Дисертації з теми "Semantic aspect"

A survey of previous shcolarship has shown that there is no satisfactory description of the tense and aspect system of Modern Persian. This dissertation is the first attempt to study the syntax and semantics of Modem Persian verb forms in the light of recent discussions of tense and aspect. This study falls into six chapters. Chapter 0 reviews the literature on the tense and aspect system of Modern Persian and shows that the former treatments of Modern Persian tense-aspect forms are inaccurate and incomprehensive. They are inaccurate in that the characterizations presented therein for some of the Persian verb forms are wrong, and are incomprehensive in that they do not investigate the semantics of all of the Persian verb forms. Chapter 1 is the study of the syntax of Persian verb forms, with special reference to verb formation. Chapter 2 discusses the theoretical assumptions and the methodology. Chapter 3 is an attempt to establish the meanings of the morphological markers of tense, i. e. the past tense marker /-D/ and the non-past tense marker /-0/, and to investigate the temporal values of Modern Persian verb forms. This chapter defines the meaning of the past tense marker /D/ as indicating that there is a time point subsequent to the time of the situation referred to which is the deictic centre of the context of the communication, and that of the non-past tense marker /0/ as the absence of any time point subsequent to the time of the situation. The chapter also establishes that Modern Persian verb forms grammaticalize the semantic notions of anteriority, simultaneity and posteriority. The other major outcomes are as follows: the major tense split in Modern Persian as in many other languages is between the past and the non-past. The Modern Persian perfect forms are tense rather than aspectual categories. Chapter 4 attempts to assign a single invariant meaning to each of the Modern Persian aspect markers (i. e. mi-, 0-, and be- ), and to investigate their interactions with other categories associated with the verb, i. e. with the categories of tense and Aktionsart. This chapter establishes that Modem Persian has three aspects: the perfective, the imperfective, and the progressive, and that the perfective markers O and be- present the situation referred to as a single unanalysable whole, the imperfective marker mi- presents the situation referred to as continuous at a given time point, and finally the progressive auxiliary dash. t. oen 'have' presents the situation as in progress at a given time point. The chapter also illustrates that the imperfective and the progressive verb forms simply express the situation referred to as continuous and as in progress at a given time point, and as such are non-committal to the completion vs. the incompletion of the situation in question. Finally, chapter 5 summarizes the results of the research and presents some notes with regard to the opportunities for further research.

The nature of tense in classical Japanese is vague and uncertain, sometimes appearing to be interpretable by combinations of particular verbs with specific verbal auxiliaries and sometimes appearing to be absent altogether. The present study introduces a series of these so-called tense-bearing auxiliaries in classical Japanese while attempting to show that their use can be ambiguous based on the contexts in which they appear. The notions of context driven semantic formalism are explored as a possible means to derive truth from these utterances that seem otherwise tenseless when taken out of context. To accomplish this, time and tense are given very specific meaning and definition and thereafter explored in the context of both modern and classical Japanese.

The main aim of the present thesis has to help improving our understanding of neural mechanisms underlying autobiographical memory (AbM), particularly how personal recollections interact with emotion and influence semantic memory Our first study investigated the neural correlates of spontaneous re-living of emotion during recollection of personal event cued with personally known faces. Our findings suggested that the use of highly self-relevant stimuli and the collection of data with no previous refreshment of the memory trace (i) influenced the right lateralisation of the activation in the medial temporal lobe (MTL), and (ii) involved increased activity in the cortical midline structures and subcortical circuits, known to sustain the self-generated emotion, even though no emotion was explicitly acknowledged. In our second study, the aforementioned nonverbal experiment was compared with a verbal one involving pre-scanning testing in order to clarify whether the lateralisation issue of the general network sustaining AbM retrieval. Our finding of a predominantly left-lateralized cerebral network in both experiments suggested that left-sided pattern of brain activations is associated with AbM retrieval per se in healthy subjects. The third experimental work of the present thesis focused on the influence of autobiographical significance on the semantic memory cerebral network. Our results provided functional neuroimaging evidence that autobiographically significant semantic knowledge relies on a pattern of brain activations different from that underlying ‘purely’ semantic knowledge, with the core difference being located at the MTL. The last study investigated the neuronanatomical representations of both autobiographical and semantic remote memory in two patients presenting with left temporal lobe epilepsy. (i) We provided functional neuroimaging evidence of the dissociation within remote memory (autobiographical vs semantic). (ii) Importantly, we documented dissociation within semantic memory for famous people according to the nature of material. Our last experimental work confirms the importance of combining neuropsychological and neuroimaging methods in appropriate patients in order to better understand human memory functions.

La tesi pertany a una línia d’estudis recentment iniciada amb l’objectiu de descriure la varietat de l’anglès avançat. Proposem una anàlisi integral d’una sèrie de factors semàntics, discursius i interlingüístics que conformen l’ús de la morfologia verbal que empren aprenents avançats catalans i francesos d’anglès idioma estranger; específicament dues poblacions d’especialistes de l’anglès (estudiants de Filologia Anglesa i professors d’anglès a la universitat). A partir d’un corpus de narracions orals d’un llibre en imatges, explorem la distribució de la morfologia temporo-aspectual en relació amb les característiques semàntiques dels predicats (la hipòtesi de l’aspecte) i els moviments narratius que els predicats expressen en la narració (la hipòtesi del discurs). Les formes verbales són analitzades també des de la perspectiva de l’anomenat estíl retòric d’aprenent, és a dir la tria sistemàtica de recursos lingüístics que els aprenents fan en tasques comunicatives complexes en base a un repertori après de formes però també à una determinada manera de seleccionar i organitzar la informació pròpia del seu idioma matern. El fet que els aprenents disposin d’aspecte gramatical en català i en francès no garanteix, d’entrada, el mateix ús d’aquesta morfologia verbal en anglès. Les diferències resideixen tant en la utilització del progressiu amb els predicats de tipus duratiu atèlic, com en el ventall de funcions que les formes verbals en general tenen en el discurs dels aprenents. La coalició prototípica dels predicats duratius atèlics amb el progressiu continua sent forta, particularment en les produccions dels estudiants francòfons, i dona peu a un ús generalitzat d’aquesta forma, molt sovint en tensió amb la funció de fer avançar la narració que té el predicat. El grau de gramaticalització de l’aspecte progressiu en el idioma matern dels aprenents sembla interferir amb les hipòtesis d’ús del progressiu en anglès idioma estranger. Els grups de professors són els que més s’alliberen de les congruències semàntiques amb els predicats en el seu ús de les formes verbals, de manera semblant als locutors nadius. Amb aquests aprenents, el progressiu té una funció discursiva específica i esdevé opcional quan la informació temporal pròpia de la forma verbal es pot recuperar d’altres elements en context. L’estudi estableix que el ventall de funcions que les formes verbals tenen en anglès avançat és més limitat i que no sempre es correspon a les funcions emprades pels locutors nadius. Un exemple és la forma no progressiva de present i de passat, que s’utilitza sobretot per expressar relacions de moviment endavant de la narració en les produccions dels estudiants, mentres que els professors i els anglesos utilitzen la forma no progressiva com a forma per defecte i en contextos narratius més variats. L’anàlisi interlingüístic de dos episodis estructurats per la relació de simultaneïtat revela que hi ha una influència subtil de l’idioma matern en la manera de construir una perspectiva temporal en l’expressió de la simultaneïtat en anglès idioma estranger. Aquesta influència es manifesta fins i tot amb els aprenents més avançats (els professors). Totes aquestes observacions conviden a una reflexió sobre la rigidesa dels contrastos gramaticals, les coalicions atípiques predicat/forma o forma/funció que poden sorgir en el discurs, i la manera que tenen els aprenents d’arribar a detectar i produir aquestes coalicions en un idioma estranger com l’anglès. Les observacions també indiquen que les produccions orals en un idioma estranger es fan a través del filtre lingüístic i conceptual de l’idioma matern fins a estadis molt avançats d’aprenentatge.
Our dissertation belongs to a recently initiated line of studies seeking to characterise the advanced English L2 variety. We present an integrated analysis of a series of semantic, discourse and cross-linguistic factors underlying the use of verb forms by advanced French and Catalan learners of English as a foreign language. On the basis of a corpus of oral picture book narratives produced by two populations of language specialists (i.e., English Studies graduates and professors at several French and Catalan universities), we explore the distribution of tense-aspect morphology in relation to the aspectual class of predicates (the Aspect Hypothesis) and the temporal information predicates encode in narrative discourse (the Discourse Hypothesis). Tense-aspect forms are also considered from the perspective of the so-called L2 rhetorical style, the systematic linguistic choices learners make in a given communicative task drawing both on their learnt repertoire of L2 devices and on information selection and organisation patterns unconsciously transferred from their L1. The availability of grammaticalised aspectual distinctions in the learners’ mother tongues does not ensure a nativelike use of aspectual marking in advanced English L2. Differences reside in the use of tense-aspect morphology with durative atelic predicates and in the functional-semantic scope verb forms have in discourse. Prototypical predicate/form coalitions in learner production were found to remain strong in the use of the progressive with durative atelic predicates and to lead to an across-the-board reliance on the progressive, often in tension with the plot-advancing role of the predicate. The degree of grammaticalisation of the progressive aspect in the learners’ L1 seems to interfere with the hypotheses of use concerning the progressive form in English L2, particularly in the case of the French L1 student group. Only the professor groups employ tense-aspect forms in a way which is genuinely liberated from the semantic congruence with the predicate, similar to what was observed in English L1. With these very advanced learners, the progressive has a discourse-specific function and becomes optional when viewpoint information can be retrieved from other elements in the context. English L2 form-function mappings in the domain of tense-aspect morphology were also found to be more limited or not to match the ones observed in English L1. A case in point is the non-progressive present or past form, strongly associated with plot-advancing contexts in the production of the student groups, whereas the non-progressive is a default form, encoding a variety of narrative material, in the production of the professor groups and the English native speakers. The cross-linguistic analysis of a specific type of narrative contexts, namely two episodes where the expression of simultaneity plays a central role, revealed the existence of a subtle L1 influence on the construction of a temporal perspective in English L2, even with the most proficient learners. These findings invite to a reflection on the margins of grammaticalised contrasts, where atypical coalitions arise, and how learners can grasp such peripheral uses in an instructional setting. They also indicate that L2 oral production at the advanced stages is bound to a linguistic and conceptualisation filter which is the legacy of learners’ L1.

Cette thèse, au croisement du Web Social et du Web Sémantique, vise à rapprocher folksonomies et représentations structurées de connaissances telles que les thesauri ou les ontologies informatiques. Les folksonomies, résultant de l'usage de plateformes de social tagging, souffrent d'un manque de précision qui les rend difficile à exploiter pour la naviguation. Cette thèse présente notre approche multi-points de vue de l'enrichissement sémantique des folksonomies. L'amorçage est assuré par des traitements automatiques qui permettent d'extraire des relations sémantiques entre tags grâce à la combinaison d'une méthode que nous avons mise au point et analysant les labels de tags, et de méthodes que nous avons adaptées et analysant la structure de folksonomies. Les contributions des utilisateurs sont décrites par notre modèle SRTag supportant les points de vue divergents, et capturées par une interface intégrant à la navigation des fonctionnalités de micro-édition de folksonomie. Les conflits entre points de vue sont détectés et solutionnés par un agent automatique dont les résultats sont ensuite exploités pour aider un utilisateur référent à maintenir une structuration globale et cohérente de la folksonomie, servant en retour pour enrichir chaque point de vue individuel avec les autres contributions tout en garantissant une cohérence locale. Notre méthode permet d'améliorer la navigation dans les systèmes de connaissances à base de tags, mais fournit aussi une base à des thesauri nourris par un processus bottom-up d'acquisition de connaissances.

