{"title":"Biased Polar Questions","authors":"Maribel Romero","doi":"10.1146/annurev-linguistics-022421-064837","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-linguistics-022421-064837","url":null,"abstract":"Although the following polar question forms raise the same issue, the positive question Is Jane coming?, the low negation question Is Jane not coming?, and the high negation question Isn't Jane coming? cannot be used interchangeably because they are sensitive to the expectations that the speaker may originally have (original speaker bias) and to contextual evidence that becomes available during the conversational exchange (contextual evidence bias). This article summarizes the aspects of these constructions on which agreement has been reached and identifies central points of empirical and theoretical divergence in the literature; further, it critically reviews current attempts to derive original speaker bias in high negation questions as well as the asymmetry between positive questions and low negation questions with respect to contextual evidence bias. Expected final online publication date for the Annual Review of Linguistics, Volume 10 is January 2024. Please see http://www.annualreviews.org/page/journal/pubdates for revised estimates.","PeriodicalId":45803,"journal":{"name":"Annual Review of Linguistics","volume":"277 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.2,"publicationDate":"2023-11-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139229003","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Interjections at the Heart of Language","authors":"Mark Dingemanse","doi":"10.1146/annurev-linguistics-031422-124743","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-linguistics-031422-124743","url":null,"abstract":"Interjections, the words that come between sentences, are easily overlooked and usually treated as peripheral to the language sciences. This review surveys work from disparate disciplines that suggests an inversion of perspective: from interjections as marginal items to interjections at the heart of language. Around one out of every seven turns in conversation is an interjection, and the most common ones are not the involuntary grunts that typically feature in examples; instead, they form a small set of agile and adaptive interactional tools that streamline everyday language use. Continuers like mmhm help people co-construct complex interactional structures, repair initiators like huh? help people calibrate mutual understanding on the fly, and change-of-state tokens like oh display knowledge as it evolves in interaction. Interjections emerge as words that help us talk and think, scaffolding the complexity of language as we know it. Expected final online publication date for the Annual Review of Linguistics, Volume 10 is January 2024. Please see http://www.annualreviews.org/page/journal/pubdates for revised estimates.","PeriodicalId":45803,"journal":{"name":"Annual Review of Linguistics","volume":"12 3","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-11-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135589116","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Efthymia C. Kapnoula, Mina Jevtović, James S. Magnuson
{"title":"Spoken Word Recognition: A Focus on Plasticity","authors":"Efthymia C. Kapnoula, Mina Jevtović, James S. Magnuson","doi":"10.1146/annurev-linguistics-031422-113507","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-linguistics-031422-113507","url":null,"abstract":"Psycholinguists define spoken word recognition (SWR) as, roughly, the processes intervening between speech perception and sentence processing, whereby a sequence of speech elements is mapped to a phonological wordform. After reviewing points of consensus and contention in SWR, we turn to the focus of this review: considering the limitations of theoretical views that implicitly assume an idealized (neurotypical, monolingual adult) and static perceiver. In contrast to this assumption, we review evidence that SWR is plastic throughout the life span and changes as a function of cognitive and sensory changes, modulated by the language(s) someone knows. In highlighting instances of plasticity at multiple timescales, we are confronted with the question of whether these effects reflect changes in content or in processes, and we consider the possibility that the two are inseparable. We close with a brief discussion of the challenges that plasticity poses for developing comprehensive theories of spoken language processing. Expected final online publication date for the Annual Review of Linguistics, Volume 10 is January 2024. Please see http://www.annualreviews.org/page/journal/pubdates for revised estimates.","PeriodicalId":45803,"journal":{"name":"Annual Review of Linguistics","volume":"8 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-10-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135808844","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Emily Lindsay-Smith, Matthew Baerman, Sacha Beniamine, Helen Sims-Williams, Erich R. Round
