scholarly journals The duration of word-final s in English: A comparison of regular-plural and pluralia-tantum nouns

Morphology ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marcel Schlechtweg ◽  
Greville G. Corbett
Keyword(s):  
Native Speakers ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Acoustic Parameter ◽  
Standard View ◽  
British English ◽  
The Third ◽  
Third Person ◽  
Reading Study ◽  
The Third Person ◽  
Genitive Case

AbstractThe alveolar fricative occurs in word-final position in English in different grammatical functions. Nominal suffixes may indicate plurality (e.g. cars), genitive case (e.g. car’s) or plurality and genitive case in cumulation (e.g. cars’). Further, there are the third person singular verbal suffix (e.g. she fears) and the cliticized forms of the third person singular forms of have and be (e.g. she’s been lucky; she’s friendly). There is also non-affixal s (e.g. freeze (noun)). Against the standard view that all these types are homophonous, several empirical studies have shown that at least some of the fricatives listed can actually be differentiated in their duration. The present article expands this line of research and considers a further case, which has not been included in previous analyses: pluralia-tantum nouns (e.g. goggles). We report on a carefully controlled reading study in which native speakers of British English produced pluralia-tantum and comparable regular-plural nouns (e.g. toggles). The duration of the word-final fricative was measured, and it was found that the two do not systematically differ in this acoustic parameter. The new data are interpreted in comparison to relevant previous studies, and against the background of the similarities of pluralia-tantum and regular-plural nouns.

Morphosyntactic Transfer from a Spoken Heritage Dialect to the Standard Variety

2020 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 202-233
Author(s):  
Reem Faraj
Keyword(s):  
Heritage Language ◽  
Native Speakers ◽  
Control Groups ◽  
Heritage Speakers ◽  
Standard Arabic ◽  
The Third ◽  
Third Person ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Third Person ◽  
Modern Standard

This study examines cases of morphosyntactic transfer from Syrian Arabic to Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) in the production of heritage speakers who are not only bilingual (L1 Syrian Arabic, L2 English), but also diglossic; Syrian Arabic is their heritage language (HL), and MSA is the form they learned in school. Two control groups, native speakers of Syrian Arabic and learners of MSA, were also included. The proposal presented here is that adolescent heritage speakers of Syrian Arabic have a more developed Syrian Arabic grammar, which results in- transfer to MSA, and that degree and duration of input-output and exposure to both varieties impact the type and number of non-target forms in the production of the studied heritage group. The goal is to find the extent of such transfer, how it is manifested, and whether it is also related to sentence and subject type or other factors. The focus of this study is verbs in SV and VS sentences in MSA, where the subject is a nominal DP and the verb is in the third person. The agreement patterns in VS and SV sentences are asymmetrical in MSA but they are not in Syrian Arabic. The SV order in MSA reflects different agreement patterns with both genders and all three numbers, whereas in Syrian Arabic there is one default non-singular verb form. In this paper I provide a formal account of the differences among the agreement patterns in MSA and Syrian Arabic within the Minimalist framework. Using this approach, a morphosyntactic transfer of agreement features from Syrian Arabic to MSA is argued to be a transfer of T0 features. The results demonstrate that errors in the MSA verb produced by the heritage speakers differ from those of MSA learners and that more than half of the heritage speakers’ errors are compatible with morphosyntactic agreement forms in Syrian Arabic. These findings provide evidence for transfer from Syrian Arabic to MSA. It is possible that when three linguistic systems are competing (L1, L2, and L3) and where L1 is the most dominant, L2 is less developed than L1 but more developed than L3, and L2 and L3 are typologically close, transfer takes place from L2 to L3. More research to address this question is needed. The study contributes to the understanding of agreement in heritage speakers’ production and the phenomenon of transfer in bilingual and diglossic situations.

scholarly journals Problems of teaching verb categories (contact, version and passive voice) of the Georgian language to non-native speakers

2021 ◽  
pp. 208-217
Author(s):  
Nana Saganelidze ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Language Learners ◽  
Native Speakers ◽  
Second Person ◽  
Passive Voice ◽  
Indirect Contact ◽  
The Third ◽  
First Languages ◽  
Students First ◽  
Third Person ◽  
The Third Person

