Linguistic signs do not coincide with intended or interpreted meanings. For relevance theory, this theoretical commonplace merely demonstrates the inferential nature of language. For Paul de Man, on the contrary, it suggested that language is unstable, random, arbitrary, mechanical, ironic and inhuman. This book seeks to show that relevance theory is a more plausible account of communication, cognition and literary interpretation than the deconstructionist theory de Man elaborated from readings of Rousseau, Hegel and Nietzsche.

The author questions the status quo in Romance linguistics. The Ergative/Unaccusative syntactic approach has been accepted as the orthodox analytical paradigm. He re-examines both the theoretical imperative and the empirical evidence for that approach, drawing on a large amount of new and surprising data from Italian, Spanish, French and Catalan.

Faith, family, and the weight of history intersect in this remarkable debut from a rising literary talent
A cold, gray Sunday dawns on New York City to find Paul Metzger trudging through the winter streets to visit his past. He goes first to see his estranged, decades-older half-brother; then his dying father, whose notorious early life still haunts his children; and finally the ex-wife he cannot help but continue to love. But a fourth encounter-violent, unexpected-sets in motion a chain of events that will forever change Paul's life, as well as the family he's struggled so long...

The life of Paul Metzger, a writer, is in disrepair. Mid-30s, divorced, underachieving. A mid-winter Sunday in New York sees him traversing the city to visit three people: an elder half-brother who wants little to do with him; a disgraced, dying father, once infamous as a Nazi sympathiser; and an ex-wife whom Paul still loves.

English as a Lingua Franca: Theorizing and Teaching English examines the English used among non-native speakers around the world today and its relation to English as a native language, as well as the implications for English language teaching.

Challenging and incisive, this book analyses positive and negative accounts of English as a lingua franca, and its linguistic features, within the context of:

• native and World Englishes
• multilingualism and intercultural communication
• sociolinguistic issues including...

The world's best-selling grammar series for learners of English.