Linguistics

In this short squib, I reopen the issue whether declarations, including explicit performatives, are a special case of assertions (namely, self-verifying assertions), or whether they form a distinct ty - lingbuzz, the linguistics archive

In recent years, the term token has gained widespread use among linguists and non-linguists alike, largely due to the rise of large language models (LLMs) such as ChatGPT. However, this term does not - lingbuzz, the linguistics archive

In this paper, I explore what a theory of the essence of language might look like if we try to explain language by taking Genesis, the Gospel of John, and the natural sciences to all be true. In doing - lingbuzz, the linguistics archive

I describe and analyze patterns of syntactically conditioned allomorphy observed in A'ingae (or Cofán, an endangered Amazonian isolate, ISO 639-3: con). Three information structural morphemes—the new - lingbuzz, the linguistics archive

The goal of this paper is to account for the variable agreement properties of the 1.PL pronoun "a gente" in Brazilian Portuguese. We argue that previous approaches make wrong predictions about how dif - lingbuzz, the linguistics archive

The article presents an overview over the demonstrative and anaphoric devices of Daakie, a language spoken in the South of the island Ambrym in Vanuatu. It is based on extensive field work. After an i - lingbuzz, the linguistics archive

A major line of research in semantics concerns meaning-driven explanations of combinatorial restrictions of various operators. Such explanations rely on a link from semantic triviality to ungrammatic - lingbuzz, the linguistics archive

This squib is motivated by two observations about verum focus. First, despite the intuitive idea that a verum-focused proposition vf(p) requires a salient alternative ¬p (see e.g. Goodhue 2018), there - lingbuzz, the linguistics archive

While there has been much research on the typology of speech reports, the variety of communicative predicates has remained largely understudied. In line with the growing body of work on the fine-grain - lingbuzz, the linguistics archive

In natural language, logical functions that have the formal property of upward-monotonicity are pervasive. This is most visible in the prevalence of upward-monotonic operators in the logical lexicon. - lingbuzz, the linguistics archive

This document was produced as part of the project ``Research on conditional and modal language'', funded by the National Science Foundation (Grant #2116972; M. Kaufmann, PI; S. Kaufmann, Co-PI), 2021- - lingbuzz, the linguistics archive

This paper proposes a feature-based analysis of the indicative and subjunctive tenses in Portuguese, grounded in four primitive anchoring-aspect features and their figurative extensions: [non-assertiv - lingbuzz, the linguistics archive

Recent claims suggest that large language models (LMs) underperform humans in comprehending minimally complex English statements (Dentella et al., 2024). Here, we revisit those findings and argue that - lingbuzz, the linguistics archive

This commentary paper is a response to the target article by Andreas Trotzke and Anastasia Giannakidou, who argue that neither exclamatives like 'How smart Anya is!', nor declarative exclamations like - lingbuzz, the linguistics archive

In this article, we provide a transcription and analysis of two versions of a traditional Chuj folktale surrounding a mythical character, the kokolom/chi’jolom, whose head is severed. The two versions - lingbuzz, the linguistics archive

Recent behavior of large language models (LLMs) presents a striking challenge to traditional theories of meaning. These models generate coherent, multilingual language output with no symbolic grammar, - lingbuzz, the linguistics archive

This paper documents and analyzes a predicate ellipsis alternation found in contemporary Spanish, addressing some challenges it poses for current theories of ellipsis licensing with the Minimalist Pro - lingbuzz, the linguistics archive

Free relatives have long posed challenges for theories of the syntax-semantics interface: although clausal in form, they have the same distribution and interpretation as definite noun phrases. In this - lingbuzz, the linguistics archive

In sign language, classifier predicates have a highly iconic semantics, which has motivated the development of a formal framework ('Iconological Semantics') with a pictorial component evaluated relati - lingbuzz, the linguistics archive

This document offers an introduction to grammatical analysis, using the Yucatec Maya language as a focus of study to illustrate fundamental linguistic concepts. It emphasizes the need for a patient an - lingbuzz, the linguistics archive

A distributed analysis of only divides its contribution between two expressions that quantify over alternatives. We argue that only displays behavior best explained by assuming such a do - lingbuzz, the linguistics archive

According to the DP hypothesis, the merger of a determiner and a noun yields a determiner phrase (DP) rather than a noun phrase (nP). Focusing on Spanish, I defend the DP hypothesis but reject - lingbuzz, the linguistics archive

The aim of this contribution is to clarify and further develop a view (with its empirical generalizations) on which higher-order objects play a highly restricted role in the ontology of natural langua - lingbuzz, the linguistics archive

- lingbuzz, the linguistics archive

This paper discusses the multiple meanings of the Mandarin Chinese verb xiang and focuses on the different clause-embedding properties of each reading. I propose three semantic entries for xiang: Th - lingbuzz, the linguistics archive

Recent advances in large language models (LLMs) have revealed unprecedented fluency, reasoning, and cross-linguistic capabilities. These behaviors challenge traditional theories of how meaning arises - lingbuzz, the linguistics archive

Every token of language a child receives as input is also a token of language use: someone using language for some or other purpose. In this chapter we discuss the developmental interactions between f - lingbuzz, the linguistics archive

This paper presents a method for deriving valid relational syllogisms with comparative relations, called DMcr. We first introduce some basic notions and notation for comparative relations, predicates, - lingbuzz, the linguistics archive

A prominent solution to the ‘symmetry problem’ allows implicatures to be computed from simple but not from complex alternatives ('Complexity'; Katzir 2007). Recently Schwarz and Wagner (2024) have pro - lingbuzz, the linguistics archive

Spanish and French may use relativised constructions introduced by a definite and a demonstrative, respectively, as complements of question-embedding verbs. We argue that these constructions are the i - lingbuzz, the linguistics archive