Cette thèse relève de l’ingénierie des connaissances et en particulier elle s’inscrit dans le cadre technique du web sémantique. Nous prenons un objet particulier : une théorie linguistique de la temporalité (temps et aspect), et nous proposons une traduction en plusieurs étapes de cette théorie en un artefact de représentation des connaissances : une ontologie. Nous passons en revue différents modèles (logiques, IA, linguistiques) de représentation du temps. Nous détaillons la notion d’ontologie en elle-même et telle qu’elle est utilisée dans le cadre informatique. Ensuite nous traduisons la théorie linguistique que nous choisissons en un objet vérifiant les propriétés d’un réseau d’entités qui sont caractéristiques d’une ontologie au sens du web sémantique. La dernière étape consiste en l’implémentation de notre ontologie en utilisant les standards W3C
This is a knowledge engineering work that specifically deal with semantic web technologies. We first take an particular objet: a linguistic theory of time and aspect and we propose a translation of it into a knowledge engineering artefact (an ontology) following several steps. We look at different approach of time (logical, AI, linguistic) of time representation. Then we analyse the notion of ontology as understood in the computer science framework. An ontology is a network of entities, we give a translation of the linguistic theory of time and aspect into an ontology and we translate this resulting ontology using W3C semantic web standards

L’objectif de cette thèse est d’étudier l’influence de facteurs perceptifs et psycholinguistiques sur la couleur, en tant que construction cognitive. Des millions de teintes peuvent être discriminées alors que moins d’une centaine de termes de couleur existe. L’origine des onze termes basiques identifiés dans la littérature reste débattue, mais serait plutôt perceptive pour les couleurs uniques noir, blanc, rouge, vert, jaune et bleu, et liée à un consensus culturel et langagier pour orange, marron, rose, violet et gris. La couleur aurait aussi une dimension émotionnelle, comme le suggère l’expression langagière « voir rouge ». Dans ce travail, une première étude a examiné l’organisation conceptuelle des 11 termes de couleur basiques. Les participants devaient fournir le niveau de proximité entre chacun des termes pris deux-a-deux. Les résultats ont montré que l’espace coloré conceptuel était corrélé à l’espace coloré perceptif pour toutes les couleurs uniques sauf le jaune. Les autres couleurs basiques s’organisaient selon des facteurs perceptifs, ainsi que culturels, en relation avec leur association à certains concepts ou connaissances sémantiques. Une deuxième étude a permis de préciser la familiarité et la valence émotionnelle de couleurs basiques et non-basiques présentées sous forme de mots ou de patchs. La familiarité et l’arousal étaient supérieurs pour les couleurs basiques présentés sous forme de mots, suggérant une conceptualisation plus accessible que pour les non-basiques et les patchs. Des mesures de valence émotionnelle, arousal, familiarité et d'association aux six émotions basiques pour 33 mots et 33 patchs de couleurs basiques et non-basiques sont fournies comme outil potentiel pour de futures recherches. Une troisième étude se focalise sur un pigment médiéval ayant un spectre de réflectance plat, mais dont des appariements et dénominations confirment une illusion de bleu pour la moitié des observateurs. Une tâche de Stroop a été adaptée pour tester les effets perceptifs et sémantiques sur la présence de cette illusion. Des effets de congruence ont été obtenus en associant ce pigment au mot gris tout comme au mot bleu. Les résultats montraient (a) un ancrage des réponses à la teinte ambigüe vers la catégorie disponible la plus ressemblante, témoignant de l’élasticité de la représentation de couleur, et (b) que l’effet de congruence de la tâche de Stroop dépendait également de facteurs perceptifs, tel un contraste coloré crée en manipulant le fond d’écran. Dans l’ensemble, les résultats amènent de nouveaux éléments précisant l’interaction des traitements perceptifs et psycholinguistiques dans l’interprétation de l’environnement coloré
The objective of this thesis is to study the influence of perceptive and psycholinguistic factors on color, considered as a cognitive construction. Millions of hues can be discriminated while less than a hundred color terms are used. The origin of the eleven basic color terms identified in the literature is still debated, but may be more perceptive for the unique colors black, white, red, green, yellow and blue, and linked to cultural and linguistic consensus for orange, brown, purple and grey. Color may also have an emotional dimension, as denotes for example the expression “seeing red”. In this work, a first study investigated the conceptual organization of the 11 basic color terms. Participants had to provide proximity levels for each two-by-two pairs of the terms. Results showed that the conceptual color space is correlated to the perceptual color space for all unique colors but yellow. Other basic colors were organized based on perceptive factors, and also cultural ones, in relation to their association with certain concepts or semantic knowledge. A second study focalized on familiarity and emotional valence of basic and non-basic colors presented as words or as patches. Familiarity and arousal were higher for basic colors presented as words, which may be explained by a more accessible conceptualization than for non-basic colors and patches. Measures of emotional valence and associations with the six basic emotions for 33 color words and 33 patches, basic and non-basic, are provided as a potential tool for future research. A third study investigated a medieval pigment with a flat reflectance spectrum, but for which pairings and denominations confirmed an illusory blue for half of observers. A Stroop task was adapted to test perceptive and semantic effects on the presence of this illusion. Congruency effects were obtained upon association of this pigment as much with the word grey as with the word blue. Results showed (a) an anchoring of responses to the ambiguous hue biased towards the most resembling available category, testifying to the elasticity of color representation, and (b) that the congruence effect in the Stroop task also depended on perceptive factors, such as a color contrast created by manipulating background color during the task. On the whole, these results bring new elements specifying the interaction of perceptive and psycholinguistic processing in the interpretation of the colored environment

Актуальність дослідження обумовлена постійним інтересом лінгвістів до мовних засобів створення мотивації, вивчення мовного впливу в окремих текстах, необхідністю комплексного вивчення та опису засобів персуазивної комунікації на матеріалі англомовних мотиваційних жанрів. Окрім того, на сьогодні тексти мотиваційного дискурсу англійської мови все ще залишаються недостатньо дослідженими як з лінгвістичної, так і з перекладацької точки зору. Це обумовлює необхідність вивчення мовних особливостей таких текстів та їх перекладу українською мовою. Мета дослідження полягає у вивченні лексико-семантичних аспектів мотиваційної літератури на матеріалі книги Н. Хілла «Think and Grow rich» та особливостей їх перекладу українською мовою.
Актуальность исследования обусловлена ​​постоянным интересом лингвистов к языковым средствам создания мотивации, изучению речевого воздействия в отдельных текстах, необходимостью комплексного изучения и описания средств персуазивной коммуникации на материале англоязычных мотивационных жанров Кроме того, на сегодня тексты мотивационного дискурса английского языка все еще остаются недостаточно исследованы как с лингвистической, так и с переводческой точки зрения. Это обуславливает необходимость изучения языковых особенностей таких текстов и их перевода на украинский язык. Цель исследования состоит в изучении лексико-семантических аспектов мотивационной литературы на материале книги Н. Хилла «Think and Grow rich» и особенностей их перевода на украинский язык.
The study's relevance is due to the constant interest of linguists in the linguistic means of creating motivation, the study of linguistic influence in individual texts, the need for comprehensive research, and the description of means of persuasive communication on the material of English motivational genres. In addition, today, the texts of the motivational discourse of the English language remain insufficiently studied both from a linguistic and translation point of view. The purpose of the study is to study the linguistic and semantic aspects of motivational literature on the material of N. Hill's book "Think and Grow rich" and the peculiarities of their translation into Ukrainian.

Notre thèse porte sur des prédicats et une structure du russe impliquant un datif et pouvant exprimer l’obligation : les trois prédicats modaux impersonnels nado, nužno, (« il faut ») et prijtis (« être contraint », « avoir l’occasion ») et la structure dative-infinitive, dont la valeur modale naît de la juxtaposition d’un datif et d’un infinitif. Aucun des prédicats n’avait fait l’objet d’une description complète et la place de la structure dative-infinitive par rapport aux structures à prédicat modal explicite restait mal définie. Notre approche est sémasiologique et énonciative : nous sommes parti des formes pour comprendre comment se construit leur sens dans des énoncés envisagés dans leur contexte large et soumis à des locuteurs natifs. Cela nous a permis de préciser les conditions d’emploi de chacune des formes étudiées et d’isoler les facteurs contextuels pouvant faire varier leur interprétation. Nous avons pu démontrer que nado et nužno, habituellement présentés comme synonymes, diffèrent par le caractère de la modalité exprimée par chacun : objective et absolue pour nado; subjective et relative pour nužno. Prijtis’ a, lui, une orientation rétrospective et oppose une situation impliquant la réalisation du procès qu’il introduit à une ou plusieurs situations ne l’impliquant pas ; cette opposition, due au préverbe pri-, produit, suivant la nature des situations confrontées, une valeur soit de contrainte, soit de contingence. Enfin, nous avons démontré que la structure dative-infinitive n’a rien d’elliptique et a une fonction énonciative : elle n’asserte pas une relation de nécessité, mais l’actualise pour en souligner les implications dans la situation considérée
Our thesis analyzes different predicates and a structure with a dative that are able to express obligation in Russian: three impersonal modal predicates – nado, nužno, ("must") and prijtis ("to be constrained", "to have the opportunity") – and the dative-infinitive structure, the modal meaning of which arises from the juxtaposition of a dative and an infinitive. None of these predicates had been fully described; additionally, the place of the dative-infinitive structure and its relation to structures containing an explicit modal remained poorly defined. Our approach is semasiological and discursive: we started by studying the forms in order to understand how their meaning is constructed. These were always analyzed in a broad context and submitted to native speakers. This allowed us to highlight the conditions of use of each of these forms and to isolate the contextual factors that could interfere with their interpretation. This allowed us to show that nado and nužno, generally described as synonyms, differ by the type of modality they express: objective and absolute for nado; subjective and relative for nužno. Prijtis ’, in contrast, has a retrospective orientation and is opposing a situation in which the process is realized against one or more other situations in which it is not the case. This opposition, coming from the preverb pri-, creates a meaning of either constraint or contingency, depending on the nature of the situations involved. Finally, we have shown that the dative-infinitive structure is not elliptical but has a discursive function: it does not construct a relation of necessity, but reasserts it to highlight its implications in a considered situation

