Some temporal expressions in early Southern Min play scripts

2021 ◽  
Vol 50 (2) ◽  
pp. 245-268
Author(s):  
Chinfa LIEN

Abstract Drawing on the data in early Southern Min play scripts, this paper explores temporal expressions—in particular temporal adverbials—which bear on the issues of their grammatical categories and syntactic placement. Considerable space is devoted to clarifying two kinds of distinctions of temporal adverbials on the strength of attested examples. A distinction is made between deictic temporal adverbials and determiner phrase-derived temporal adverbials. Similarly, durative adverbials are shown to behave differently from punctual adverbials. Finally, I argue that the metonymic semantic shift of deictic temporal adverbials denoting tomorrow and yesterday/the day before yesterday is grounded in the constraint of proximity to the deictic center of today in connection with the backdrop of diachronic development.

2019 ◽  
Vol 29 ◽  
pp. 300
Author(s):  
Yurie Hara

This paper analyzes the semantic shift of a Japanese construction V-e-bafrom causal to conditional. The conventional meaning of the V-e-ba constructionis a sequential conjunction in the sense of update semantics. The causal meaning in Old Japanese is obtained by an I-implicature, whilethe conditional meaning in Modern Japanese is obtained by Q-implicatures. Theproposed diachronic development is in accordance with Deo’s (2015) EvolutionaryGame Theory model.


Author(s):  
Toshiko Yamaguchi

AbstractIn cognitive linguistics, a widely accepted and highly influential approach to the notion of time is conceptual metaphor. This states that the abstract concept time should be understood in terms of a concrete concept such as space. This paper challenges this notion by proposing that time exhibits independent experience. Using diachronic data, the paper investigates how temporal expressions in Japanese have emerged that are also employed as spatial expressions, and demonstrates how they conform to theoretical standpoints that are postulated in synchronic studies. First, I refer to the insights of Fraisse (1963), who singles out from a psychological point of view two fundamental perspectives of time: succession and duration. Second, I provide 10 examples from the eighth century to the fourteenth century that comply with five aspects of psychological reality (succession, duration, causation, organization, and anticipation). Third, I evaluate Evans’ (2004) cognitive complex models that champion temporal independence. The paper makes two claims. First, the rise of Japanese temporal expressions does not rely on external experience but on internal, that is, psychological perspectives. Second, the three attributes central to Evans’ models (motion, agency, and sequence) were not absolutely fundamental when Japanese temporal expressions emerged. While this last point downgrades Evans’ models, the paper tentatively suggests an alternative approach, namely that a diachronic development should embrace indexical, iconic, and symbolic evidence for the construction of linguistic signs.


2014 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 81-93
Author(s):  
Laurel Smith Stvan

Examination of the term stress in naturally occurring vernacular prose provides evidence of three separate senses being conflated. A corpus analysis of 818 instances of stress from non-academic texts in the Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA) and the Corpus of American Discourses on Health (CADOH) shows a negative prosody for stress, which is portrayed variously as a source outside the body, a physical symptom within the body and an emotional state. The data show that contemporary speakers intermingle the three senses, making more difficult a discussion between doctors and patients of ways to ‘reduce stress’, when stress might be interpreted as a stressor, a symptom, or state of anxiety. This conflation of senses reinforces the impression that stress is pervasive and increasing. In addition, a semantic shift is also refining a new sense for stress, as post-traumatic stress develops as a specific subtype of emotional stress whose use has increased in circulation in the past 20 years.


2021 ◽  
Vol 29 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
H. H. Hardy

Biblical Hebrew lqr't is situated at the intersection of grammatical categories as a content item and a function word. The analysis of any given token is confounded by this diversity and its variously encoded denotations: the infinitive construct “to meet” and the polysemous prepositions, the directional TOWARD and the adversative AGAINST. The usage in Exodus 14:27 (wmsrym nsym lqr'tw) prompts a number of different analyses. Interpretations include: hoi de aigyptioi ephygon hypo to hydor (LXX); wmsry' -'rqyn lqwblh (Peshitta); fugientibusque Ægyptiis occurrerunt aquæ (Vulgate); “the Egyptians fled at its approach” (NJPS); “the Egyptians fled before it” (NRSV); and “the Egyptians were fleeing toward it” (NIV). This study examines lqr't by comparing a range of grammatical methods. These approaches centre evolutionary growth (philology), syntagmatic and paradigmatic features (structuralism), functional usage (eclectic linguistics), and cross-linguistic development (grammaticalisation) in order to explore questions of the origin, development, and usage of lqr't. The combined approaches help to situate and construct an archaeology of linguistic knowledge and a genealogy of philological change of language and text.


2018 ◽  
Vol 28 (7) ◽  
pp. 2245-2249
Author(s):  
Suzana Ejupi ◽  
Lindita Skenderi

Working with English learners for many years, gives you the opportunity to encounter linguistic obstacles that they face while learning English language as a foreign language. Additionally, teaching for 13 years and observing the learning process, it enables you to recognize the students’ needs and at the same time, detect linguistic mistakes that they make, while practicing the target language. During my experience as a teacher, in terms of teaching and learning verbs in general and its grammatical categories in specific, it is noticed that Albanian learners find it relatively difficult the correct use of verbs in context and even more confusing the equivalent use of verbs in Albanian. Since verbs present an important part of speech, this study aims to investigate several differences and similarities between grammatical categories of verbs in English and Albanian. As a result, the Albanian learners of English language will be able to identify some of the major differences and similarities between the grammatical categories of verbs in English and Albanian; overcome the usual mistakes; gain the necessary knowledge regarding verbs and use them properly in English and Albanian.


Philology ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 4 (2018) ◽  
pp. 157-172
Author(s):  
FERNANDO GOMEZ-ACEDO ◽  
ENEKO GOMEZ-ACEDO

Abstract In this work a new insight into the reconstruction of the original forms of the first Basque cardinal numbers is presented and the identified original meaning of the names given to the numbers is shown. The method used is the internal reconstruction, using for the etymologies words that existed and still exist in Basque and other words reconstructed from the proto-Basque. As a result of this work it has been discovered that initially the numbers received their name according to a specific and logic procedure. According to this ancient method of designation, each cardinal number received its name based on the hand sign used to represent it, thus describing the position adopted by the fingers of the hand to represent each number. Finally, the different stages of numerical formation are shown, which demonstrate a long and diachronic development of the whole counting system.


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