 French/English pupils. The findings of the study indicate that FLL orientations, attitudes and motivation vary considerably between the two sociolinguistic environments. Levels of motivation were generally higher in the French sample than in the English one. Desire to learn foreign languages and a commitment to expend effort in order to fulfil this desire were key components of this motivation. The study also found evidence to suggest that the importance accorded to FLL by the socio-cultural context, communicated to the child through the socialisation agents of the family, the mass media and prospective employers, is of key importance in FLL motivation.

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Urakami, Junnosuke. "Some problems in the phonology of Old Japanese reconsidered in the light of comparative evidence from the Amami dialects." Thesis, SOAS, University of London, 1989. http://eprints.soas.ac.uk/29487/.

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This thesis focuses on the most controversial phonological problem in Old Japanese, the phonetic and phonological status of two types of syllables, found in written texts, known as the 'A/B-type' contrast. Previous approaches have centred around the phonetic evaluation of Middle Chinese characters, and examination of Pre-Old Japanese diphthongal sources reconstructed through the morpho-phonemic analysis of Old Japanese. All of these approaches have various limitations, since Old Japanese does not provide sufficient evidence to support the results thus gained. Recently attempts have been made to apply study of the Ryukyu dialects to the problem. In particular linguists have claimed that the Modern Amami dialects reflect the A/B-type distinction. The importance here lies in the fact that study within this field can provide firm empirical evidence. The present thesis, therefore, aims at shedding light on the A/B-type distinction by a study of the Modern Amami dialects, specifically by the reconstruction of the phonemes of Proto-Amami. Chapter One is an introduction, containing the argument in favour of undertaking this line of research, with details of the survey and informant information. Chapter Two contains a review of the Old Japanese A/B distinction, plus a survey of previous works in the field by Hashimoto, Arisaka, Lange, Unger, Ono, Matsumoto, Mori, etc. Problems to be dealt with in the present work are isolated. Chapter Three discusses the Ryukyu dialects, and focuses in on the importance of the Amami dialects. It concludes with a synchronic overview of the Amami dialects. Chapter Four contains the reconstruction of Proto-Amami phonemes, a synchronic description of Proto-Amami and sound changes. Chapter Five offers a sub-grouping of the Modern Amami dialects, with a tree diagram and isoglosses. Chapter Six contains a comparison of the Old Japanese A/B contrast with PA. Chapter Seven compares the results obtained for PA from Chapter Six with the work of past researchers, specifically Shibata. Chapter Eight is a summary of this work, plus suggestions for further work on Proto-Amami.

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Coopmans, Peter. "Language types, continua or parameters? Taaltypen, continua of parameters? : (met een samenvatting in het Nederlands) /." Utrecht : Drukkerij Elinkwijk BV, 1985. http://catalog.hathitrust.org/api/volumes/oclc/54192013.html.

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Wu, Zhaojun. "Learning bilingual semantic frames /." View abstract or full-text, 2008. http://library.ust.hk/cgi/db/thesis.pl?CSED%202008%20WUZ.

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Smith, Elizabeth Allyn. "Correlational Comparison in English." The Ohio State University, 2010. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1282105587.

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Ndlovu, Sambulo. "A comparative analysis of metaphorical expressions used by rural and urban Ndebele speakers: the contribution of S'ncamtho." Doctoral thesis, University of Cape Town, 2018. http://hdl.handle.net/11427/29515.

