English Reflexives Research Articles

Pragmatic Influence in Processing L2 English Reflexive Pronouns by Korean Learners of English

Pragmatic Influence in Processing L2 English Reflexive Pronouns by Korean Learners of English

The distribution of nafs in modern Standard Arabic and Classical Arabic: a corpus-based study

PurposeThis corpus-based study provides a descriptive account of the distribution of the polysemous noun nafs in two Arabic varieties, Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) and Classical Arabic (CA). The research objective is to survey the use of nafs as a reflexive marker in local binding domains and as a self-intensifier in NP-adjoined positions.Design/methodology/approachThe consulted corpora are Timespamped JSI Web corpus for MSA and Quran corpus for CA. While attending to corpora size differences, MSA and CA exhibit a pattern of difference and similarity in nafs diffusion.FindingsIn the modern variety, nafs is pervasively used as reflexive marker in canonical binding domains, along with a less frequent, yet notable, intensifier user, and these uses are partially and cautiously attributed to the specific genre in which they occur. In CA, nafs is mainly recurrent as a polysemous noun, along with extensive use as a reflexive marker in local binding settings. As an intensifier, nafs is totally non-existent in the CA corpus, in the same way as it is in absentia in VP-constituent extraction in MSA.Originality/valueExamining whether nafs, as a reflexive marker, deviates from canonical binding in Arabic the way English reflexive pronouns do. Building a general account of this distribution is relevant in understanding the explicit (syntactic) and implicit (discourse-based) dimensions of reflexive marker and self-intensifier processing and interpretation in Arabic as a first and second language.

Interpretive asymmetries between null and overt PRO in complement and adjunct infinitives in (Colombian) Spanish

Cross-linguistically, control complement clauses have been reported to allow overt pronominal subjects displaying the diagnostic properties of obligatory control (‘Overt PRO’; see Livitz (2011) and reference therein). Building on Gómez (2017), we extend the empirical range of the overt PRO phenomena to para finality adjunct clauses in (Colombian) Spanish. We show that the controlled subject of para-infinitives ―be it null PRO or overt PRO― has the same distribution and interpretive properties as that of complement infinitives. We bring to light unexpected asymmetries in the interpretive properties of overt vs. null PROs which we dub the Overt vs. covert PRO paradox: while they both only allow a bound variable reading under ellipsis, overt PRO, unlike null PRO, also allows a coreferential reading under association-with-focus. Here again, the data are identical in complement vs. adjunct control. We account for this paradox by putting forth the Anaphor Generalizations, which state that (i) both overt and null anaphors must be syntactically bound, and (ii) while null anaphors must be semantically bound, overt anaphors can but need not be semantically bound. We further show how the Anaphor Generalizations can be extended to account for similar patterns of interpretation reported for English and French reflexives.

ԱՆԴՐԱԴԱՐՁ ԿԱՌՈՒՅՑՆԵՐԻ ՀԱՄԱՎԵՐԱԲԵՐԱՅԻՆ ԵՎ ԻՄԱՍՏԱՅԻՆ ՎԵՐԼՈՒԾՈՒԹՅՈՒՆԸ ԱՆԳԼԵՐԵՆՈՒՄ (ՀԱՅԵՐԵՆԻ ԶՈՒԳԱԴՐՈՒԹՅԱՄԲ) / COREFERENTIAL AND SEMANTIC ANALYSIS OF REFLEXIVE CONSTRUCTIONS IN ENGLISH (WITH REFERENCE TO ARMENIAN)

The paper is devoted to coreferential divergencies between English reflexive pronouns and their antecedents. The comparative analysis also shows that the Armenian counterparts of the English reflexive pronouns are independent linguistic units, used separately from their antecedents. The scale of reflexivity is defined by the extent of affectedness the object undergoes as a result of the action performed by the subject. The scope of affectedness of the object ranges from radical physical changes to zero affect, in which case the subject and the reflexive object display a complete confluence.

