YPL1 - Issue 12

Issue 12 (November 1986)

Editors: S.J. Harlow and A.R. Warner

Italian Comparatives of Inequality with Che and Di

5–34

Adrian C. Battye

A Note on Passives in GPSG

35–42

Robert D. Borsley

Reduplicated Constructions in Chinese and Questions of Generative Power

43–66

Jonathan Calder

A Note on Subcategorization, Constituent Order, and the Notion 'Head'

67–74

Gerald Gazdar and Geoffrey K. Pullum

Constituent Structure in Text-Copying

75–116

Patrick Griffiths

Abstract

In this paper a text-copying task is explored as a naturalistic, reasonably direct, and sensitive psycholinguistic method for the determination of syntactic constituent structure. In two experiments, 70 subjects wrote out copies of typed passages. The points where they paused and looked back to the typed originals were recorded and aggregated across all subjects copying a given passage. The passages differed in content but contained sentences with comparable structure. In general, patterns of pausing were highly correlated across sentences which matched in structure, but reliably distinct in relevant control comparisons. Sentences, clauses and many details of their internal constituency emerge clearly. These details are presented and compared with descriptions from the field of theoretical linguistics. Some suggestive evidence in support of two-stage parsing models is noted. 

Gaps in Generalised Phrase Structure Grammar

117–126

Steve Harlow

Some Rhythm, Resonance and Quality Variations in Urban Tyneside Speech

127–134

John K. Local

A Methodology for Describing Socio-Linguistic Variability within Multi-lingual Settings in General, and 'Interactive' and 'Reactive' Ethnic Processes in Language in Particular

135–152

Ben Rampton

Abstract

After mentioning the social context where I am conducting my research (and where the ideas outlined below have yet to be put to the test), this paper briefly refers to work on the English of British schoolchildren of South Asian extraction. It then speculates on the relationship between their English and two ethnic processes – what Gumperz calls the 'interactive' and the 'reactive'. The way in which Network Analysis (as used by Gal and L Milroy) permits an investigation of the first of these is outlined, and then consideration is given to a means of examining the second (the 'reactive'). This is Identity Structure Analysis (ISA), developed by P Weinreich, which in addition provides a systematic method for discovering what it feels like inside a network. The paper ends with a bolder claim for this combination of Network Analysis with ISA. Together, they give empirical and economical realisation to several important components in Le Page's sociolinguistic hypothesis and riders. Depending on the adequacy and status of this theory, the methodology described here covers parameters that are really the most fundamental to any (neighbourhood) sociolinguistic survey (whose main focus is on the language of the individual speaker). 

Ellipsis Conditions and the Status of the English Copula

153–172

Anthony R. Warner

Reviews

Helen Kwok. Sentence Particles in Cantonese. Centre of Asian Studies Occasional Papers and Monographs, University of Hong Kong. 1984. 127 pp. HK$45.00.

175–176

Robert S. Bauer

Roger Hewitt. White Talk Black Talk: Inter-racial Friendship and Communication among Adolescents. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1986.

177–179

R.B. Le Page

S.A. Wurm (ed.). Papers in Pidgin and Creole Linguistics No. 3. Pacific Linguistics Series A No. 65. Canberra: Australian National University, Department of Linguistics. 1983.

181–187

R.B. Le Page