Teaching Georgian to non-native speakers, it is important to focus on categories students' first languages lack or express them in a different way. The paper discusses the formation of indirect contact, neutral version, and passive voice in verbs. Infixes -in- and -evin- are used to form forms of indirect contact. They are added to infinitive forms without markers - -in- is used with stems containing vowels, and - evin- with stems without vowels. At the same time, prefix a- is added to verbs at the beginning, and the thematic marker -eb at the end. Like all other thematic markers, the latter disappears in the second series of conjugation. Deriving version forms is a little more complicated, as there are neutral version forms without markers and with the prefix a-, subjective and objective version forms with the prefix i- for the first and second persons and u- for the third person in both singular and plural forms. Neutral version is formed with the prefix a- in verbs with eb- and ob- thematic markers apart from several exceptions and verbs with the am- thematic marker, apart from one exception (as version is impossible in the third series of conjugation, examples are in the first and second series of conjugation): a-šen-eb-s - a-a-šena, a-tbob-s - ga-a-tbo, a-b-am-s - da-a-ba). Thematic markers make no difference in forming subjective and objective version forms. If a verb is semantically able to have subjective and/or objective versions, verbs in the first and second series of conjugation take forms of subjective and/or objective version. Forms of subjective version use prefix i-: c'ers – i-c'ers, dac'era – da-i-c'era. In forms of objective version, verbs take the prefix i- in the first and second person and u- in the third person, both singular and plural. Like in the forms of indirect contact, the aforementioned rule of using person markers can be put to use: m-i-c'ers is me, g-i-c'ers is šen, u-c'ers is mas/mat, gv-i-c'ers is čven, g-i-c'ert is tkven, u-c'eren isini mas/mat. As for the passive voice, it can be formed with prefixes (i- and e-), a suffix (-d) and without any markers. Thematic markers and the presence/absence of a vowel in the infinitive play a role in forming verbs in the passive voice. In the passive voice, prefixes are added to verbs with single stems (without thematic markers) and verbs with -av, -am, -op, -i thematic markers, those with vowel interchange, and some verbs with the -ob thematic marker. Verbs with a vowel in the infinitive form the passive voice the thematic stems of the second series of conjugation: xat’va – i-xat’eba, e xat’eba; breca – i-briceba, e-briceba, while stems without vowels form the passive voice from the infinitive without markers. There are several such verbs with -av and -eb thematic markers, verbs with -i, -am and -eb thematic markers and some verbs with the -ob thematic marker: šek’vr-a – i-k’vreba, e-k’vreba; da-d-eba – i-deba, e-deba; č'r-a – i-č'reba, e-č'reba; dadgm-a – i-dgmeba, e-dgmeba; ga-q’op-a – i-q’opa, e-q’opa; da-xrč-oba – i-xrčoba, exrčoba. Verbs with a vowel and the -eb thematic marker, apart from two exceptions, form the passive voice with the suffix -d from the thematic stem of the second series of conjugation: šen-eb-a – šen-d-eba. The passive voice is formed without markers from verbs with the -ob thematic markers. The thematic stems of the second series of conjugation are used as the roots: ga-tb-ob-a – tb-eb-a. The passive voice with suffixes (with the -d suffix) is formed only in verbs with the - eb thematic marker. The passive voice markers is formed only in some verbs with the -ob thematic marker. Other verbs can form the passive voice only with the i- and eprefixes. Verbs in the passive voice with the prefix e- have only two persons (emaleba is mas). Other passive voice forms can have only one person (imaleba is, c'itldeba is, idgmeba is, išleba is, iq’opa is, igrixeba is, xmeba is). The author hopes that this approach to these problems can help Georgian language learners.

Effects of Light-Hearted and Serious Entertainment on Enjoyment of the First and Third Person

2016 ◽  
Vol 28 (1) ◽  
pp. 42-48 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthias Hofer
Keyword(s):  
Young People ◽  
Media Consumption ◽  
First Person ◽  
Online Experiment ◽  
Entertainment Media ◽  
Third Person Effect ◽  
The Third ◽  
Third Person ◽  
Perceived Enjoyment ◽  
The Third Person

Abstract. This was a study on the perceived enjoyment of different movie genres. In an online experiment, 176 students were randomly divided into two groups (n = 88) and asked to estimate how much they, their closest friends, and young people in general enjoyed either serious or light-hearted movies. These self–other differences in perceived enjoyment of serious or light-hearted movies were also assessed as a function of differing individual motivations underlying entertainment media consumption. The results showed a clear third-person effect for light-hearted movies and a first-person effect for serious movies. The third-person effect for light-hearted movies was moderated by level of hedonic motivation, as participants with high hedonic motivations did not perceive their own and others’ enjoyment of light-hearted films differently. However, eudaimonic motivations did not moderate first-person perceptions in the case of serious films.

