This volume represents the culmination of an extensive research project that studies the development of linguistic form/function relations in narrative discourse. It is unique in the extent of data which it analyzes - more than 250 texts from children and adults speaking five different languages - and in its crosslinguistic, typological focus. It addresses the issue of how the structural properties and rhetorical preferences of different native languages - English German, Spanish, Hebrew and Turkish - impinge on narrative abilities across different phases of development.

This volume represents the culmination of an extensive research project that studied the development of linguistic form/function relations in narrative discourse. It is unique in the extent of data which it analyzes--more than 250 texts from children and adults speaking five different languages--and in its crosslinguistic, typological focus. It is the first book to address the issue of how the structural properties and rhetorical preferences of different native languages--English, German, Spanish, Hebrew, and Turkish--impinge on narrative abilities across different phases of development.

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