Notre thèse a pour objet les temps du passé de l’indicatif en français (en particulier le passé simple, l’imparfait et le passé composé). Les approches sur le temps sont multiples et elles utilisent des concepts variés qui tentent d’expliquer le fonctionnement de ces formes à travers de nombreux paradigmes. Ainsi, la grammaire scolaire se contente de stipuler que les temps du passé de l’indicatif ont pour rôle de situer les événements dans l’époque passée. Mais, si l’on confronte les théories traditionnelles avec les approches linguistiques plus récentes sur la sémantique des temps verbaux, on observe que l’emploi de ces temps implique à la fois une référence temporelle, une visée illocutoire et discursive ainsi qu’une attitude psychologique et pragmatique. Nous étudions donc dans ce travail les usages en discours des temps du passé à partir de leurs valeurs en langue en essayant de montrer de quelle manière les contenus temporel, aspectuel et modal interfèrent et se complètent dans l’expression verbale du passé. Nous mettons en évidence le fait que le choix des temps du passé est motivé également par la manière de se représenter les événements et par le type d’information que veut faire passer le locuteur à son interlocuteur. L’emploi des temps du passé caractérise également des types particuliers de discours et participe à la cohérence informationnelle du texte. Enfin, le traitement d’approches aspectuo-temporelles, textuelles et pragmatiques nous conduira à adopter le modèle essentiellement praxématique pour une étude du fonctionnement des temps du passé en langue et en discours dans un texte littéraire, Thérèse Desqueyroux de François Mauriac
Our work has for object the times of the past in French (in particular the simple past, the imperfect and the present perfect). The approaches at the time are multiple and they use varied concepts which try to explain the functioning of these forms through of many paradigms. So, the grammar contents with stipulating that the times of the past have for role to place the events in the past time. But, if we confront the traditional theories with the more recent linguistic approaches on semantics of the tenses of the verb, we observe that the use of these times implies at the same time a temporal reference, an aim illocutoire and discursive as well as a psychological and pragmatic attitude. We study in this work the uses in speech of the past time from their values in language by trying to show, first of all, how temporal, aspectual and modal contents interfere and complement each other in the verbal expression of past. We highlight the fact that the choice of the past times is motivated by the way of representing itself the events and by the type of information that the speaker wants to introduce to his interlocutor. The employment of the past times also characterizes particular types of speech and participates in the informative coherence of the text. The treatment of aspectuo-temporal, textual and pragmatic approcaches leads us to adopt the model primarily praxematic for a study of the use of the past times in language and speech in a literary text, Thérèse Desqueyroux of François Mauriac

Une question centrale des recherches sur la lecture concerne la nature séquentielle ou parallèle de l’identification des mots pendant la lecture de phrases. L’hypothèse dominante postule que l’attention spatiale est allouée à un seul mot à la fois, et qu’avec cette contrainte, l’identification des mots doit forcément s’opérer de manière séquentielle. Cependant, un certain nombre de résultats suggèrent, au contraire, que l’attention spatiale peut être allouée à plusieurs mots à la fois, de manière distribuée. Cette attention disbribuée pourrait permettre l’identification en parallèle de plusieurs mots de manière simultanée, et les travaux présentés dans cette thèse cherchent à déterminer la viabilité de cette hypothèse. Notamment, nos travaux visent à préciser le niveau de traitement (visuel, orthographique, lexical, sémantique ou syntaxique) permis par cette attention distribuée
This thesis addresses one of the most hotly debated issues in reading research: Are words processed serially or in parallel during reading? One could argue that this is primarily a question of visuo-spatial attention: is attention distributed across multiple words during reading? The research presented here suggests that attention can indeed be allocated to multiple words at once. It is further established that attention is a key factor driving (sub-lexical) orthographic processing. The next question, then, is whether multiple lexical representations can be activated in parallel. This thesis comprises a wealth of evidence for parallel lexical activation: firstly we have found that readers activate embedded words (e.g., ‘use’ in ‘houses’) alongside the word that is to be recognized, indicating that parallel lexical processing would occur even if readers could effectively focus their attention on single words. Moreover, we have found that semantic and syntactic categorization decisions about foveal target words are influenced by the semantic and syntactic aspects of surrounding words, even when all these words are presented for a duration shorter than the average time needed to recognize a single word. Hence, given that readers’ attention is spread across multiple words and that multiple lexical representations can be activated in parallel, it seems reasonable to claim that the reading system is in principle a parallel processing system