딥러닝 언어모형을 활용한 영어 비결속 재귀사 검증

딥러닝 언어모형을 활용한 영어 비결속 재귀사 검증

Binding Interpretations of Korean EFL Learners: Focusing on SSC-violating English Reflexives

This study investigated how Korean EFL learners would respond to pragmatically salient English reflexives that violate syntactic binding condition. Specially focusing on English sentences with reflexives violating SSC (Specified Subject Condition, Chomsky, 1980), the study probed whether the EFL learners – compared with English native speakers – would accept Long-Distance (LD) binding of English reflexives, which is syntactically not allowed in English. In addition, the study examined whether different types of experimental stimuli (i.e., simultaneous vs. sequential presentation of context-sentence material) could affect the interpretations of English reflexives. A picture-based Truth Value Judgment Task, composed of 80 test items, was conducted with 46 Korean EFL learners and 22 English native speakers. The results demonstrated the following: i) Korean EFL learners showed higher acceptance rates than English native speakers with the sentences representing LD-binding of SSC-violating antecedent (i.e., core binding violation in English), especially when the contextual information given by pictures preferred LD–antecedents; ii) Distinct types of experimental stimuli-presentation (i.e., simultanoues vs. sequential) did not make significant effects.

Reflexive and Reciprocal Encoding in the Australian Mixed Language, Light Warlpiri

Mixed languages combine significant amounts of grammatical and lexical material from more than one source language in systematic ways. The Australian mixed language, Light Warlpiri, combines nominal morphology from Warlpiri with verbal morphology from Kriol (an English-lexified Creole) and English, with innovations. The source languages of Light Warlpiri differ in how they encode reflexives and reciprocals—Warlpiri uses an auxiliary clitic for both reflexive and reciprocal expression, while English and Kriol both use pronominal forms, and largely have separate forms for reflexives and reciprocals. English distinguishes person and number in reflexives, but not in reciprocals; the other source languages do not distinguish person or number. This study draws on naturalistic and elicited production data to examine how reflexive and reciprocal events are encoded in Light Warlpiri. The study finds that Light Warlpiri combines near-maximal distinctions from the source languages, but in a way that is not a mirror of any. It retains the person and number distinctions of English reflexives and extends them to reciprocals, using the same forms for reflexives and reciprocals (like Warlpiri). Reflexives and reciprocals occur within a verbal structure (perhaps under influence from Warlpiri). The results show that a mixed language can have discrete contributions from three languages, that the source languages can influence different subsystems to different extents, and that near-maximal distinctions from the source languages can be maintained.

Interpretations of English Reflexives by Korean EFL Learners on a Picture-based Truth Value Judgment Task

Interpretations of English Reflexives by Korean EFL Learners on a Picture-based Truth Value Judgment Task

Binding Conditions of English Reflexives and Pronouns in the ICE-USA

Binding Conditions of English Reflexives and Pronouns in the ICE-USA

Binding Conditions of English Reflexives and Pronouns in the ICE-USA

Binding Conditions of English Reflexives and Pronouns in the ICE-USA

'Override'-refleksiver i dansk og engelsk

‘Override’ reflexives in Danish and English Surprisingly, English allows
 (i) Peter’s behaviour only damages himself.(ii) Peter doesn’t realise that such behaviour only damages himself.
 although himself does not refer to the subject (i.e. Peter’s behaviour/such behaviour). Far from all clauses allow himself to not refer to the subject, and therefore himself in (i-ii) is often called an ‘override’ reflexive. We suggest that ‘override’ reflexives are the combination of nonreflexive him with the intensifier himself, and that this is then ‘shortened’ from him himself to himself. In Danish, the combination of the corresponding pronoun ham with the corresponding intensifier selv results in the Danish ‘override’ reflexive ham selv. This paper will show how Danish having two versions of ham selv and English two versions of himself fits into the general reflexive systems of the two languages. The analysis will be held up against data from the major corpora: KorpusDK, BNC and COCA.