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This thesis explores language expansion and change through metaphorical expressions that originate with urban youth varieties. It focuses on the impact of S'ncamtho, an Ndebele-based urban youth variety of Bulawayo in Zimbabwe along the variables of rural/urban, sex, age and level of education. The thesis uses Cognitive Metaphor Theory to build on research on metaphor in urban youth varieties to answer the overarching question; how is S'ncamtho impacting Ndebele? It confirms that sex and sexuality, music and partying, love and relationships are popular themes in S'ncamtho. The thesis identifies relexicalisation and replacement of metaphoric vehicles as the main metaphor derivational strategies in S'ncamtho and confirms the existence of clearly discernible genres of metaphor in S'ncamtho which are proverbs, sayings, aphorisms and euphemistic metaphors. While S'ncamtho and other youth varieties in Africa have been identified as urban varieties, the study brings in the dimension of measuring the spread of S'ncamtho to peri-urban and rural areas. Data from questionnaire tests, interviews and observations is analysed using the Idiom Familiarity and Comprehension Judgement Method to measure the impact and spread of S'ncamtho metaphors. The guiding theory in evaluating the spread of S'ncamtho metaphors is a Social Psychology framework- Social Impact Theory (SIT). The thesis argues that S'ncamtho metaphors spread outside Bulawayo’s high density male youth to female and older Ndebele speakers in and outside the city, it identifies male youth in the age cohort 15- 35 years as more familiar and using more S'ncamtho metaphors compared to females and older males in urban, peri-urban and rural areas. It also reveals that S'ncamtho metaphor familiarity declines with age and distance from Bulawayo, and that generally females use less S'ncamtho compared to males and the young are more familiar with S'ncamtho compared to adults. The research reveals that there is no significant difference between rural and urban professionals in S'ncamtho metaphor familiarity and this confirms that improved communication networks impact on the spread of S'ncamtho as professional people frequent Bulawayo for pay and other services. However, the study also noted that there are still more people who have negative attitudes towards S'ncamtho, compared to those who view its impact positively. The thesis argues that the popularity of S'ncamtho has seen S'ncamtho metaphors operating in professions including journalism, health professions, teaching and religious professions. Furthermore, attitudes are changing as some people have begun to view S'ncamtho positively outside the criminal prejudices.

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Dunlop, Leonie Mhari. "Breaking old and new ground : a comparative study of coastal and inland naming in Berwickshire." Thesis, University of Glasgow, 2016. http://theses.gla.ac.uk/7739/.

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This thesis investigates the place-names of four parishes in Berwickshire and compares coastal and inland naming patterns. Berwickshire is a large county that borders on northern England and historically formed part of Anglo-Saxon Northumbria. Partly due to the survival of extensive archives from the medieval priory of Coldingham, preserved in Durham Cathedral Archives, this county holds some of Scotland’s earliest recorded place- names. The parishes that form the research area are grouped together in the north-east of the county. Two of these parishes, Abbey St Bathans and Bunkle & Preston, are inland, and two, Cockburnspath and Coldingham, have extensive coastlines. The diversity of this group of parishes allows a comparative study of the place-names of coastal and inland areas to be undertaken. The topography of Berwickshire’s thirty-two parishes is very varied, and the four parishes have been chosen to reflect this range of landscapes. The place-names within the four parishes examined in this thesis derive almost exclusively from Old English, Older Scots, Modern Scots including Standard Scottish English, with a small minority derived from Old Norse, Gaelic, and Brittonic. The chronology of Old English, Older Scots, and Modern Scots is defined as given in the Concise Scots Dictionary: Old English is the period up to 1100, Older Scots is the period 1100-1700, and Modern Scots is the period 1700 onwards (CSD, 1985: xiii). Often with place-names it is not possible to give a precise dating for the coining of a toponym. For the purposes of this study, the language label given for a toponym is that of the date of the earliest record of the place-name with earlier linguistic evidence supplementing discussion. This thesis focuses on the names of topographic features, for example hills, rocks and woodland, and the role of perception in their naming. In order to compare the role of perception in inland and coastal naming, this thesis includes a diachronic study of the toponymy of the research area, along with two case studies. The first of these is a study of the toponymy of relief features, which focuses on generic elements in order to compare the perception of one type of referent in the two environments. The second is a study of the ‘colour’ category, which focuses on qualifying elements in order to compare the use of colour terms in the two environments. This thesis is the first comparative study of inland and coastal place-names, and it is one of the first to investigate new ways of using fieldwork as a central part of its methodology. In doing so it proposes innovative and nuanced ways to understand the toponymy of diverse landscapes within a community.

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Crook, Alice Louise. "Personal naming practices in early modern Scotland : a comparative study of eleven parishes, 1680-1839." Thesis, University of Glasgow, 2016. http://theses.gla.ac.uk/8223/.