Business Intelligence tools support making better business decisions by analyzing available organizational data. Data Warehouses (DWs), typically structured with the Multidimensional (MD) model, are used to store data from different internal and external sources processed using Extract-Transformation-Load (ETL) processes. On-Line analytical Processing (OLAP) queries are applied on DWs to derive important business-critical knowledge. DW and OLAP technologies perform efficiently when they are applied on data that are static in nature and well organized in structure. Nowadays, Semantic Web technologies and the Linked Data principles inspire organizations to publish their semantic data, which allow machines to understand the meaning of data, using the Resource Description Framework (RDF) model. In addition to traditional (non-semantic) data sources, the incorporation of semantic data sources into a DW raises the additional challenges of schema derivation, semantic heterogeneity, and schema and data management model over traditional ETL tools. Furthermore, most SW data provided by business, academic and governmental organizations include facts and figures, which raise new requirements for BI tools to enable OLAP-like analyses over those semantic (RDF) data. In this thesis, we 1) propose a layer-based ETL framework for handling diverse semantic and non-semantic data sources by addressing the challenges mentioned above, 2) propose a set of high-level ETL constructs for processing semantic data, 3) implement appropriate environments (both programmable and GUI) to facilitate ETL processes and evaluate the proposed solutions. Our ETL framework is a semantic ETL framework because it integrates data semantically. We propose SETL, a unified framework for semantic ETL. The framework is divided into three layers: the Definition Layer, ETL Layer, and Data Warehouse Layer. In the Definition Layer, the semantic DW (SDW) schema, sources, and the mappings among the sources and the target are defined. In the ETL Layer, ETL processes to populate the SDW from sources are designed. The Data Warehouse Layer manages the storage of transformed semantic data. The framework supports the inclusion of semantic (RDF) data in DWs in addition to relational data. It allows users to define an ontology of a DW and annotate it with MD constructs (such as dimensions, cubes, levels, etc.) using the Data Cube for OLAP (QB4OLAP) vocabulary. It supports traditional transformation operations and provides a method to generate semantic data from the source data according to the semantics encoded in the ontology. It also provides a method to connect internal SDW data with external knowledge bases. On top of SETL, we propose SETLCONSTUCT where we define a set of high-level ETL tasks/operations to process semantic data sources. We divide the integration process into two layers: the Definition Layer and Execution Layer. The Definition Layer includes two tasks that allow DW designers to define target (SDW) schemas and the mappings between (intermediate) sources and the (intermediate) target. To create mappings among the sources and target constructs, we provide a mapping vocabulary called S2TMAP. Different from other ETL tools, we propose a new paradigm: we characterize the ETL flow transformations at the Definition Layer instead of independently within each ETL operation (in the Execution Layer). This way, the designer has an overall view of the process, which generates metadata (the mapping file) that the ETL operators will read and parametrize themselves with automatically. In the Execution Layer, we propose a set of high-level ETL operations to process semantic data sources. Finally, we develop a GUI-based semantic BI system SETLBI to define, process, integrate, and query semantic and non-semantic data. In addition to the Definition Layer and the ETL Layer, SETLBI has the OLAP Layer, which provides an interactive interface to enable OLAP analysis over the semantic DW
Les eines d’Intel·ligència Empresarial (BI), conegudes en anglès com Business Intelligence, donen suport a la millora de la presa de decisions empresarials mitjançant l’anàlisi de les dades de l’organització disponibles. Els magatzems de dades, o data warehouse, (DWs), típicament estructurats seguint el model Multidimensional (MD), s’utilitzen per emmagatzemar dades de diferents fonts, tant internes com externes, processades mitjançant processos Extract- Transformation-Load (ETL). Les consultes de processament analític en línia (OLAP) s’apliquen als DW per extraure coneixement crític en l’àmbit empresarial. Els DW i les tecnologies OLAP funcionen de manera eficient quan s’apliquen sobre dades de natura estàtica i ben estructurades. Avui en dia, les tecnologies de la Web Semàntica (SW) i els principis Linked Data (LD) inspiren les organitzacions per publicar les seves dades en formats semàntics, que permeten que les màquines entenguin el significat de les dades, mitjançant el llenguatge de descripció de recursos (RDF). Una de les raons per les quals les dades semàntiques han tingut tant d’èxit és que es poden gestionar i fer que estiguin disponibles per tercers amb poc esforç, i no depenen d’esquemes de dades sofisticats. A més de les fonts de dades tradicionals (no semàntiques), la incorporació de fonts de dades semàntiques en un DW planteja reptes addicionals tals com derivar-hi esquema, l’heterogeneïtat semàntica i la representació de l’esquema i les dades a través d’eines d’ETL. A més, la majoria de dades SW proporcionades per empreses, organitzacions acadèmiques o governamentals inclouen fets i figures que representen nous reptes per les eines de BI per tal d’habilitar l’anàlisi OLAP sobre dades semàntiques (RDF). En aquesta tesi, 1) proposem un marc ETL basat en capes per a la gestió de diverses fonts de dades semàntiques i no semàntiques i adreçant els reptes esmentats anteriorment, 2) proposem un conjunt d’operacions ETL per processar dades semàntiques, i 3) la creació d’entorns apropiats de desenvolupament (programàtics i GUIs) per facilitar la creació i gestió de DW i processos ETL semàntics, així com avaluar les solucions proposades. El nostre marc ETL és un marc ETL semàntic perquè Es capaç de considerar e integrar dades de forma semàntica. Els següents paràgrafs elaboren sobre aquests contribucions. Proposem SETL, un marc unificat per a ETL semàntic. El marc es divideix en tres capes: la capa de definició, la capa ETL i la capa DW. A la capa de definició, es defineixen l’esquema del DW semàntic (SDW), les fonts i els mappings entre les fonts i l’esquema del DW. A la capa ETL, es dissenyen processos ETL per popular el SDW a partir de fonts. A la capa DW, es gestiona l’emmagatzematge de les dades semàntiques transformades. El nostre marc dóna suport a la inclusió de dades semàntiques (RDF) en DWs, a més de dades relacionals. Així, permet als usuaris definir una ontologia d’un DW i anotar-la amb construccions MD (com ara dimensions, cubs, nivells, etc.) utilitzant el vocabulari Data Cube for OLAP (QB4OLAP). També admet operacions de transformació tradicionals i proporciona un mètode per generar semàntica de les dades d’origen segons la semàntica codificada al document ontologia. També proporciona un mètode per connectar l’SDW amb bases de coneixement externes. Per tant, crea una base de coneixement, composta per un ontologia i les seves instàncies, on les dades estan connectades semànticament amb altres dades externes / internes. Per fer-ho, desenvolupem un mètode programàtic, basat en Python, d’alt nivell, per realitzar les tasques esmentades anteriorment. S’ha portat a terme un experiment complet d’avaluació comparant SETL amb una solució elaborada amb eines tradicional (que requereixen molta més codificació). Com a cas d’ús, hem emprat el Danish Agricultural dataset, i els resultats mostren que SETL proporciona un millor rendiment, millora la productivitat del programador i la qualitat de la base de coneixement. La comparació entre SETL i Pentaho Data Integration (PDI) mostra que SETL és un 13,5% més ràpid que PDI. A més de ser més ràpid que PDI, tracta les dades semàntiques com a ciutadans de primera classe, mentre que PDI no conté operadors específics per a dades semàntiques. A sobre de SETL, proposem SETLCONSTUCT on definim un conjunt de tasques d’alt nivell / operacions ETL per processar fonts de dades semàntiques i orientades a encapsular i facilitar la creació de l’ETL semàntic. Dividim el procés d’integració en dues capes: la capa de definició i la capa d’execució. La capa de definició inclou dues tasques que permeten definir als dissenyadors de DW esquemes destí (SDW) i mappings entre fonts (o resultats intermedis) i l’SDW (potencialment, altres resultats intermedis). Per crear mappings entre les fonts i el SDW, proporcionem un vocabulari de mapping anomenat Source-To-Target Mapping (S2TMAP). A diferència d’altres eines ETL, proposem un nou paradigma: les transformacions del flux ETL es caracteritzen a la capa de definició, i no de forma independent dins de cada operació ETL (a la capa d’execució). Aquest nou paradigma permet al dissenyador tenir una visió global del procés, que genera metadades (el fitxer de mapping) que els operadors ETL individuals llegiran i es parametritzaran automàticament. A la capa d’execució proposem un conjunt d’operacions ETL d’alt nivell per processar fonts de dades semàntiques. A més de la neteja, la unió i la transformació per dades semàntiques, proposem operacions per generar semàntica multidimensional i actualitzar el SDW per reflectir els canvis en les fonts. A més, ampliem SETLCONSTRUCT per permetre la generació automàtica de flux d’execució ETL (l’anomenem SETLAUTO). Finalment, proporcionem una àmplia avaluació per comparar la productivitat, el temps de desenvolupament i el rendiment de SETLCONSTRUCT i SETLAUTO amb el marc anterior SETL. L’avaluació demostra que SETLCONSTRUCT millora considerablement sobre SETL en termes de productivitat, temps de desenvolupament i rendiment. L’avaluació mostra que 1) SETLCONSTRUCT utilitza un 92% menys de caràcters mecanografiats (NOTC) que SETL, i SETLAUTO redueix encara més el nombre de conceptes usats (NOUC) un altre 25%; 2) utilitzant SETLCONSTRUCT, el temps de desenvolupament es redueix gairebé a la meitat en comparació amb SETL, i es redueix un altre 27 % mitjançant SETLAUTO; 3) SETLCONSTRUCT es escalable i té un rendiment similar en comparació amb SETL. Finalment, desenvolupem un sistema de BI semàntic basat en GUI SETLBI per definir, processar, integrar i consultar dades semàntiques i no semàntiques. A més de la capa de definició i de la capa ETL, SETLBI té una capa OLAP, que proporciona una interfície interactiva per permetre l’anàlisi OLAP d’autoservei sobre el DW semàntic. Cada capa està composada per un conjunt d’operacions / tasques. Per formalitzar les connexions intra i inter-capes dels components de cada capa, emprem una ontologia. La capa ETL amplia l’execució de la capa de SETLCONSTUCT afegint operacions per processar fonts de dades no semàntiques. Per últim, demostrem el sistema final mitjançant el cens de la població de Bangladesh (2011). La solució final d’aquesta tesi és l’eina SETLBI . SETLBI facilita (1) als dissenyadors del DW amb pocs / sense coneixements de SW, integrar semànticament les dades (semàntiques o no) i analitzar-les emprant OLAP, i (2) als usuaris de la SW els permet definir vistes sobre dades semàntiques, integrar-les amb fonts no semàntiques, i visualitzar-les segons el model MD i fer anàlisi OLAP. A més, els usuaris SW poden enriquir l’esquema SDW generat amb construccions RDFS / OWL. Prenent aquest marc com a punt de partida, els investigadors poden emprar-lo per a crear SDWs de forma interactiva i automàtica. Aquest projecte crea un pont entre les tecnologies BI i SW, i obre la porta a altres oportunitats de recerca com desenvolupar tècniques de DW i ETL comprensibles per les màquines.
(Danskere) Business Intelligence (BI) værktøjer understøtter at tage bedre forretningsbeslutninger, ved at analysere tilgængelige organisatoriske data. Data Warehouses (DWs), typisk konstrueret med den Multidimensionelle (MD) model, bruges til at lagre data fra forskellige interne og eksterne kilder, der behandles ved hjælp af Extract-Transformation-Load (ETL) processer. On-Line Analytical Processing (OLAP) forespørgsler anvendes på DWs for at udlede vigtig forretningskritisk viden. DW og OLAP-teknologier fungerer effektivt, når de anvendes på data, som er statiske af natur og velorganiseret i struktur. I dag inspirerer Semantic Web (SW) teknologier og Linked Data (LD) principper organisationer til at offentliggøre deres semantiske data, som tillader maskiner at forstå betydningen af denne, ved hjælp af Resource Description Framework (RDF) modellen. En af grundene til, at semantiske data er blevet succesfuldt, er at styringen og udgivelsen af af dataene er nemt, og ikke er afhængigt af et sofistikeret skema. Ud over problemer ved overførslen af traditionelle (ikke-semantiske) databaser til DWs, opstår yderligere udfordringer ved overførslen af semantiske databaser, såsom skema nedarvning, semantisk heterogenitet samt skemaet for data repræsentation over traditionelle ETL værktøjer. På den anden side udgør en stor del af den semantiske data der bliver offentliggjort af virksomheder, akademikere samt regeringer, af figurer og fakta, der igen giver nye problemstillinger og krav til BI værktøjer, for at gøre OLAP lignende analyser over de semantiske data mulige. I denne afhandling gør vi følgende: 1) foreslår et lag-baseret ETL framework til at håndterer multiple semantiske og ikke-semantiske datakilder, ved at svare på udfordringerne nævnt herover, 2) foreslår en mængde af ETL operationer til at behandle semantisk data, 3) implementerer passende miljøer (både programmerbare samt grafiske brugergrænseflader), for at lette ETL processer og evaluere den foreslåede løsning. Vores ETL framework er et semantisk ETL framework, fordi det integrerer data semantisk. Den følgende sektion forklarer vores bidrag. Vi foreslår SETL, et samlet framework for semantisk ETL. Frameworket er splittet i tre lag: et definitions-lag, et ETL-lag, og et DW-lag. Det semanvii tiske DW (SWD) skema, datakilder, samt sammenhængen mellem datakilder og deres mål, er defineret i definitions-laget. I ETL-laget designes ETLprocesser til at udfylde SDW fra datakilderne. DW-laget administrerer lagring af transformerede semantiske data. Frameworket understøtter inkluderingen af semantiske (RDF) data i DWs ud over relationelle data. Det giver brugerne mulighed for at definere en ontologi for et DW og annotere med MD-konstruktioner (såsom dimensioner, kuber, niveauer osv.) ved hjælp af Data Cube til OLAP (QB4OLAP) ordforrådet. Det understøtter traditionelle transformations operationer, og giver en metode til at generere semantiske data fra de oprindelige data, i henhold til semantikken indkodet i ontologien. Det muliggør også en metode til at forbinde interne SDW data med eksterne vidensbaser. Herved skaber det en vidensbase, der er sammensat af en ontologi og dets instanser, hvor data er semantisk forbundet med andre eksterne / interne data. Vi udvikler et høj niveau Python-baseret programmerbart framework for at udføre de ovennævnte opgaver. En omfattende eksperimentel evaluering, der sammenligner SETL med en traditionel løsning (hvilket krævede meget manuel kodning), om brugen af danske landbrugsog forretnings datasæt, viser at SETL præsterer bedre, programmør produktivitet og vidensbase kvalitet. Sammenligningen mellem SETL og Pentaho Data Integration (PDI) ved behandling af en semantisk kilde viser, at SETL er 13,5% hurtigere end PDI. Udover SETL, foreslår vi SETLCONSTRUCT hvor vi definerer et sæt ETLoperationer på højt niveau til behandling af semantiske datakilder. Vi deler integrationsprocessen i to lag: Definitions-lag og eksekverings-lag. Definitionslaget indeholder to opgaver, der giver DW designere muligheden for at definere (SDW) skemaer, og kortlægningerne mellem kilder og målet. For at oprette kortlægning mellem kilderne og målene, leverer vi et kortlægnings ordforråd kaldet Source-to-Target Mapping (S2TMAP). Forskelligt fra andre ETL-værktøjer foreslår vi et nyt paradigme: vi karakteriserer ETLflowtransformationerne i definitions-laget i stedet for uafhængigt inden for hver ETL-operation (i eksekverings-laget). På denne måde har designeren et overblik over processen, som genererer metadata (kortlægningsfilen), som ETL operatørerne vil læse og parametrisere automatisk. I eksekverings-laget foreslår vi en mængde høj niveau ETL-operationer til at behandle semantiske datakilder. Udover rensning, sammenføjning og datatypebaseret transformationer af semantiske data, foreslår vi operationer til at generere multidimensionel semantik på data-niveau og operationer til at opdatere et SDW for at afspejle ændringer i kilde-dataen. Derudover udvider vi SETLCONSTRUCT for at muliggøre automatisk ETL-eksekveringsstrømgenerering (vi kalder det SETLAUTO). Endelig leverer vi en omfattende evaluering for at sammenligne produktivitet, udviklingstid og ydeevne for scon og SETLAUTO med den tidligere ramme SETL. Evalueringen viser, at SETLCONSTRUCT forbedres markant i forhold til SETL med hensyn til produktivitet, udviklingstid og ydeevne. Evalueringen viser, at 1) SETLCONSTRUCT bruger 92% færre antal indtastede tegn (NOTC) end SETL, og SETLAUTO reducerer antallet af brugte begreber (NOUC) yderligere med 25%; 2) ved at bruge SETLCONSTRUCT, er udviklingstiden næsten halveret sammenlignet med SETL, og skæres med yderligere 27% ved hjælp af SETLAUTO; 3) SETLCONSTRUCT er skalerbar og har lignende ydelse sammenlignet med SETL. Til slut udvikler vi et GUI-baseret semantisk BI system SETLBI for at definere, processere, integrere og lave forespørgsler på semantiske og ikkesemantiske data. Ud over definitions-laget og ETL-laget, har SETLBI et OLAP-lag, som giver en interaktiv grænseflade for at muliggøre selvbetjenings OLAP analyser over det semantiske DW. Hvert lag er sammensat af en mængde operationer/opgaver. Vi udarbejder en ontologi til at formalisere intra-og ekstra-lags forbindelserne mellem komponenterne og lagene. ETLlaget udvider eksekverings-laget af SETLCONSTUCT ved at tilføje operationer til at behandle ikke-semantiske datakilder. Vi demonstrerer systemet ved hjælp af Bangladesh population census 2011 datasættet. Sammenfatningen af denne afhandling er BI-værktøjet SETLBI . SETLBI fremmer (1) DW-designere med ringe / ingen SW-viden til semantisk at integrere semantiske og / eller ikke-semantiske data og analysere det i OLAP stil, og (2) SW brugere med grundlæggende MD-baggrund til at definere MDvisninger over semantiske data, der aktiverer OLAP-lignende analyse. Derudover kan SW-brugere berige det genererede SDW-skema med RDFS / OWLkonstruktioner. Med udgangspunkt i frameworket som et grundlag kan forskere sigte mod at udvikle yderligere interaktive og automatiske integrationsrammer for SDW. Dette projekt bygger bro mellem de traditionelle BIteknologier og SW-teknologier, som igen vil åbne døren for yderligere forskningsmuligheder som at udvikle maskinforståelige ETL og lagerteknikker.

