Linguistic Theory Research Articles

Semantic Classification of Phraseological Units

This study explores the semantic classification of phraseological units and its significance in language learning and teaching. Phraseological units, including idioms, enrich linguistic expression by conveying figurative, metaphoric, symbolic, and ironical meanings. However, their complexity poses challenges for learners due to the disconnect between literal and figurative interpretations. By categorizing idioms into semantic groups, such as figurative or symbolic, this research simplifies their understanding and usage, enabling learners to enhance their linguistic and cultural competence. The study integrates linguistic theories, corpus linguistics, and practical teaching techniques, such as conceptual mapping and comparative analysis, to examine idioms’ structural and cultural nuances. Findings highlight the importance of semantic classification in improving comprehension, retention, and cross-cultural communication. Recommendations for future idiom pedagogy emphasize the integration of innovative methods and cross-linguistic comparisons to address learners' evolving needs.

Promoting the Use of African Indigenous Languages among the Youth in Kenya: An Argument for E-Inclusivity

This paper looks at the use of African indigenous languages in social media as a positive mechanism to decolonise the Internet. Specifically, the study analysed the use of Gikuyu language as an indigenous language to establish whether Kenyan youths use indigenous languages on social media platforms, with an aim of highlighting the need to promote African languages on social media as a means to decolonise the Internet. The case-based study used a mixed-method research design. Using purposive sampling, the study employed focus group discussions to gather qualitative data, while employing stratified sampling to conduct a survey using a questionnaire for quantitative data. Random sampling was used to identify 300 high school participants aged between 15 and 25 years in a public school in rural Kenya. Using Herman Batibo’s African Linguistic Dynamism Theory to capture the diversity and dynamism in language use and Blumler and Katz’s Uses and Gratifications Theory to account for the strategic use of language to meet one’s needs, the study found that Gikuyu language is rarely used by the youth on social media. This prompts the need to promote the use of African languages through policy, electronic media, publishing of fictional books and adoption of youth speaks fora.

Exploring Syntactic Ambiguity and Deep Structure Transformations in the translations Rumi's Mystical Poetry: A Generative Grammar Perspective

This paper aims at understanding how the element of mysticism in the selected work of Rumi can be explored via linguistic theory principles such as generative grammar and syntactic ambiguity. By deconstructing surface and deep structures, this study unveils the intricate interplay between language and meaning in six poems: “The Guest House”, “The Marriage of True Minds”, “Where There is Ruin”, “Silence is the Language of God”, “Only Breath” and “Out Beyond Ideas”. These poems are analyzed to decode the mystical meanings hidden in linguistic ambivalences. In “The Guest House”, the metaphor that applies to human life as a ‘guest house’ is studied under the view of syntactic doublet, which corresponds to Sufi conceptions of tenderness and receptiveness. In “The Marriage of True Minds”, love and unity are aligned, which shows how conditional syntax accords with the Sufism perspective of love. This research demonstrates how Rumi’s syntactical creativity supports the theoretical frameworks of multiple readings under the light of mystic wisdom. The insights established in this research yield the concept of analyzing the structure of Rumi’s poem, as well as the relation between language and spirituality.

Framing in media and communication studies: A bibliometric analysis

This paper presents a comprehensive bibliometric analysis of framing and frame theory in media and communication studies, utilizing Web of Science (WOS) data from 2014 to 2023. Framing, as a critical concept in media discourse, shapes public perception by highlighting specific aspects of information while downplaying others. Despite its central role in political communication, news framing, and social media research, there is a notable gap in better incorporating linguistic perspectives, particularly metaphor framing, within the existing literature. Using VOSviewer, this study analyzes co-occurrence networks and thematic clusters to map the evolving landscape of framing research. The results reveal key areas of focus, including political communication, science communication, and identity politics on social media platforms, while also highlighting the underrepresentation of linguistic approaches. This analysis not only identifies influential authors and institutions but also underscores the need for further integrating cognitive linguistic theories, such as metaphor framing, to deepen our understanding of how media discourse constructs reality. The paper concludes by suggesting directions for future research, calling for more interdisciplinary studies to explore the complex mechanisms underlying media framing.

