Kategoria BISAC: Foreign Language Study >> General

The book is concerned with a hitherto underresearched grammaticalization process: the development from quality-attributing adjective to determiner in the English noun phrase. It takes a bottom-up approach, based on extensive synchronic and diachronic corpus studies of six English adjectives of comparison: other, different, same, identical, similar and comparable. Their functional diversity in current English is proposed to constitute a case of layering, representing the original descriptive use, which expresses how like/unlike each...

This book analyzes the form and function of the English passive from a verb-based point of view. It takes the position that the various surface forms of the passive (with or without thematic subject, with or without object, with or without by-phrase, with or without auxiliary) have a common source and are determined by the interplay of the syntactic properties of the verb and general syntactic principles. Each structural element of the passive construction is examined separately, and the participle is considered the only defining component of the passive.

Special emphasis...

Questions about how ancient Greek texts establish their authority, reflect on each other, and project their own truths have become central for a wide range of recent critical discourses. In this volume, an influential group of international scholars examines these themes in a variety of poetic and rhetorical genres. The result is a series of striking and original readings from different critical perspectives that display the centrality of these questions for understanding the poetic and rhetorical aims of ancient Greek texts. Characterized by a combination of close attention to...

TRENDS IN LINGUISTICS is a series of books that open new perspectives in our understanding of language. The series publishes state-of-the-art work on core areas of linguistics across theoretical frameworks as well as studies that provide new insights by building bridges to neighbouring fields such as neuroscience and cognitive science.

TRENDS IN LINGUISTICS considers itself a forum for cutting-edge research based on solid empirical data on language in its various manifestations, including sign languages. It regards linguistic variation in its synchronic and diachronic dimensions as...

What factors influence the choice between alternative grammatical structures such as the following: a lit / a lighted cigarette, more full / fuller of convincing arguments, the main thesis of the book / the book's main thesis, take hostage a group of 15 holiday makers / take a group of 15 holidaymakers hostage, conceding that the argument is convincing / conceding the argument to be convincing? This is the central issue explored in this volume, which contains a unique selection of innovative in-depth empirical studies written in a broadly functional framework. The factors...

This book is an extremely detailed and comprehensive examination of conditional sentences in English, using many examples from actual language-use. The syntax and semantics of conditionals (including tense and mood options) and the functions of conditionals in discourse are examined in depth, producing an all-round linguistic view of the subject which contains a wealth of original observations and analyses. Not only linguists specializing in grammar but also those interested in pragmatics and the philosophy of language will find this book a rewarding and illuminating source.

This series creates a space for innovative scholarship examining the ways language functions as a powerful meaning-making resource for constructing identities, managing relationships and building communities. Grounded in new, data-driven methodologies, quantitative and qualitative, and engaging a diverse range of communicative and textual practices, the series embraces work from variationist sociolinguistics through to discourse studies, linguistic anthropology and social semiotics. Monographs and edited volumes are welcomed, as is any work that explicitly situates language in its...