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This thesis investigates name giving in early modern Scotland through the collection and analysis of a corpus of 63,460 baptismal records from the Old Parish Registers of eleven parishes between 1680 and 1839. Some use is also made of marital and burial records. Parishes were chosen to represent a range of geographical, linguistic, and social variables, and comprise Auchtermuchty, Dundonald, Durness, Govan, Holm, Kilmallie, Kilrenny, Longside, Saltoun, Tiree, and Tongland. While large collections of first names from both mediaeval and modern Scotland have recently been made available, a dataset of early modern names has not previously been produced. The lack of such data and subsequent lack of analysis are particularly important to redress due to both the political and social upheaval in Scotland during this time, and the development of naming systems in contemporary Europe. This thesis therefore contributes both a dataset of early modern names and preliminary analysis of these names, allowing Scotland to be situated within the wider European context. The principal methodology is quantitative. By this means, the study establishes and compares the name-stock in the different parishes. It also investigates sources of names, such as first names derived from surnames, and female names derived from male names, and highlights regional and other patterns. Naming motivations are investigated through close analysis of name-sharing. Records for 16,426 families are used to establish the incidence of name-sharing with parents, maternal and paternal grandparents, deceased elder siblings, other relatives, and non-relatives such as godparents, landowners, and ministers. Birth order and unusual names are used to investigate the likelihood of name-sharing being deliberate. Rates of name-sharing are also used to demonstrate the varying incidence of conformity to the so-called Scottish ‘traditional’ naming pattern (naming after relatives in fixed sequence). For all naming practices, regional differences between these geographically disparate communities are examined, with particular focus on the Highland/Lowland divide. Although the thesis focuses primarily on first names, middle names are also examined, in terms of the name-stock, the influences behind naming, and the upward trend of this emerging practice throughout the period studied. The research establishes the primacy of mothers’ maiden names in this position, and also investigates the incidence of other types of commemorative middle names. In addition to quantitative analysis, complementary qualitative analysis of 12 case studies is presented. Each case study comprises one extended familial group, making it possible to explore in greater detail how various naming practices were used within individual families.

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Sherman, Zoe Bernadette. "Afghanistan's constitutions a comparative study and their implications for Afghan democratic development." Thesis, Monterey, Calif. : Springfield, Va. : Naval Postgraduate School ; Available from National Technical Information Service, 2006. http://library.nps.navy.mil/uhtbin/hyperion/06Mar%5FSherman.pdf.

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Thesis (M.A. in National Security Affairs)--Naval Postgraduate School, March 2006.
Thesis Advisor(s): Thomas Johnson. "March 2006." Includes bibliographical references (p. 89 -91). Also available online.

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Intachakra, Songthama. "Linguistic politeness in British English and Thai : a comparative analysis of three expressive speech acts." Thesis, Queen Mary, University of London, 2001. http://qmro.qmul.ac.uk/xmlui/handle/123456789/28852.

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This study attempts to further our understanding of linguistic politeness by focusing on both a Western and a non-Western language. It is based on two sets of data (one spontaneous and the other elicited) and provides a comparative analysis of three expressive speech acts produced by native speakers of British English and Thai. At face value, compliments, apologies and thanks may seem to have little referential meaning, yet these speech acts can be crucially important in originating, maintaining or even terminating social relationships. The data reveal a tendency for the two groups of speakers to use the three politeness devices in a different manner, reflecting cross-cultural differences in social norms and value systems. This project follows earlier studies of similar nature, in particular those carried out on different varieties of English. The findings are interpreted within pragmatic and sociolinguistic theoretical frameworks, and are discussed in the following format: linguistic structures of the speech acts, their functions, the topics of compliments, apologies and thanks, interpersonal and contextual factors influencing the production of these expressives, and the responses given to them. The analysis has implications for language specialists and lay people alike, in that it brings together a number of important insights with regard to these speech features that may result in miscommunication if and when British and Thai speakers converse in intercultural situations.

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Van, Geyte Els. "Persuasion in higher education : a comparative investigation of argumentational strategies in student and expert opinion essays." Thesis, University of Birmingham, 2018. http://etheses.bham.ac.uk//id/eprint/8636/.