Causal determinism and a totally global fatalism from the third-person perspective

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Xiaoyang Yu
Keyword(s):  
Human Brain ◽  
Human Language ◽  
Causal Determinism ◽  
The Third ◽  
Person Perspective ◽  
Neural Substrate ◽  
Third Person ◽  
Third Person Perspective ◽  
Physical Laws ◽  
The Third Person

The human brain and the human language are precisely constructed together by evolution/genes, so that in the objective world, a human brain can tell a story to another brain in human language which describes an imagined multiplayer game; in this story, one player of the game represents the human brain itself. It’s possible that the human kind doesn’t really have a subjective world (doesn’t really have conscious experience). An individual has no control even over her choices. Her choices are controlled by the neural substrate. The neural substrate is controlled by the physical laws. So, her choices are controlled by the physical laws. So, she is powerless to do anything other than what she actually does. This is the view of fatalism. Specifically, this is the view of a totally global fatalism, where people have no control even over their choices, from the third-person perspective. And I just argued for fatalism by appeal to causal determinism. Psychologically, a third-person perspective and a new, dedicated personality state are required to bear the totally global fatalism, to avoid severe cognitive dissonance with our default first-person perspective and our original personality state.

scholarly journals Deictic Shifting in Greek Contractual Writing (I–IV AD)

Philologus ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 164 (1) ◽  
pp. 83-106
Author(s):  
Klaas Bentein
Keyword(s):  
Literary Texts ◽  
Ancient Greek ◽  
Narrative Technique ◽  
The Third ◽  
Third Person ◽  
The Third Person

AbstractMuch attention has been paid to ‘deictic shifts’ in Ancient Greek literary texts. In this article I show that similar phenomena can be found in documentary texts. Contracts in particular display unexpected shifts from the first to the third person or vice versa. Rather than constituting a narrative technique, I argue that such shifts should be related to the existence of two major types of stylization, called the ‘objective’ and the ‘subjective’ style. In objectively styled contracts, subjective intrusions may occur as a result of the scribe temporarily assuming himself to be the deictic center, whereas in subjectively styled contracts objective intrusions may occur as a result of the contracting parties dictating to the scribe, and the scribe not modifying the personal references. There are also a couple of texts which display more extensive deictic alter­nations, which suggests that generic confusion between the two major types of stylization may have played a role.

Yahweh, Women, and the Trinity

1975 ◽  
Vol 32 (3) ◽  
pp. 234-242
Author(s):  
Jay G. Williams
Keyword(s):  
Holy Spirit ◽  
New Age ◽  
The Third ◽  
The Holy Spirit ◽  
Third Person ◽  
The Third Person ◽  
The Church ◽  
The Trinity

“Might it not be possible, just at this moment when the fortunes of the church seem to be at low ebb, that we may be entering a new age, an age in which the Holy Spirit will become far more central to the faith, an age when the third person of the Trinity will reveal to us more fully who she is?”

The Mystery of Jesus' Teaching about “The Son of Man”

2012 ◽  
Vol 42 (2) ◽  
pp. 70-80
Author(s):  
Edward A. Beckstrom
Keyword(s):  
Dead Sea Scrolls ◽  
Dead Sea ◽  
High Priest ◽  
The Third ◽  
Son Of Man ◽  
Third Person ◽  
The Will ◽  
The Dead ◽  
The Third Person ◽  
Will Of God

For centuries a mystery has surrounded the meaning of Jesus' term “The Son of Man” in his ministry, and today it is often called “The Son of Man Problem.” Studying “Son of Man” in all of its biblical references, and apocryphal usages, together with insights from the Dead Sea Scrolls, I propose a solution that the idiom means “Priest” or “High Priest,” but most especially “Heavenly High Priest” and is framed in the third person by Jesus because it is expressed as his destiny given by God—it is the Will of God. “The Son of Man” is distinct from Jesus own will, but is the destiny he follows. It is also the use of this term that caused Caiaphas to cry “blasphemy” at Jesus' Sanhedrin trial, who then sent him to Pilate for crucifixion, yet asserting that Jesus proclaimed himself “King of the Jews.” Caiaphas, knew, I believe, that “Son of Man” was synonymous with “High Priest.”

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