Cette thèse se propose de spécifier la relation entre les structures motrices et celles du langage en tant que systèmes coopératifs dans la construction du sens. Bien qu'un grand nombre d'études aient mis en évidence que les structures motrices sont impliquées dans le traitement du langage, il est encore difficile de déterminer le rôle de ces structures dans la compréhension. Les théories dites «incarnées» et «désincarnées» débattent de la nature de la représentation du sens des mots en termes de la nécessité des structures motrices pour le langage, en négligeant le fait que les conditions de leur activation n’ont pas été décrites. Des recherches récentes soulignent l’importance de la prise en compte des contextes dans lesquels le langage recrute l'activité motrice. Néanmoins, cette tendance est en contradiction avec les présomptions implicites dans la recherche sur l’interaction langage-motricité, qui se basent sur le modèle «deux-étapes» du traitement sémantique et sur la perspective du «dictionnaire» de la représentation du sens lexical. Dans ce cadre, le traitement du sens des mots est pris comme un processus modulaire. Ce n'est qu'une fois ce processus accompli que le contexte peut influencer la signification. Ces présomptions ont biaisé le débat sur le rôle de l'activité motrice induite par le langage, qui se réduirait à la question de savoir si l'activation motrice doit être considérée comme faisant partie de l'accès lexico-sémantique ou comme résultat de la construction d’un modèle de situation. Or, un grand nombre de travaux ont mis en évidence que le traitement lexico-sémantique et le contexte sont interdépendants. Cette connaissance provenant de la psycholinguistique doit être explicitement intégrée à la recherche sur le rôle de l'activité motrice induite par le langage. Dans un effort pour porter le débat hors de la discussion «lexical vs. post-lexical», cette thèse vise à déterminer les conditions sous lesquelles les contextes linguistiques déclenchent l'activité motrice. Pour ce faire, nous avons testé un nouvel outil qui analyse en ligne les modulations de la force de préhension pendant que les participants écoutaient des mots cibles intégrés dans différents contextes. Nos résultats montrent que quand le mot cible était un verbe d'action de la main et que la phrase focalisait l'action (« John signe le contrat»), une augmentation de la force de préhension était observée dans la fenêtre temporelle associée à la récupération lexico-sémantique. Aucune augmentation de la force de préhension comparable n’a été détectée lorsque le même mot d'action était intégré dans des phrases négatives («John ne signe pas le contrat») ou dans des phrases dont le focus avait été déplacé vers l'état mental de l'agent («John veut signer le contrat»)
The present dissertation was conducted in order to specify the relationship between motor and language structures as cooperative systems in lexical meaning construction. Specifically, this thesis aimed at deepening our understanding of how the linguistic context coordinates the recruitment of motor structures during lexical semantic processing. Although the involvement of motor activity in action-related language comprehension is now sufficiently documented, the specific role that motor structures play in action language processing is still unclear. “Embodied” and “disembodied” theories debate the nature of meaning representation in terms of the necessity of motor structures, neglecting the fact that the conditions of their activation during language processing are not well-described. Very recent research has begun to note the necessity of exploring the context under which words trigger modality-specific cortical activity. However, this trend is at odds with implicit theoretical assumptions that have been made in research on motor-language crosstalk, which are based on the “two-step” model of semantic processing and the “dictionary-like” view of lexical meaning representation. Within such framework, word meaning recognition is taken to proceed in a modular fashion. Only after this process has concluded is the context thought to exert its effects. These assumptions have biased the debate on the role of language induced motor activity. The discussion has been centered on whether motor activation should be considered an integral part of the lexical access process or taken as the result of an ensuing “higher order” operation (i.e., situation model construction). A large body of work evidences that lexical semantic processing and semantic context are far more integrated and interdependent. It seems crucial to integrate this knowledge gained from psycholinguistics into the research on the role of language induced motor activity. In an effort to liberate the debate from the “lexical vs. post-lexical” discussion, this thesis aimed at determining the conditions under which language triggers motor activity. To accomplish these objectives, we introduced a novel tool that analyzes on-line modulations of grip-force while participants listened to specific target words embedded within different types of contexts. Our results show that when the target word was a hand action verb and the sentence focus centered on that action (“John signs the contract”), an increase of grip force was observed in the temporal window classically associated with lexical semantic processing. No comparable increase in grip force was detected when the same action word was embedded in negative sentences (“John doesn’t sign the contract”) or in sentences which focus was shifted towards the agent’s mental state (“John wants to sign the contract”). Our results suggest that the presence of an action word in an

Uma das questões mais importantes nas linguagens e arcabouços orientados a aspectos atuais é a expressividade da linguagem ou mecanismo de definição de pointcuts. A expressividade de uma linguagem de pointcuts impacta diretamente a qualidade dos pointcuts, uma propriedade que pode ser decisiva para a eficácia das implementações de aspectos. Neste trabalho, propomos os seletores de pontos de junção como um mecanismo de extensão simples para enriquecer linguagens de pointcut atuais com elementos que fazem o papel de \"novos pointcuts primitivos\". Os seletores de pontos de junção permitem a criação de pointcuts com maior valor semântico. Apesar de existirem mecanismos similares em algumas abordagens existentes, o conceito subjacente não foi claramente definido ou completamente explorado. Apresentamos também uma arquitetura simples para a adição de seletores de pontos de junção a um arcabouço orientado a aspectos existente, e mostramos exemplos do uso de seletores para melhorar a qualidade de pointcuts e facilitar o desenvolvimento de aspectos.
One of the main issues in modern aspect-oriented programming languages and frameworks is the expressiveness of the pointcut language or mechanism. The expressiveness of pointcut languages directly impacts pointcut quality, a property that can be decisive for the effectiveness of aspect implementations. In this work we propose join point selectors as a simple extension mechanism for enriching current pointcut languages with constructs that play the role of \"new primitive pointcuts\". Join point selectors allow the creation of pointcuts with greater semantic value. Although similar mechanisms can be found in some existing approaches, the underlying concept has not yet been clearly defined nor fully explored. We also present a simple architecture for adding join point selectors to an existing aspect-oriented framework, and show examples of usage of join point selectors to enhance the quality of pointcuts and make aspect development easier.

This thesis investigates lexical and grammatical aspect in two unrelated languages, Sencoten(the Saanich dialect of Straits Salish) and Japanese. In particular, the main focus is on how various perfect readings are derived in the two languages, which show striking similarities in this respect. In Sencoten, a particle kwlh yields various readings depending on the situation aspect and viewpoint aspect of the predicate with which it occurs (Kiyota 2006b). These various readings include an inceptive reading, an on-going situation reading, and a completion reading. The Japanese aspectual marker -tei- also induces a range of different readings: a progressive reading, a resultant state reading, and a perfect reading (Ogihara 1998a, Nishiyama 2006, a.o.). To account for these various readings, I propose that both kwlh in Sencoten and -tei- in Japanese are perfect markers. However, the actual semantic function of each is different: kwlh in Sencoten introduces a perfect time span (Pancheva 2003), whereas -tei- in Japanese denotes an anteriority relation between an event time and a reference time (Reichenbach 1947, Klein 1992, 1994), where the event time can be the time interval of a sub-event of a larger event. -Tei- also has a pragmatic component (or presupposition), just as Portner (2003) claims for the English perfect. Aspectual properties of predicates also play a crucial role in yielding the range of different readings. Therefore, this thesis also proposes a new aspectual classification of predicates in Sencoten and Japanese, which departs from the common classification of predicates based on Indo-European languages. In Sencoten, various readings are derived by interaction between the semantics of verbal predicates (i.e. lexical aspect), the semantics of the grammatical aspect (perfective or imperfective), and the semantics (and possibly pragmatics) of the perfect. In Japanese, the range of interpretations is due to interaction between the semantics of verbal aspect, the function of an adverb, and the semantics and pragmatics of the perfect. In other words, the same factors enter into my analysis of both Sencoten and Japanese, though there is one striking difference between the two languages: the perfective/imperfective opposition is involved in Sencoten, but not in Japanese.

I intend reviewing, in the first place, the contributions to some aspects of the realism issue's discussion coming from some important representatives of the so-called analytic philosophy. With this in view, I intend to show that Austin's conceptual framework, beyond its elucidating power, excludes main aspects of the aforementioned use. In the second place, starting from some of Moore's contentions, we offer an elucidation of the meaning of the expression ''this is real in terms of this may be sought and found. Finally, we project this strategy to clarify the sense and scope of realism's declared independence dimension.
En el presente artículo me propongo, en primer lugar, revisar las contribuciones de algunos de los representantes más importantes de la llamada filosofía analítica a algunos de los aspectos de la discusión sobre el tópico del realismo. Para ello, intentaré mostrar que el mapa conceptual ofrecido por Austin, más allá de su poder elucidatorio, excluye importantes aspectos de dicho uso. En segundo lugar. a partir de algunas afirmaciones de Moore se ofrece una elucidación del significado de la expresión esto es real en términos de esto puede ser buscado y encontrado''. Finalmente, se proyecta esta estrategia para esclarecer el sentido y alcance de la dimensión de independencia declarada por el realismo.

This thesis investigates verbal and prepositional representations of change under a non-localistic analysis based on the mereology of events, i.e., a system of aspect that uses event parts as primitives in lieu of path parts. Localistic analyses, developed from motional concepts (e.g., Verkuyl 1993, Asher & Sablayrolles 1994), do not extend to non-motional data (e.g., changes of state or possession) except via metaphor, thereby bypassing essential generalizations about change.
It is argued that, instead of modeling change after the tripartite source-route-goal divisions of a spatial path, the various combinations of two eventive primitives---distinguished point and distinguished process---are sufficient and necessary in accounting for abstract and concrete data, including the four aspectual verb classes of states, activities, achievements and accomplishments (Vendler 1967). The medial lexical specification, route, is shown to be unnecessary, being an epiphenomenon of two distinguished points interacting, or inferable through pragmatic considerations. This is shown by examples from English and French.
Event mereology unifies concrete with abstract change under a single system of features for verbs (e.g., arrive and inherit ), prepositions, and their associated phrases (in the house and in debt). Underspecification and complementation further economize the lexical representations while accounting for cases of semantic ambiguity. Such issues as homogeneity in states/processes, resultatives, aspectual verbs (continue, stop), agentivity, and the effects of aspectual coercion by English aspectual morphemes (-ed, -ing) are examined and re-formulated where necessary.
The event-mereological approach is demonstrated to be compatible with various current syntactic analyses, and one such analysis (Travis 1999) is investigated in detail. Event mereology is also shown to extend to more complex aspectual patterns observed of serial verb constructions in Edo (Stewart 1998).

This thesis presents empirical research in the field of software development with a focus on handling semantic aspects. There is a general lack of empirical data in the field of software development. This makes it difficult for industry to choose an appropriate method for their particular needs. The lack of empirical data also makes it difficult to convey academic results to the industrial world.

This thesis tries to remedy this problem by presenting a number of empirical evaluations that have been conducted to evaluate some common approaches in the field of semantics handling. The evaluations have produced some interesting results, but their main contribution is the addition to the body of knowledge on how to perform empirical evaluations in software development. The evaluations presented in this thesis include a between-groups controlled experiment, industrial case studies and a full factorial design controlled experiment. The factorial design seems like the most promising approach to use when the number of factors that need to be controlled is high and the number of available test subjects is low. A factorial design has the power to evaluate more than one factor at a time and hence to gauge the effects from different factors on the output.

