HPSG Gazette – Issue #10 (April 2016) –
Outline
Editorial
Publications
Moves
HPSG Bibliography – Last entries
Strip of the issue
Editorial
Dear All,
Welcome to the vernal HPSG Gazette! You're probably all longing for summer (if nothing else, buzzing with excitement about coming to Warsaw), but we hope you will still enjoy this issue in the meantime.
You will find in this 10th issue an announcement of a new publication, information about a move within the HPSG-community, and the new bibliography entries (with 2 PhD theses from Buffalo - congratulations!).
We wish the gazette to be a useful tool for all! Please send us HPSG-related information (reports on HPSG-related talks, work in progress, theses, new HPSG projects and software, moves within the HPSG community, etc.) for the next issue of the gazette (to appear in the middle of July) to:
Urgent information should be posted on the the HPSG mailing list rather than sent to the Gazette.
Best regards,
Elodie Winckel & Antonio Machicao y Priemer
Publications
Grammatical theory: From transformational grammar to constraint-based approaches (by Stefan Müller)
This book introduces formal grammar theories that play a role in current linguistic theorizing (Phrase Structure Grammar, Transformational Grammar/Government & Binding, Generalized Phrase Structure Grammar, Lexical Functional Grammar, Categorial Grammar, Head-Driven Phrase Structure Grammar, Construction Grammar, Tree Adjoining Grammar). The key assumptions are explained and it is shown how the respective theory treats arguments and adjuncts, the active/passive alternation, local reorderings, verb placement, and fronting of constituents over long distances. The analyses are explained with German as the object language. The second part of the book compares these approaches with respect to their predictions regarding language acquisition and psycholinguistic plausibility. The nativism hypothesis, which assumes that humans posses genetically determined innate language-specific knowledge, is critically examined and alternative models of language acquisition are discussed. The second part then addresses controversial issues of current theory building such as the question of flat or binary branching structures being more appropriate, the question whether constructions should be treated on the phrasal or the lexical level, and the question whether abstract, non-visible entities should play a role in syntactic analyses. It is shown that the analyses suggested in the respective frameworks are often translatable into each other. The book closes with a chapter showing how properties common to all languages or to certain classes of languages can be captured.
The book can bee downloaded at the web page of Language Science Press for free. Hard and softcover versions can be bought from there as well.
Moves in the HPSG-community
Stefan Müller is now at the Humboldt-University in Berlin.
Post address: Institut für deutsche Sprache und Linguistik Philosophische Fakultät II Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin Unter den Linden 6 D-10099 Berlin
Office: Dorotheenstrasse 24, 10117 Berlin - Mitte (Room: 3.304)
E-Mail: st.mueller@hu-berlin.de
HPSG Bibliography: Last entries
Here's the updated bibliography with the submissions since our last issue. Thanks to everybody who contributed to the bibliography!
@phdthesis{Jin_Dawei04.07.201615:06:36, author = "Dawei Jin", email = "rchaves@buffalo.edu", homepage = "http://www.acsu.buffalo.edu/~rchaves/", school = "University at Buffalo", title = "The Semantic-Pragmatics Interface and Island Constraints in Chinese", type = "PhD Dissertation", url = "http://www.acsu.buffalo.edu/~rchaves/dawei_dissertation.pdf", year = "2016" } @phdthesis{Wetta_Andrew_C.04.07.201615:04:51, author = "Andrew C. Wetta", email = "rchaves@buffalo.edu", homepage = "http://www.acsu.buffalo.edu/~rchaves/", school = "University at Buffalo", title = "Construction-based Approaches to Flexible Word Order", type = "PhD Dissertation", url = "http://www.acsu.buffalo.edu/~rchaves/wetta_dissertation.pdf", year = "2014" } @incollection{Bildhauer_Felix04.13.201612:57:55, address = "Oxford", author = "Bildhauer, Felix", booktitle = "The Routledge Handbook of Syntax", editor = "Carnie, Andrew and Sato, Yosuke and Siddiqi, Dan", pages = "526--555", publisher = "Routledge", title = "Head-Driven Phrase Structure Grammar", year = "2014" }
Please submit further entries to make the HPSG-Bibliography as complete as possible. Older papers not yet registered are welcome as well.
Strip of the issue
The linguists strike back
The strip of the issue was brought to you by Speculative Grammarian, the premier scholarly journal featuring research in the neglected field of satirical linguistics.