English partitives in Functional Discourse Grammar: types and constraints

Keizer, Evelien

doi:10.5334/gjgl.11

Cited by 4 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 13 publications

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“…For our current purposes we will just assume that the complement of a standard partitive must be a DP. For a recent review of the partitive constraint, see Keizer (2017). 26 See also Barker (1998) (e.g., a friend of John's friends).…”

Section: De In Partitivesmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Status ofDein Romance Indefinites, Partitives and Pseudopartitives*

Espinal

Cyrino

2021

Studia Linguistica

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This paper focuses on the status of de in Romance indefinites, partitives and pseudopartitives. It argues that there is neither a ‘partitive article’ nor a ‘partitive preposition’ in syntax. De in Romance indefinites is the overt Spell‐Out of an abstract operator de that cancels the definiteness of articles and is responsible for indefiniteness. De in Romance partitives is the overt Spell‐Out of a relator head that takes a definite DP as complement and a QP in the specifier position. Finally, pseudopartitivity is shown to have crosslinguistic parallels with indefinites, and it is derived by postulating a mono‐projectional analysis in which a semilexical N selects for a de‐phrase, in exactly the same way that quantifiers and cardinals select for indefinite de‐phrases.

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Section: De In Partitivesmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Status ofDein Romance Indefinites, Partitives and Pseudopartitives*

Espinal

Cyrino

2021

Studia Linguistica

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“…the creation of partially fixed frames used for the formation © 2018. John Benjamins Publishing Company All rights reserved Functional Discourse Grammar 11 of partitive constructions (Keizer 2017) and binominal noun phrases of the type that fool of a doctor or a whale of a problem (Ten Wolde 2018).…”

Section: Language Changementioning

confidence: 99%

Functional Discourse Grammar

Keizer

Olbertz

2018

Studies in Language Companion Series

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Functional Discourse Grammar, like its predecessor Functional Grammar, is firmly rooted in the functional paradigm, in that it views language first and foremost as a means of communication, and regards the form of language as emerging from its communicative function. Within the functional paradigm, however, FDG takes a moderate stance in that it recognizes that, although shaped by use, and as such subject to constant change, "in synchronic terms the grammar of a language is indeed a system, which must be described and correlated with function in discourse" (Butler 2003: 30). FDG thus "seeks to reconcile the patent fact that languages are structured complexes with the equally patent fact that they are adapted to function as instruments of communication between human beings" (Hengeveld & Mackenzie 2008: ix; cf. Dik 1997a: 3); using Van Valin's (1993) terminology, FDG can be characterized as a 'structural-functional' theory of language.Like all functional approaches, what is at the heart of FDG is the relation between function and form. More specifically, FDG takes a "function-to-form" approach, taking as its input a speaker's communicative intentions, which, through processes of Formulation and Encoding (see below), lead to a specific linguistic form. At the same time, however, FDG is "form-oriented", in that it only seeks to account for those pragmatic and semantic phenomena that are reflected in the morphosyntactic and phonological form of an utterance (e.g. Hengeveld & Mackenzie 2008: 39). Finally, unlike most functional approaches, FDG makes use of a sophisticated formalism to allow for a concise and precise representation of both the functional and the formal properties of languages. Together, these characteristics provide FDG with its unique position in what Butler & Gonzálvez García (2014) describe as "Functional-Cognitive space". The Architecture of FDG Distinctive features and overall organizationSo how are these general characteristics reflected in the organization of the model? First of all, the "function-to-form" approach is mirrored in the model's top-down organization, which starts with the speaker's intention and then works its way down to articulation. In this way, "FDG takes the functional approach to language to its logical extreme", as pragmatics is taken to govern semantics, pragmatics and semantics to govern morphosyntax, and pragmatics, semantics, and morphosyntax to govern phonology (Hengeveld & Mackenzie 2008: 13). The privileged role of pragmatics is further reflected in the fact that FDG takes the Discourse Act as

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Refining and re-defining secondary determiners in relation to primary determiners

Davidse

2022

Studies in Language Companion Series

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The aim of this study is to delineate the functional category of English secondary determiners more precisely than in current reference grammars and in my own previous work. To provide a principled basis for a functional typology of secondary determiners, I firstly develop a typology of primary determiner (or ‘grounding’) types within the framework of Cognitive Grammar. Following Langacker, four main types are distinguished, and their referential and discursive properties are characterized: indefinite grounding, relative quantification, possessive grounding, and definite grounding. This typology then forms the starting point for drawing up a typology of the main types of instructions given by secondary determiners, i.e. to retrieve the type specifications of an instance newly introduced by an indefinite NP, to identify the correct antecedent of a definite NP, to relate a referent to another instance of the same type, or to refer to a generalized referent. Thirdly, modifier types that had been confused with secondary determiners in earlier work are distinguished from them on the basis of their semantics and formal behaviour, viz. focus markers, nominal aspectual modifiers, modal and temporal modifiers, and metadesignatives.

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English partitives in Functional Discourse Grammar: types and constraints

Cited by 4 publications

References 13 publications

The Status ofDein Romance Indefinites, Partitives and Pseudopartitives*

The Status ofDein Romance Indefinites, Partitives and Pseudopartitives*

Functional Discourse Grammar

Refining and re-defining secondary determiners in relation to primary determiners

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