Another contribution of the thesis is the development of a method for handling semantic aspects in an industrial setting. A background investigation performed concludes that there seems to be a gap between what academia proposes and how industry handles semantics in the development process. The proposed method aims at bridging this gap. It is based on academic results but has reduced formalism to better suit industrial needs. The method is applicable in an industrial setting without interfering too much with the normal way of working, yet providing important benefits. This method is evaluated in the empirical studies along with other methods for handling semantics. In the area of semantic handling, further contributions of the thesis include a taxonomy for semantic handling methods as well as an improved understanding of the relation between semantic errors and the concept of contracts as a means of avoiding and handling these errors.

Ce travail offre une nouvelle perspective sur l’analyse de l’imperfectivité dans la presse espagnole. Le point de départ pour cette analyse est la catégorie sémantico-fonctionnelle de l’aspectualité qui peut être exprimée en espagnol par l’aspect, aktionsart, des adverbes, des périphrases verbales, etc. Sur la base de l’imperfectivité comme une catégorie sémantico-fonctionnelle, qui comprend tous les moyens possibles pour exprimer l’indétermination sémantique comme l’imparfait(cantaba), le présent (canta), ESTAR+GERUNDIO, etc., il est possible d’établir un lien sémantique avec d’autres catégories sémantiques comme la temporalité, la modalité et l’évidentialité où le point central de ce chevauchement est constitué par la perspective du locuteur, à partir de laquelle il formule son énoncé, ce qui est associé à sa subjectivité dans le choix, par exemple, d’une forme verbale imperfective(cantaba) dans des contextes où devrait apparaître une forme verbale perfective(cantó) : El valor total […] ascendía a unos 5.950 euros.Bien que, dans certains contextes, cette décision puisse être expliquée de façon grammaticale, dans d’autres contextes (textes journalistiques) cela ne semble pas être le cas parce que le locuteur se sert de l’indétermination sémantique exprimée par le pretérito imperfecto pour exprimer ses énoncés avec une intention,par exemple, pour signaler une distanciation, une reprise d’énoncés, etc.À cause de son indétermination sémantique, l’imperfectivité se rapproche d’autres fonctions sémantiques comme la modalité épistémique et l’évidentialité indirecte qui permettent de donner à une situation un caractère ‘ouvert’ ou ‘indéterminé’ pour exprimer par exemple une supposition, la reprise d’une citation ou la distanciation du locuteur face à ce qui a dit
The aim of this study is to analyse the use of imperfectivity in the Spanishpress. The point of departure for this analysis is the semantic-functional category ofaspectuality which can be expressed in Spanish by diverse linguistic means likegrammatical aspect, Aktionsarten, adverbs, verbal periphrases, etc. By consideringimperfectivity as a semantic-functional category, which comprises all the possiblelinguistic means to express semantic indeterminacy like the Spanish imperfecto(cantaba), presente (canta), ESTAR+GERUNDIO, etc., a semantic relation to othercategories such as temporality, modality and evidentiality can be made. Thesecategories interplay with the speaker’s stance in expressing an utterance, which isassociated with subjectivity. For example, an imperfective verb form (cantaba) maybe chosen in contexts where the perfective verb form (cantó) is expected to appear:El valor total […] ascendía a unos 5.950 euros (‘The total value […] rose (imperfecto)to some 5.950 euros’).Although in some contexts the use of the imperfective verb form isgrammatically motivated, there are other contexts where this is not the case, e.g. injournalistic texts. The speaker takes advantage of the semantic indeterminacy of theSpanish imperfecto cantaba with a specific intention like showing distance from theutterance or reproducing an utterance made by third parties, etc.Thus imperfectivity, due to its semantic indeterminacy, relates to othersemantic functions like epistemic modality and indirect evidentiality by which asituation is presented as open and undetermined, e.g. the expression of asupposition, or a quotation, or a speaker’s distance from his utterance

This dissertation presents a theory of grammatical aspect in which perfects and prospectives form a sub-group separate from perfectives and imperfectives. I claim that aspects in this sub-group display a number of similar semantic and syntactic behaviors because of the way in which they relate event and reference times. While perfectives and imperfectives situate these times in inclusion relations, perfects and prospectives separate event time from reference time. This effectively creates an interval, homogeneous with respect to the eventuality, that can be interpreted as a state. The separation of the times in these aspects also means that modification of the interval between these times is possible, as is modification by adverbials like since that cannot occur with other aspects. These claims are supported by the morphosyntax and semantics of aspect particles in Scottish Gaelic, with additional data from English. I investigate six particles in Scottish Gaelic, focusing on four I claim to mark various aspects and one I claim to be simply a preposition. I argue that in addition to two inclusion aspects, perfective and imperfective (expressed via a synthetic form and by a' , respectively), Scottish Gaelic shows four distinctions of precedence aspect - two retrospective (air , as dèidh) and two prospective (gu , a' dol do). I provide a neo-Reichenbachian analysis of these particles within event semantics. In each case, the particle is an instantiation of an Aspect head that existentially quantifies over an event and places its runtime in a relation to reference time. I also argue that the particle ann, which seems to appear with both verbal and nominal material, is not an aspect particle but a preposition. Its appearance in the same linear position as the aspect particles belies its distinct syntactic structure. Overall, the data indicate the benefit of a view of grammatical aspect in which the basic time relations of reference time within, before, and after event time delineate groups of aspects rather than individual distinctions. This view of aspect is a more cohesive alternative to one in which aspects that may actually be very similar are taken to exist in separate categories.

We analyse the semantics of aspect-oriented extensions to functional languages by presenting compositional translations of these primitives into languages with traditional notions of state and control. As a first step, we examine an existing semantic description of aspects which allows the labelling of program points. We show that a restriction of these semantics to aspects which do not preempt the execution of code can be fully abstractly translated into a functional calculus with higher order references, but that removing this restriction requires a notion of exception handling to be added to the target language in order to yield a sound semantics. Next, we proceed to show that abandoning the labelling technique, and consequently relaxing the so-called ``obliviousness'' property of aspectual languages, allows preemptive aspects to be included in the general references model without the need for exceptions. This means that the game model of general references is inherited by the aspect calculus. The net result is a clean semantic description of aspect-orientation, which mirrors recently published techniques for their implementation, and thereby provides theoretical justification for these systems. The practical validity of our semantics is demonstrated by implementing extensions to the basic calculus in Standard ML, and showing how a number of useful aspect-oriented features can be expressed using general references alone. Our theoretical methodology closely follows the proof structure that often appears in the game semantics literature, and therefore provides an operational perspective on notions such as ``bad variables'' and factorisation theorems.

Enforcing security policies to distributed systems is difficult, in particular, when a system contains untrusted components. We designed AspectKE*, a distributed AOP language based on a tuple space, to tackle this issue. In AspectKE*, aspects can enforce access control policies that depend on future behavior of running processes. One of the key language features is the predicates and functions that extract results of static program analysis, which are useful for defining security aspects that have to know about future behavior of a program. AspectKE* also provides a novel variable binding mechanism for pointcuts, so that pointcuts can uniformly specify join points based on both static and dynamic information about the program. Our implementation strategy performs fundamental static analysis at load-time, so as to retain runtime overheads minimal. We implemented a compiler for AspectKE*, and demonstrate usefulness of AspectKE* through a security aspect for a distributed chat system.

This dissertation contains three studies, which explore various questions about verbal aspect and how it is affected by the process of nominalization. The first study examines the type of regular eventive nominalizations in Slavic and Germanic languages, which comprise verbal and resultative nouns. It is shown that the availability of these nominalization types depends on how the values of two aspectual parameters are set up in particular languages. The second study deals with English -er, and French -eur deverbal nouns, which denote external arguments. Four different types of reading are recognized for these nouns: episodic, habitual, dispositional, and occupational/instrument readings. The observed variation is accounted for by means of the notion of a stage of an individual or a kind. The last study investigates in more detail the meaning of resultative nominals. They are claimed to have a meaning which parallels that of the perfect aspect in the sentential domain. The overall conclusion is that aspect plays a significant role in the semantics of deverbal nominals.
Aquesta tesi ofereix tres estudis que exploren diverses qüestions sobre l’aspecte verbal i come està afectat pel procés de nominalització. El primer estudi examina les nominalitzacions eventives regulars les llengües eslaves i germàniques, específicament els noms verbals i resultatius. Es mostra que la possibilitat d’aquests tipus de nominalitzacions depèn de com els valors de dos paràmetres aspectuals es configuren en llengües concretes. El segon estudi se centra en els noms deverbals en -er d’anglès i en -eur de francès, que denoten arguments externs. S’identifica quatre intepretacions diferents per aquests noms: episòdica, habitual, de disposició, i ocupacional / instrument. La variació observada s’explica mitjançant la noció d’estadi (stage) d’un individu o d’una classe d’individus (kind). L’últim estudi investiga amb més detall el significat dels nominals resultatius. S’argumenta que aquests nominalitzacions tenen un significat paral·lel a la de l’aspecte perfecte en el domini oracional. La conclusió global de la tesi és que aspecte juga un paper fonamental en la semàntica dels noms deverbals.

In this thesis we investigate some of the issues involved in creating a reversible variant of the formal software development language B. We consider the effects of regarding computation as a potentially reversible process, yielding a number of new programming structures which we integrate into an implementation-level language RB0, a more expressive variant of B0, the current implementation-level language for B. Since reversibility simplifies garbage collection, in RB0 we make use of more abstract, set-based data types, normally available in B only at the specification level. Similarly, we propose extending the domain of abstract functions currently specifiable in B to allow them to become concrete functions, thereby furnishing B with a functional sub-language. We also investigate expanding the use of Lambda calculus from the abstract stage of B to the implementation. Unlike B0, RB0 will not disallow non-determinism, and can also specify what we call Prospective Value computations (which are described). The executable language implements all of these features. After introducing some preliminary concepts, we review the work leading to the rise of Reversible Computing as a possible answer to the growing problem of energy dissipation in modern processors. We describe the language RB0, and demonstrate the use of its features, introducing the companion language RB1 and its role in the process. We then introduce our execution platform, the Reversible Virtual Machine (RVM), and translate some of the examples developed earlier into RVM code. For the concrete functions, we provide a proposed syntax and translation schema to enable consistent translation to RVM, and introduce a postfix Lambda notation to link the RB0 specification to the RVM’s own postfix notation. We provide comprehensive translation schemas for those parts of RB0 which would be found in B operations; these will form the basis of an automated translation engine. In addition, we look at a denotational semantics for Bunch theory, which has proved useful in formalising the underlying concepts.

Throughout the reading process, a narrative text produces various sensations of immediacy or distance. One important reason for this is that a narrative will in some places present situtations from a particular perspective, with which the reader is implicitly invited to identify, while in other places it will describe situations as independent of any perspective. If a perspective (that of the narrator, or that of a character in the text) is introduced, the narrative reflects an individual's (potentially fallible) perceptions, attitudes or beliefs; and this creates the impression of perspectival immediacy. If no perspective is introduced, on the other hand, the narrative pretends to relate "objective facts" within the fiction; and this creates the impression of perspectival distance. Thus the contrast between perepectivally situated and perepectivally non-situated sentences in a narrative produces perspectival refractions. The difference between both types of sentences, however, is often felt to be recalcitrant to a full linguistic analysis. For example, it is generally assumed that the perspectival status of a sentence is determined by the presence or absence of aubject-oriented elements in the sentence. But although such elements play an important role in focusing perspective, they need not occur in a sentence for the sentence to be perspectivally situated. In Chapter 1 of this dissertation, we draw attention to an observation which has received very little attention in the existing literature on perspective: per pectivally non-situated sentences typically move narrative time forward (in the sense that the order of the sentences on the page mimics temporal progression on the imaginary time line of the narrative), while perspectivally situated sentences do not convey forward movement in time. In other words, there appears to be a relationship between temporal ordering and perspective. Our aim is to specify the precise nature of this relationship. To do so, we first of all try to establish what determines the temporal relationship between consecutive sentences in narrative. We take as the starting point for our discussion some recent theories in the field of formal semantics which define this relationship in terms of the aspectual type a sentence belongs to. In Chapter 2, we explore to what extent these theories enable us to explain the apparent correlation between temporal ordering and perspective in narrative texts. In Chapters 3-5, we propose a detailed analysis of the relationship between the aspectual properties of sentences and their perspectival characteristics. Our central claim is that sentences exhibiting a state profile always introduce a perspective into a narrative. We try to make explicit why this is the case. In Chapter 6, the conclusions of this analysis are integrated into a more general theory of perspective in narrative fiction.