A Multifactorial Analysis of Binding Conditions in British English Using ICE-GB Corpus

The present study examines the distributions of English reflexives in their comparisons with pronouns as proposed in Binding Theory through corpus-based as well as corpus-driven linguistic approach. In order to obtain empirical evidence related to the distributions of reflexives and pronouns in real sentences, ICE-GB corpus representing British English (BrE) was used. A multi-factorial regression analysis was adopted to investigate 26 possible morpho-syntactic, semantic and pragmatic conditions related to binding phenomena that have been suggested in the previous theoretical and experimental studies on binding. One thousand sentences including reflexives and pronouns were extracted from the ICE-GB corpus and 26 linguistic factors were encoded manually. Then, the data were statistically analyzed in R (using multifactorial analysis). Overall results observed from the analysis were as follows: (i) the reflexives and pronouns in BrE are clearly in complementary distribution at least in grammatical binding contexts within sentences; (ii) eleven main factors and five interactions with the number of clause-embedding were found to be statistically significant.

Anti-reflexivity and logophoricity: an account of unexpected reflexivization contrasts

In this article, I will provide an account of unexpected reflexivization contrasts (URCs) which have been problematic for analyses of English reflexives since the early days of Generative Grammar (Jackendoff 1969; Postal 1968; Lakoff 1968). These contrasts were the main motivation for introducing thematic conditions on reflexivization (Jackendoff 1972; Wilkins 1988). I will argue that thematically-based accounts are empirically inadequate and that, when the reflexivity-and-chains approach of Reinhart & Reuland (1993) is paired with an enriched conception of compositionality and a theory of logophoric discourse roles, the problem of URCs can be reduced to the more tractable problem of logophoric reflexives. This, however, requires that logophoric reflexives be seen not as exempt, but as tolerable violations of Condition A (Menuzzi 1999). I will argue that these violations, under adequate circumstances (e.g., when they occur within anti-reflexive predicates), give rise to logophoric interpretations. The unexpected reflexivization contrasts turn out to be a byproduct of the particular animacy requirement logophoric expressions place on their antecedents.

Reverse transfer of L3 on the Interpretation of L2 Reflexives

English reflexives allow only for short-distance binding except for exempt anaphors, while Chinese and Korean reflexives can be both short- and long-distance bound. This study examines the cross-linguistic influence of L3 Korean on L2 English in the interpretation of reflexive bindings with Chinese and Korean participants. 30 Chinese-English (CE), 20 Korean-English (KE), and 23 Chinese-English-Korean (CEK) participants completed an English proficiency test and a Truth Value Judgment Task (TVJT). The results of proficiency test showed KE scored significantly higher than CE and CEK, while the latter two were comparable. Nevertheless, although the mean scores of TVJT revealed marginally significant variance, Post-hoc comparisons showed KE scored significantly higher than CE, but not than CEK. CEK displayed numerically higher score than CE, though not significantly. The findings mirrored the pattern in Ahn & Jang (2019) in that L3 seemed to play a more robust role in L2 acquisition. The variation in TVJT between CE and CEK was unlikely to be introduced by either L1or L2 proficiency. Aligning with the Foreign Language Effect Model, L2 may be changed to reflect patterns in L3 when a specific feature was not common for both languages.

Effects of the interface categories on the acquisition patterns of English reflexives among learners of English as a foreign language

Objectives: Binding properties are difficult for learners to fully acquire. This study explored English-as-a-foreign-language learners’ acquisition patterns of the three binding properties of English reflexives and the effectiveness of the Interface Hypothesis. Methodology: One hundred and twenty-two native speakers of Chinese, a language with different binding properties, participated in the study; they were categorized into low, intermediate and advanced groups according to an English proficiency test. They were read 32 stories of 2 to 5 sentences each and were required to provide a comment sentence instantiating the three binding properties; i.e. c-command, subject orientation and locality. Data and analysis: A mixed repeated measures ANOVA was conducted with group and individual results of the experimental task to ascertain whether there were significant differences across different binding properties and among the three proficiency groups. Findings: Results from a truth-value judgment task indicate that the within-groups difficulty order of the three distinct binding properties is that: (a) for the low-proficiency group, c-command was easier than locality and orientation; and (b) for the intermediate-proficiency and the high-proficiency groups, c-command was easier than locality which, in turn, was easier than orientation. Among the three proficiency-groups, four acquisition patterns were found, which standard Binding Theory and its extensions cannot adequately explain. Originality: This is the first study to provide a variable-dependent account. It is argued that success or failure in establishing interface relations in second language grammars is likely to depend on a number of variables, including the involvement of the syntax–lexicon interface, syntax–semantics interface and syntax–discourse interface. Implications: The research suggests that the acquisition of English reflexives is variable-dependent, but not domain-wide. Specifically, the relationship between the binder and anaphoric expression can be established between the anaphors and some of their potential antecedents in second language English grammars, but not others, lending support to the Interface Hypothesis.

