Events, Phrases, and Questions (Oxford Studies in Theoretical Linguistics) - Softcover

Truswell, Robert

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0199577781 ISBN 13: 9780199577781

Publisher: Oxford University Press, 2011

Synopsis

This book examines some knotty problems in natural language. These typically involve questions where the sense or the grammaticality of an utterance teeters on or over the edge of acceptability among native speakers. The phenomena in question have been examined within syntactic theory for over two decades with no wholly satisfactory outcome. Dr Truswell broadens the scope of the enquiry to the interface between syntactic structure and other, indirectly related, cognitive, and semantic structures such as aspect, agentivity, and presupposition. Uniting work from philosophical, cognitive and linguistic perspectives, he develops a model of the internal structure of events as perceptual and cognitive units. He deploys the model to explain and predict the acceptability of particular formulations. He considers the individuation of events in the light of the model and provides a novel account of patterns of question formation. He shows that these patterns throw new light on central claims of Chomsky's biolinguistic minimalist program and Jackendoff's parallel architecture theory of mind and language. This is work at the cutting edge of linguistic theory, catholic in its theoretical scope, open to insights from cognate fields, and illustrated with examples from a wide range of languages. It will interest philosophers, semanticists and cognitive scientists concerned with topics like events, agentivity, and planning, as well as linguists studying syntax or the syntax-semantics interface.

About this title

About the Author

Robert Truswell is British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow in Linguistics and English Language at the School of Philosophy, Psychology, and Language Sciences, University of Edinburgh. His research broadly concerns the interfaces between syntax and semantics. He received his PhD in Phonetics and Linguistics from University College London in 2007 and then spent a year as a postdoctoral research fellow at Tufts University.

Edition details

• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Publication date: 2011
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0199577781
• ISBN 13: 9780199577781
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 278