Orientador: Rodolfo Ilari, Edson Françozo
Dissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Instituto de Estudos da Linguagem
Made available in DSpace on 2018-08-08T03:53:56Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Basso_RenatoMiguel_M.pdf: 1736319 bytes, checksum: acf1a84b14a626cd4aff52527ce0266b (MD5) Previous issue date: 2007
Resumo: o presente trabalho é uma investigação do fenômeno da detelicização, representado por sentenças como "João leu o livro por 1 semana", na qual temos um evento télico (Le., que tem um ponto final não arbitrário) seguido por um adjunto do tipo "por X tempo", que, segundo a literatura, é incompatível com eventos télicos. Dado essa alegada incompatibilidade, várias das teorias que tratam da detelicização a abordam como um caso de coerção ou "type-mismatch" para dar conta do fato de que os falantes aceitam esse tipo sentença. Para proceder a tal investigação, inicialmente apresentamos o quadro teórico que adotamos, segundo o qual os fenômenos tempo-aspectuais devem ser tratadas levando-se em conta a separação e interação de seus sub-dornínios: (i) referência temporal, que responde pela localização de eventos numa suposta seta do tempo, e é, portanto, o componente dêitico; (ii) aspecto, que é a representação, feita subjetivamente pelo falante, de um evento como concluso ou inconcluso; e (iii) acionalidade, sUb-domínio que diz respeito ao tipo de evento em questão. O objetivo do segundo capítulo é entender melhor o conceito de telicidade e como ele é apreendido pelas teorias tempo-aspectuais contemporâneas. Esse passo é imprescendível, pois somente eventos télicos podem passar pelo processo de detelicização. No terceiro capítulo apresentamos em detalhe a detelicização, definida como a apresentação de um evento interrompido, ou seja, um evento télico que se inicia e pára sem, no entanto, alcançar seu ponto final, seu telas. Depois de caracterizar esse fenômeno, esboçamos uma teoria semântico-pragmática que visa a capturá-Ia, assim como esmiuçar o que é propriamente semântico e o que é pragmático no estudo dos fenômenos tempo-aspectuais. Por fim, no quarto capítulo efetuamos dois experimentos psicolingüísticos que visavam a verificar a existência de alguma contraparte empírica (i.e., tempo de leitura) da coerção ou "type-mismatch" postulados para sentenças como "João leu o livro por uma semana". A análise dos experimentos revelou que não há qualquer diferença significativa entre o tempo de leitura de, por exemplo, "João leu o livro por uma semana" versus "João leu o livro em uma semana". Assim, diante desse resultado experimental e da teoria aqui esboçada, dispensamos como um todo o apelo a expedientes como coerção para entender a detelicização
Abstract: This dissertation investigates the phenomenon of detelicization, represented by sentences such as "João leu o livro por 1 semana" ("John read a book for 1 week"), in which there is a telic event (i.e., an event which has a non-arbítrary final point) followed by an adjunct like "for X time", which, according to the literature, is incompatible with telic events. In order to accommodate the fact that the speakers accepted thís kind of sentence, most of the theories which deal wíth detelicization treat the alleged incompatibilíty via coercion or type-mismatch. Thís díssertatíon presents an alternative to the main stream: a semantic-pragmatic approach. In order to investigate detelicization, first we present the theoretic framework we adopt. In this framework, we consíder the temporal-aspectual domaín as composed of three subdomaíns, namely: (i) temporal reference, whích gives the deictic localization of an event in the time arrow; (ií) aspect, which is the way a speaker chooses to represent an event; the event can be concluded or unconcluded; (iii) actionality, that ís, what kínd of event is denoted by the predicate. The objective of the second chapter ís to achieve a better understandíng of the notion of telícíty, and of how it is captured by contemporary temporal-aspectual theories. This understanding ís índispensable, since only telic events can be "detelicízed". In the third chapter we define detelicization in detail, Í.e. ít ís the presentatíon of and event as interrupted, that is, a telic event which begíns and stops wíthout reaching its final point, íts telos. We then íntroduce a semantic-pragmatic theory which explaíns how this interpretation comes about, and what ís semantics and what is pragmatics in it. Finally, in the fourth chapter we perform two psycholinguistícs experiments aíming at verifyíng the existence of some empirical grounds (i.e., reading time) sustaíníng coercion or type-mismatch, postulated to account for sentences as "'João leu o livro por 1 semana". The analysis of experiments' results shows no significative difference in reading time between, e.g., "João leu o livro por 1 semana" and "João leu o livro em 1 semana" ("John read a book in 1 week"). Gíven this result and the semantic-pragmatic approach sketched here, we claím that the notion of coercion is unnecessary to ::.ccount for the phenomenon of detelicization
Mestrado
Mestre em Linguística

Föreliggande studie undersöker sex elevers självskattade förståelse av tre mellanstadielärares språkbruk i tre olika ämnen. Studien utgår från tre frågeställningar som behandlar lärarnas språkbruk, elevernas självskattade förståelse samt elevernas tankar om förståelse och inlärning. Datainsamlingsmetoder är ljudinspelningar, deltagande observationer samt enkäter. Legitimation code theorys semantiska vågor är studiens teoretiska utgångspunkt och analysmetod. Semantisk densitet och semantisk gravitation används därför för att analysera lärarnas språkbruk i kombination med elevernas självskattade förståelse. Studiens resultat åskådliggör att eleverna i stor utsträckning har svårt att förstå ämnesspecifika begrepp som förklaras med hög informationstäthet. Eleverna angav även att muntliga och skriftligaförklaringar bidrog till att skapa större förståelse av ett ämnesinnehåll. Eleverna ansåg även att uppgifter som utfördes i kooperativa och praktiska arbetssätt påverkade deras förståelse positivt. Avslutningsvis presenteras vidare utvecklingsmöjligheter med studien.

Leveraging our experience with the traditional approach to ambient assisted living (AAL) which relies on a large spread of heterogeneous technologies in deployments, this thesis studies the possibility of a more "stripped down" and complementary approach, where only a reduced hardware subset is deployed, probing a transfer of complexity towards the software side, and enhancing the large scale deployability of the solution. Focused on the reasoning aspects in AAL systems, this work has allowed the finding of a suitable semantic inference engine for the peculiar use in these systems, responding to a need in this scientific community. Considering the coarse granularity of situational data available, dedicated rule-sets with adapted inference strategies are proposed, implemented, and validated using this engine. A novel semantic reasoning mechanism is proposed based on a cognitively inspired reasoning architecture. Finally, the whole reasoning system is integrated in a fully featured context-aware service framework, powering its context awareness by performing live event processing through complex ontological manipulation. the overall system is validated through in-situ deployments in a nursing home as well as private homes over a few months period, which itself is noticeable in a mainly laboratory-bound research domain

Neste trabalho é feito um estudo dos aspectos do verbo no livro dos Salmos, considerando seus valores semântico-sintáticos. Para este fim, considera-se a evolução dos estudos da linguagem, fundamentado em Hermann Paul (1970); o desenvolvimento da ciência das significações através do trabalho de Bréal (1925) e enriquecido pela perspectiva de Marques (2001); a evolução da Linguística por meio do estruturalismo fundamentado em Ferdinand de Saussure e Leonor de Bloomfield, e do gerativismo de Noam Chomsky. Focaliza-se a dimensão textual discursiva com a função de realizar formulações sobre o verbo e articular relação entre teoria do texto e do discurso segundo a perspectiva de Travaglia (1991). Retrata-se a relação de significação que os verbos assumem no texto, embasado no estudo do aspecto segundo os pressupostos de Castilho (1968), Travaglia (1986, 1991) e Azeredo (2010). Para se estabelecer relações entre o aspecto verbal e a mensagem bíblica dos Salmos, fundamenta-se na visão semântica de Ilari (2001) e nos comentários semânticos e teológicos de Champlin (2000)
This paper is a study of verbal aspects in the book of Psalms, considering their semantic-syntactic value. To this end, the evolution in language studies is considered, based on Hermann Paul (1970); the development of the science of meaning through the work of Breal (1925), enriched by Marquess perspective (2001); the evolution of linguistics through structuralism based on the works of Ferdinand de Saussure and Leonor de Bloomfield and on Noam Chomskys generative grammar. We focus on the discoursive textual dimension to generate formulations about the verb and articulate a relation between the theory of text and discourse according to Travaglias perspective (1991). The study portrays the relations of meaning that verbs take on inside the text, based on the study of aspect according to the assumptions of Castilho (1968), Travaglia (1986, 1991) and Azeredo (2010). To establish relations between verbal aspect and the biblical message of the Psalms, the study draws on Ilaris semantic foundations (2001), and on the semantic and theological commentary in Champlin (2000)

Thesis (B.Sc)--University of Hong Kong, 2000.
"A dissertation submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the Bachelor of Science (Speech and Hearing Sciences). The University of Hong Kong, May 10, 2000." Also available in print.