{"title":"Analogy in Inflection","authors":"Emily Lindsay-Smith, Matthew Baerman, Sacha Beniamine, Helen Sims-Williams, Erich R. Round","doi":"10.1146/annurev-linguistics-030521-040935","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-linguistics-030521-040935","url":null,"abstract":"Analogy has returned to prominence in the field of inflectional morphology as a basis for new explanations of inflectional productivity. Here we review the rising profile of analogy, identifying key theoretical and methodological developments, areas of success, and priorities for future work. In morphological theory, work within so-called abstractive approaches places analogy at the center of productive processes, though significant conceptual and technical details remain to be settled. The computational modeling of inflectional analogy has a rich and diverse history, and attention is now increasingly directed to understanding inflectional systems through their internal complexity and cross-linguistic diversity. A tension exists between the prima facie promise of analogy to lead to new explanations and its relative lack of theoretical articulation. We bring this to light as we examine questions regarding inflectional defectiveness and whether analogy is reducible to grammar optimization resulting from simplicity biases in learning and language use. Expected final online publication date for the Annual Review of Linguistics, Volume 10 is January 2024. Please see http://www.annualreviews.org/page/journal/pubdates for revised estimates.","PeriodicalId":45803,"journal":{"name":"Annual Review of Linguistics","volume":"38 3","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-10-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135568031","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Types and Type Theories in Natural Language Analysis","authors":"Peter R. Sutton","doi":"10.1146/annurev-linguistics-031422-113929","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-linguistics-031422-113929","url":null,"abstract":"This article reviews the set of possible paths from a semantics based on Simple Type Theories (STTs) toward one based on Rich Type Theories (RTTs) and the motivations behind the move from one to the other. The main elements of this review are threefold. First, it provides a systematic overview of different STTs, including options for what to include as members of the set of basic types, and whether to assume type constructors additional to the one for constructing functional types. Second, this review discusses the main differences between STTs and RTTs, namely, that in RTTs but not in STTs, types are part of the object language. That is, one can refer to and reason with and about types. In turn, this makes available an alternative account of propositions to the one assumed in semantics in the Frege–Church–Montague tradition: Instead of being characterized as sets of possible worlds, propositions can be treated themselves as types, that is, as structured semantic objects. Third and finally, this review provides an outline of some of the main applications of RTTs, including hyperintensionality, quantification, anaphora, polysemy, and modification. Expected final online publication date for the Annual Review of Linguistics, Volume 10 is January 2024. Please see http://www.annualreviews.org/page/journal/pubdates for revised estimates.","PeriodicalId":45803,"journal":{"name":"Annual Review of Linguistics","volume":"35 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-10-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"136294499","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Advances in Understanding Stuttering as a Disorder of Language Encoding","authors":"Nan Bernstein Ratner, Shelley B. Brundage","doi":"10.1146/annurev-linguistics-030521-044754","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-linguistics-030521-044754","url":null,"abstract":"We review accumulating evidence that implicates the language encoding and production system in children and adults who stutter. Stuttering is unique in its onset during the most dynamic stages of language acquisition, after apparently successful mastery of early language skills. We review older theories of stuttering that have given way to an understanding of stuttering's underlying bases in cortical and subcortical networks. Behavioral data suggest strong influences of language encoding demand on the frequency and location of stuttered events; psycholinguistic findings suggest atypical language processing in the absence of overt speech. We discuss the probable neuroanatomical and neurophysiological bases of these findings, with implications for therapeutic intervention. Expected final online publication date for the Annual Review of Linguistics, Volume 10 is January 2024. Please see http://www.annualreviews.org/page/journal/pubdates for revised estimates.","PeriodicalId":45803,"journal":{"name":"Annual Review of Linguistics","volume":"35 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-10-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"136294494","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Philippine Psycholinguistics","authors":"Jed Sam Pizarro-Guevara, Rowena Garcia","doi":"10.1146/annurev-linguistics-031522-102844","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-linguistics-031522-102844","url":null,"abstract":"Over the last decade, there has been a slow but steady accumulation of psycholinguistic research focusing on typologically diverse languages. In this review, we provide an overview of the psycholinguistic research on Philippine languages at the sentence level. We first discuss the grammatical features of these languages that figure prominently in existing research. We identify four linguistic domains that have received attention from language researchers and summarize the empirical terrain. We advance