The Role of Universal Grammar in Second Language Acquisition from the Perspective of Chinese Acquiring English Reflexives

In China, the second language learning has always played an important role in primary and higher education. The issue of how children acquire the second language has experienced a boom in China over the past decade as the proficiency of a person’s English level mainly depends on its acquisition in primary stage. The main focus of this paper is to examine the role of UG in the second language acquisition and to what extent it plays in the process. To illustrate this, the four access hypotheses were given firstly. In addition, the role of UG from the aspect of Chinese learners’ acquiring the English reflexives was discussed. In this section, the importance of analyzing the reflexives and the different features of them in Chinese and English were exhibited.

Rebels without a clause: Processing reflexives in fronted wh-predicates

Abstract English reflexives like herself tend to associate with a structurally prominent local antecedent in online processing. However, past work has primarily investigated reflexives in canonical direct object positions. The present study investigates cataphoric reflexives in fronted wh-predicates (e.g., The mechanic that James hired predicted how annoyed with himself the insurance agent would be). Here, the reflexive is encountered in advance of its grammatical antecedent. We ask two questions. First, will readers engage an anaphoric (backwards-looking) or cataphoric (forwards-looking) search for an antecedent? Two, how similar is this process to the retrieval process for direct object reflexives? In two eye-tracking experiments, we found that readers initially interpret a cataphoric reflexive anaphorically, and tend to associate the reflexive with the more recently encountered antecedent. We propose that structural guidance for reflexive resolution occurs only when the necessary configurational syntactic information is available when the reflexive is encountered.

Similarities and Differences between Child and Adult L2 Learners in the Acquisition of English Reflexives

This paper reports on an experimental study which tested the claims of the Fundamental Difference Hypothesis and the Domain-by-Age-Model by comparing the performances of Arabic- and Chinese-speaking child and adult L2 learners in the acquisition of English reflexives. Whilst English and Arabic allow only local binding of reflexives, Chinese allows local and long-distance binding of reflexives. 60 L2 learners were given a word-based mean length of utterance proficiency test to confirm their proficiency level and, then, they were divided into six groups: Arabic-speaking children (n = 15); Arabic- speaking adults (n = 15); Chinese-speaking children (n = 15); Chinese- speaking adults (n = 15); an L1-English child (mean age 9.60) control group (n = 15); and an L1-English adult control group (n = 15). L2 learners’ interpretation of English reflexives was elicited through a 48-item Simon-Says- game. The results showed significant differences between the performance, of the L2 groups, and that of native speakers; yet, the majority of L2 learners were close to an 83.33% acquisition threshold. Also, by showing no significant difference between the child and adult L2 groups, the results indicated support for the Domain-by-Age-Model. As for the syntactic difference between reflexives and pronouns, L2 learners did not differentiate between them, scoring higher in reflexives.

The Interpretation of English Reflexives and Pronouns by Adult Speakers of Chinese An analysis of language transfers

The Interpretation of English Reflexives and Pronouns by Adult Speakers of Chinese An analysis of language transfers

Properties of Mandarin Reflexives

Abstract There are some problems concerning the properties of Mandarin reflexives as claimed by former studies. The present study redefines Mandarin simplex reflexives and compound reflexives as having different syntactic properties. Mandarin simplex reflexives with ziji possess features of both anaphor and pronoun and follow the normal pattern of derivation. This explains why the simplex reflexives exhibit the long-distance binding phenomenon and blocking effect. Mandarin compound reflexives are quite similar to English reflexives and they follow the special derivational pattern. At the beginning of the derivation, they form pairs with antecedents and their antecedents help to value the reflexive feature and then designate ziji as a suffix to the pronouns. This helps to explain why the Mandarin compound reflexives strictly follow the BCA. The simplex reflexive in Mandarin double reflexive structures is different from the bare conditional shui in having de dicto interpretation, that is, it has an implicit specified antecedent in the context.