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In order to succeed in Higher Education, students need to be able to argue effectively in writing. This thesis focuses on the argumentational skills of international students as manifested in short essays, similar to the written English proficiency tests for university admission. The study compared these essays to opinion pieces produced by expert academic writers. First, insights from the field of rhetoric were used to compare how the writers argued. An analytical tool was designed to deconstruct arguments into their essential parts to determine the number and distribution of these components in the texts. The results from this analysis then informed an investigation into selected types of cohesive markers and their role in managing writer-reader dialogues. The study found differences in both the argumentational and linguistic strategies used by the writers to persuade their readers, especially with regard to the integration of other voices. The thesis discusses implications for the teaching of argument in the English for Academic Purposes (EAP) curriculum and beyond, and advocates a more rhetorical approach. Recommendations include the use of a new generative model of argument in the classroom and the use of the analytical tool for further research across different argumentational genres and academic disciplines.

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Juzek, Thomas Stephan. "Acceptability judgement tasks and grammatical theory." Thesis, University of Oxford, 2016. https://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:b276ec98-5f65-468b-b481-f3d9356d86a2.

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This thesis considers various questions about acceptability judgement tasks (AJTs). In Chapter 1, we compare the prevalent informal method of syntactic enquiry, researcher introspection, to formal judgement tasks. We randomly sample 200 sentences from Linguistic Inquiry and then compare the original author judgements to online AJT ratings. Sprouse et al., 2013, provided a similar comparison, but they limited their analysis to the comparison of sentence pairs and to extreme cases. We think a comparison at large, i.e. involving all items, is more sensible. We find only a moderate match between informal author judgements and formal online ratings and argue that the formal judgements are more reliable than the informal judgements. Further, the fact that many syntactic theories rely on questionable informal data calls the adequacy of those theories into question. In Chapter 2, we test whether ratings for constructions from spoken language and constructions from written language differ if presented as speech vs as text and if presented informally vs formally. We analyse the results with an LME model and find that neither mode of presentation nor formality are significant factors. Our results suggest that a speaker's grammatical intuition is fairly robust. In Chapter 3, we quantitatively compare regular AJT data to their Z-scores and ranked data. For our analysis, we test resampled data for significant differences in statistical power. We find that Z-scores and ranked data are more powerful than raw data across most common measurement methods. Chapter 4 examines issues surrounding a common similarity test, the TOST. It has long been unclear how to set its controlling parameter d. Based on data simulations, we outline a way to objectively set d. Further results suggest that our guidelines hold for any kind of data. The thesis concludes with an appendix on non-cooperative participants in AJTs.

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Shwayder, Kobey. "The best binary split algorithm a deterministic method for dividing vowel inventories into contrastive distinctive features /." Waltham, Mass. : Brandeis University, 2009. http://dcoll.brandeis.edu/handle/10192/23254.

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Zangrando, Laura <1984&gt. "LINGUISTICS 1 AT HOGWARTS. AN ENGLISH-ITALIAN COMPARATIVE GRAMMAR ON THE BASIS OF HARRY POTTER'S SAGA." Master's Degree Thesis, Università Ca' Foscari Venezia, 2014. http://hdl.handle.net/10579/5437.

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The aim of this work is to provide a comparative grammar of English and Italian using some chapters of Harry Potter’s saga in its original version (J. K. Rowling, 1998, Harry Potter and the philosopher’s stone (Vol.1); 1999, Harry Potter and the chamber of the secrets (Vol.2) and its Italian translations (M. Astrologo, 1998, Harry Potter e la pietra filosofale, (Vol. 1); 1999, Harry Potter e la camera dei segreti (Vol.2). The grammar will cover the following issues: Unmarked and marked word order in English and Italian clauses, the position of the subject, the verb phrase, the noun phrase and its constituents and parataxis VS hypotaxis. The major differences between Italian and English will be discussed, among which the word order, the position of the subject and adjectives within the noun phrase and the quantity of main and subordinate clauses present in both versions. In the course of the discussion, I will give evidence that challenges well-know biases about the English-Italian contrast, such as the supposed hypotactic nature of Italian as opposed to a paratactic nature of English. I will also present some attrition in the position of subject and more generally of the word order in the Italian translation.

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Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Comparative linguistics'

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