two claims that emerge across these different domains: ( a) The agent-first pressure plays a central role in many of the findings, and ( b) the generalization that the patient argument is the syntactically privileged argument cannot be reduced to frequency, but instead is an emergent phenomenon caused by the alignment of competing pressures toward an optimal candidate. We connect these language-specific claims to language-general theories of sentence processing. Expected final online publication date for the Annual Review of Linguistics, Volume 10 is January 2024. Please see http://www.annualreviews.org/page/journal/pubdates for revised estimates.","PeriodicalId":45803,"journal":{"name":"Annual Review of Linguistics","volume":"57 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-10-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135695874","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Semantics of Gesture","authors":"Cornelia Ebert","doi":"10.1146/annurev-linguistics-022421-063057","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-linguistics-022421-063057","url":null,"abstract":"Current formal semantic theories aim at capturing gestural semantic contributions and in particular their interplay with the semantics that stems from cooccurring speech. To grasp how gesture contributes meaning and interacts with speech, the information status of gesture is of prime importance. This article gives an overview of the different conceptions of the information status of gestures that have been put forth and discusses the empirical predictions and theoretical consequences that arise from the respective theories. Expected final online publication date for the Annual Review of Linguistics, Volume 10 is January 2024. Please see http://www.annualreviews.org/page/journal/pubdates for revised estimates.","PeriodicalId":45803,"journal":{"name":"Annual Review of Linguistics","volume":"38 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-10-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135738611","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Intensionality and Propositionalism","authors":"Kristina Liefke","doi":"10.1146/annurev-linguistics-031522-104045","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-linguistics-031522-104045","url":null,"abstract":"Propositionalism is the view that all intensional constructions (including nominal and clausal attitude reports) can be interpreted as relations to truth-evaluable propositional content. While propositionalism has long been silently assumed in semantics and the philosophy of language, it has only recently entered center stage in linguistic research. This article surveys the properties of intensional constructions, which require the introduction of fine-grained semantic values (intensions). It contrasts two ways of obtaining such values: through the introduction of either Russellian propositions or Frege-Church-style senses. The article identifies propositionalism with a specific variant of the Russellian strategy, reviews key arguments for propositionalism, and compares familiar varieties of propositionalism on the basis of instructive examples. It closes by discussing various challenges for propositionalism and suggesting a generalization of propositionalism that meets some of these challenges. Because of the association of propositions with semantic information, the article also addresses the more general question of whether all information content (including mental and pictorial content) is propositional. Expected final online publication date for the Annual Review of Linguistics, Volume 10 is January 2024. Please see http://www.annualreviews.org/page/journal/pubdates for revised estimates.","PeriodicalId":45803,"journal":{"name":"Annual Review of Linguistics","volume":"15 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135477651","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The Size of Clausal Complements","authors":"Susanne Wurmbrand","doi":"10.1146/annurev-linguistics-031522-103802","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-linguistics-031522-103802","url":null,"abstract":"Drawing mainly—but not exclusively—on data from Germanic, this article compares syntactic, morphological, and semantic approaches to size differences of complement clauses. Focusing on two phenomena that have been related to clause size reduction and truncation—Exceptional Case Marking (ECM) and restructuring—it is shown that their distribution is radically different and that clause size cannot be the main factor regulating both of these phenomena. This article provides a solution to this conflicting state of affairs and lays out an approach that builds on a fine-grained CP structure, including both syntactic and semantic categories, a reduced structure for infinitives, and a syntax–meaning mapping that predicts different minimal clause sizes for different semantic types of complements. Based on the distribution of ECM in Germanic, a tentative ECM hierarchy is suggested that follows implicational containment relations of an expanded CP. Expected final online publication date for the Annual Review of Linguistics, Volume 10 is January 2024. Please see http://www.annualreviews.org/page/journal/pubdates for revised estimates.","PeriodicalId":45803,"journal":{"name":"Annual Review of Linguistics","volume":"77 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"136016367","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}