Notre thèse porte sur l’étude linguistique contrastive de la référence aux couleurs dans les proverbes à partir d'un corpus de 208 proverbes recueillis en France et en Irak. Nous étudierons la manière dont les couleurs sont exprimées dans les deux langues (catégories grammaticales, structure grammaticale et prosodique des énoncés, outils rhétoriques appliqués aux couleurs pour renforcer leur valeur expressive), ainsi que le rapport des locuteurs à l'usage des couleurs dans les proverbes qu'ils utilisent. Nous essayerons également d'explorer dans les deux langues les différences liées à l'époque où le proverbe a été le plus utilisé, ainsi que le degré de connaissance des proverbes selon l'âge, le sexe, la profession et la région du locuteur. La langue française, ainsi que le dialecte irakien contiennent une grande proportion de mots indiquant la couleur dans les proverbes. Et c’est la connotation de ces mots qui est à l’origine de la difficulté de compréhension. De plus, selon les pays, les cultures et les époques, les couleurs revêtent des significations différentes, parfois aux antipodes de celles des cultures voisines, comme le blanc, associé en occident et dans les pays arabes (comme en Irak) à la pureté, alors qu’il est lié au deuil dans la plupart des pays asiatiques. Grâce à la langue, comme nous le savons, l’homme peut communiquer, échanger les informations, les idées et les sentiments. En d’autres termes, les parleurs peuvent exprimer ce qu’ils veulent exprimer, ce qu’ils veulent dire et les auditeurs peuvent recevoir les informations. Cependant, dans la communication, il n’est pas toujours facile de comprendre complètement et exactement ce qui est dit et écrit, parce que le sens du mot est compliqué et sophistiqué. Le même mot, utilisé dans ces différentes situations, aura différentes significations. Les mots indiquant la couleur se heurtent aux mêmes problèmes. Fonctionnant comme une unité isolée, le proverbe est une combinaison de mots tirés du vocabulaire général de chaque langue. Nous considérons les mots indiquant la couleur dans les proverbes et les locutions proverbiales comme l’objet de notre étude parce que la couleur est partout dans notre vie : la couleur des plantes et des animaux, la couleur du ciel et de la terre, la couleur des aliments, mais aussi parce que les proverbes constituent une source de vocabulaire riche pour ceux qui apprennent la langue. Les proverbes portent divers champs sémantiques et ils reflètent bien les difficultés culturelles liées à l’apprentissage du français en Irak. En outre, nous essayerons de prouver, à travers des transformations et des manipulations, que ces proverbes peuvent être figés. Une étude approfondie de ces traits sémantiques et syntaxiques nous a paru de première nécessité pour rendre compte de l'existence du figement dans les proverbes, phénomène linguistique à la fois très important et très complexe. Par ailleurs, la comparaison critique entre ces deux langues, le français et l’arabe en l’occurrence, affirme que ce phénomène du figement n’est qu’un fait linguistique universel, et révèle que chaque langue a ses propres mécanismes de figement. Nous pouvons noter que du point de vue sémantique, le sens des proverbes n’est pas calculé selon les règles de la compositionalité ; autrement dit, le sens global des proverbes n’est pas l’addition du sens des éléments qui les composent
Our thesis concerns the contrastive linguistic study of The reference to colors in the proverbs from a corpus of 208 proverbs collected in France and in Iraq. We shall study how the colors are expressed in both languages (word classes, grammatical and prosodic structure of the statements, the rhetoric tools applied to colors to strengthen their meaning value) as well as the link of the speakers for colors in the proverbs they use. We shall also try to explore in both languages the differences related to the period when the proverb was the most used as well as in the degree of knowledge of the proverbs according to age, sex, profession and the region of the speaker. The French language as well as the Iraqi dialect contain a big proportion of words indicating the color in the proverbs. And it is the connotation of these words that is the origin of the difficulty of understanding. Furthermore, according to countries, cultures and times, the colors take on different meanings sometimes to the antipodes of those of the nearby cultures like the colour white, associated in the West and in Arab countries to purity, while it is refers to mourning in most of the Asian countries. Thanks to the language, as we know it, the man can communicate, exchange information, ideas and eelings. In other words, the speakers can express what they want to express, what they want to sayand the listenerscan receive the information. However, in communication, it is not always easy to understand completely and exactly what is said and written, because the meaning of the word is complicated and sophisticated. The same word, used in these various situations, will have various meanings. The words indicating the color come up against with the same problems. Working as an isolated unity, the proverb is a combinatio of words taken from the general vocabulary of every language. We consider the words indicating the color in the proverbs and the proverbial expressions as the object of our study because the color is everywhere in our life : the color of the plants and animals, the color of the sky and the earth, the color of food, but also because the proverbs constitute a source of rich vocabulary for those who learn the language. The proverbs refers to diverse semantic fields and they reflect nicely the cultural difficulties related to learning of the French language in Iraq. Besides this, we would try to prove through transformations and manipulations that these proverbs can be frozen. An elaborate study of these semantic and syntactical features seemed to us absolutely essential to report the existence of the congealing in the proverbs, a very important and very complex linguistic phenomenon at the same time. Besides that, the critical comparison between these two languages : French and Arabic in this particular case, asserts that the phenomenon of the congealing is just a universal linguistic fact, and reveals that each language has its own mechanisms of congealing. We can note that, from the semantic point of view, the meaning of the proverbs is not calculated according to the rules of the compositionality ; in other words, the global meaning of the proverbs is not the addition of the meaning of the elements which compose them

Este trabalho investiga a semântica da palavra tyka do Karitiana, língua amazônica da família Arikém do tronco Tupi falada atualmente por cerca de 320 pessoas em uma reserva localizada em Porto Velho, Rondônia (Nelson Karitiana - com. pessoal - 2005).
This research investigates the semantics of the word tyka in Karitiana, an Amazonian language of the Arikém family (Tupi stock) spoken nowadays by approximately 320 people who live in their own reservation located in Porto Velho, Rondônia (Nelson Karitiana - personal communication - 2005).

Comment le cerveau humain parvient-il à conceptualiser des idées abstraites ? Quelle est en particulier l’origine de l’activité mathématique lorsqu'elle est associée à un haut niveau d’abstraction ? La question de savoir si la pensée mathématique peut exister sans langage intéresse depuis longtemps les philosophes, les mathématiciens et les enseignants. Elle commence aujourd’hui à être abordée par les neurosciences cognitives. Alors que les études précédentes se sont principalement focalisées sur l’arithmétique élémentaire, mon travail de thèse privilégie l’étude de la manipulation d’idées mathématiques plus avancées et des processus cérébraux impliqués dans leur apprentissage. Les travaux présentés dans cette thèse révèlent que : (1) la réflexion sur des concepts mathématiques de haut niveau appris depuis de nombreuses années n’implique pas les aires du langage ; (2) l’activité mathématique, quels qu’en soient la difficulté et le domaine, implique systématiquement des régions classiquement associées à la manipulation des nombres et de l’espace, y compris chez des personnes non-voyantes; (3) l’apprentissage non-verbal de règles géométriques repose sur un langage de la pensée indépendant du langage parlé naturel. Ces résultats ouvrent la voie à de nouvelles questions en neurosciences. Par exemple, l’apprentissage de concepts mathématiques enseignés à l’école par le truchement des mots se passe-t-il également du langage ? Ou enfin, que signifie réellement "faire des mathématiques" pour le cerveau humain ?
How does the human brain conceptualize abstract ideas? In particular, what is the origin of mathematical activity, especially when it is associated with high-level of abstraction? Is mathematical thought independent of language? Cognitive science has now started to investigate this question that has been of great interest to philosophers, mathematicians and educators for a long time. While studies have so far focused on basic arithmetic processing, my PhD thesis aims at further investigating the cerebral processes involved in the manipulation and learning of more advanced mathematical ideas. I have shown that (1) advanced mathematical reflection on concepts mastered for many years does not recruit the brain circuits for language; (2) mathematical activity systematically involves number- and space-related brain regions, regardless of mathematical domain, problem difficulty, and participants' visual experience; (3) non-verbal acquisition of geometrical rules relies on a language of thought that is independent of natural spoken language. Finally, altogether these results raise new questions and pave the way to further investigations in neuroscience: - is the human ability for language also irrelevant to advanced mathematical acquisition in schools where knowledge is taught verbally? - What is the operational definition of the fields of “mathematics” and “language” at the brain level?

A glass couldn't contain water unless it contained H2O-molecules. Likewise, a man couldn't be a bachelor unless he was unmarried. Now, the latter is what we would call a conceptual or analytical truth. It's also what we would call a priori. But it's hardly a conceptual or analytical truth that if a glass contains water, then it contains H2O-molecules. Neither is it a priori. The fact that water is composed of H2O-molecules was an empirical discovery made in the eighteenth century. The fact that all bachelors are unmarried was not. But neither is a logical truth, so how do we explain the difference? Two-dimensional semantics is a framework that promises to shed light on these issues. The main purpose of this thesis is to understand and evaluate this framework in relation to various alternatives, to see whether some version of it can be defended. I argue that it fares better than the alternatives. However, much criticism of two-dimensionalism has focused on its alleged inability to provide a proper semantics for certain epistemic operators, in particular the belief operator and the a priori operator. In response to this criticism, a two-dimensional semantics for belief ascriptions is developed using structured propositions. In connection with this, a number of other issues in the semantics of belief ascriptions are addressed, concerning indexicals, beliefs de se, beliefs de re, and the problem of logical omniscience.

Capes, Capes-Cofecub
Esta tese investiga a contribuição semântica dos verbos aspectuais acabar, começar, continuar, deixar, parar, passar, voltar e terminar em português brasileiro. O objetivo geral é contribuir para a análise sobre aspecto e sobre verbos aspectuais em PB e nas línguas naturais em geral, utilizando a Semântica Formal como modelo de análise. Este trabalho defende que os verbos aspectuais são modificadores de eventualidades e por isso contribuem para a expressão do aspecto lexical (Aktionsart), seguindo trabalhos anteriores, como os de Oliveira et al. (2001) e de Laca (2002; 2004; 2005). Ele assume que os verbos aqui estudados se comportam de forma diferente dos verbos de aspecto gramatical como estar e ir, tendo inclusive uma posição diferente na estrutura sintática. Como os verbos aspectuais se relacionam com o aspecto lexical, este trabalho também investiga as propriedades do aspecto lexical presentes no predicado selecionado por um verbo aspectual. Para a seleção dos verbos aspectuais, as propriedades relevantes se encontram no nível do sintagma verbal (VP) e são dadas composicionalmente. Por isso, constituintes como o objeto direto podem alterá-las, permitindo (ou restringindo) a seleção do VP em questão por parte do verbo aspectual. A tese aqui defendida é a de que cada verbo aspectual seleciona seus complementos a partir de propriedades específicas presentes no VP e que estão ligadas à semântica do verbo aspectual em questão. Dessa forma, esta pesquisa defende que as restrições de seleção de cada verbo aspectual podem ser acessadas na entrada lexical do verbo aspectual, sendo possível explicar a seleção de complementos feita por esses verbos. Além disso, defendemos a tese de que a entrada lexical pode apresentar a diferença entre verbos como começar e passar, nas perífrases começar a+infinitivo e passar a +infinitivo, por exemplo.
This thesis investigates the semantic contribution of the following aspectual verbs: começar ‘begin’, continuar ‘continue’, deixar ‘quit’, parar ‘stop’, passar ‘pass’, voltar ‘resume’, and acabar/terminar ‘finish’, in Brazilian Portuguese (BrP). The main goal is to contribute to the discussion about aspect and aspectual verbs in BrP and in natural languages in general, within a Formal Semantics approach. This work treats aspectual verbs as eventuality modifiers, and, consequently, it defends that they contribute to express lexical aspect (Aktionsart) – or situation aspect (Smith 1997) – in accordance with previous works such as Oliveira et al. (2001) and Laca (2002; 2004; 2005). This thesis also proposes that the verbs under discussion behave differently from verbs which contribute to express grammatical aspect – or viewpoint aspect (Smith 1997) – such as estar ‘be’, in the progressive aspect, and ir ‘go’, in the prospective aspect, also assuming that they have different positions in the syntactic structure. Since aspectual verbs are related to lexical aspect, the present research also analyzes lexical aspect features in the predicate which is selected for these verbs. Relevant features for this selection are located in the verbal phrase level (VP) and are given compositionally. Thus, phrases such as the direct object are able to change them, allowing (or not) that an aspectual verb select this VP. This work defends the hypothesis that each aspectual verb selects their complements based on specific features found in the VP, and that these features are linked to the semantics of this aspectual verb. Then, this research defends the idea that the selection constraints of each aspectual verb can be observed in its lexical entry, which explains the selection made by these verbs. Furthermore, we defend the idea that we can verify differences between semantically similar verbs like começar and passar, in their periphrastic construction, from differences found in their lexical entries.