Manner implicatures in large language models

In human speakers’ daily conversations, what we do not say matters. We not only compute the literal semantics but also go beyond and draw inferences from what we could have said but chose not to. How well is this pragmatic reasoning process represented in pre-trained large language models (LLM)? In this study, we attempt to address this question through the lens of manner implicature, a pragmatic inference triggered by a violation of the Grice manner maxim. Manner implicature is a central member of the class of context-sensitive phenomena. The current work investigates to what extent pre-trained LLMs are able to identify and tease apart different shades of meaning in manner implicature. We constructed three metrics to explain LLMs’ behavior, including LLMs-surprisals, embedding vectors’ similarities, and natural language prompting. Results showed no striking evidence that LLMs have explainable representations of meaning. First, the LLMs-surprisal findings suggest that some LLMs showed above chance accuracy in capturing different dimensions of meaning, and they were able to differentiate neutral relations from entailment or implications, but they did not show consistent and robust sensitivities to more nuanced comparisons, such as entailment versus implications and equivalence versus entailment. Second, the similarity findings suggest that the perceived advantage of contextual over static embeddings was minimal, and contextual LLMs did not notably outperform static GloVe embeddings. LLMs and GloVe showed no significant difference, though distinctions between entailment and implication were slightly more observable in LLMs. Third, the prompting findings suggest no further supportive evidence indicating LLM’s competence in fully representing different shades of meaning. Overall, our study suggests that current dominant pre-training paradigms do not seem to lead to significant competence in manner implicature within our models. Our investigation sheds light on the design of datasets and benchmark metrics driven by formal and distributional linguistic theories.

Aspectual Pair Formation in Russian Verbs: A Cognitive Approach

Aspectual pair formation in Russian verbs represents a core grammatical feature that governs the temporal and contextual framing of actions. Traditional approaches to aspect focus on morphological mechanisms such as prefixation, suffixation, and suppletion, yet they often fail to address irregularities and semantic nuances. This study adopts a cognitive linguistic perspective, exploring how conceptual metaphors, image schemas, and mental mappings underpin aspectual distinctions. By analyzing patterns of pair formation, including both regular and irregular verbs, the research highlights the cognitive processes that align with bounded and unbounded conceptualizations of actions. The findings contribute to linguistic theory by integrating semantic and cognitive frameworks, while practical applications offer innovative strategies for teaching aspect to learners through mental imagery and contextualized learning. Challenges and unanswered questions, such as the treatment of suppletive forms and cross-linguistic comparisons, underscore the need for further interdisciplinary research to refine this approach.

On the relation between negation and phases

Abstract This research article provides evidence from Jordanian Arabic (JA) that negation is syntactically bound to the projection of a phasal head, wherein NegP is structurally licensed to project exclusively within phase-bound configurations. Therefore, NegP can project separately in CP and v*P, offering support to the multi-locus view (Alqassas 2012. The morpho-syntax and pragmatics of Levantine Arabic negation: A synchronic and diachronic analysis. Doctoral dissertation, Indiana University) that NegP in Arabic is not restricted to one structural position in the clause structure. NegP can rather project separately above TP or below TP. However, as we argue for in this article the projection of NegP is correlated with the presence of a phasal head (Chomsky 2007. Approaching UG from below. In Uli Sauerland & Hans-Martin Gärtner (eds.), Interfaces+recursion=language? Chomsky’s minimalism and the view from syntax-semantics, 1–30. Berlin, Germany: Mouton de Gruyter). Our evidence comes from two interrelated phenomena in JA: (1) the possibility of negating the past tense copula ka:n independently from the negation of the main verb in transitive and passive sentences and (2) the impossibility of independently negating the verb and the past-tense copula ka:n in unaccusative clauses. Following Jarrah’s (2023. Passive vs. unaccusative predicates: A phase-based account. Natural Language & Linguistic Theory 41. 1397–1424) assumption that unaccusative predicates, unlike passive or transitive verbs, do not project phases in JA grammar, we propose that the use of two NegPs in the same clause with unaccusative clauses is prohibited as these unaccusative predicates do not project phases. This assumption is significant as phases, local domains, are not only found to be independent in terms of their Φ-content (their head bears an independent set of unvalued Φ-features) but also in terms of negation.

The Emergence of Chunking Structures with Hierarchical HRNN

Abstract In Natural Language Processing (NLP), predicting linguistic structures, such as parsing and chunking, has mostly relied on manual annotations of syntactic structures. This paper introduces an unsupervised approach to chunking, a syntactic task that involves grouping words in a non-hierarchical manner. We present a Hierarchical Recurrent Neural Network (HRNN) designed to model word-to-chunk and chunk-to-sentence compositions. Our approach involves a two-stage training process: pretraining with an unsupervised parser and finetuning on downstream NLP tasks. Experiments on multiple datasets reveal a notable improvement of unsupervised chunking performance in both pretraining and finetuning stages. Interestingly, we observe that the emergence of the chunking structure is transient during the neural model’s downstream-task training. This study contributes to the advancement of unsupervised syntactic structure discovery and opens avenues for further research in linguistic theory.

The Fundamental Role of Binary Oppositions in Linguistic Theory

The Fundamental Role of Binary Oppositions in Linguistic Theory

Integrating Pop Music in English Language Teaching to Enhance Listening, Vocabulary, and Cultural Awareness Among Learners

This study explores the efficacy of using popular music as a pedagogical tool in English language classrooms. Drawing from linguistic theory and empirical evidence, the study examines how integrating pop songs can enhance students' listening skills, vocabulary acquisition, pronunciation, and cultural awareness. Through a mixed-methods approach, including surveys, observational studies, and comparative analysis, we evaluate the impact of pop music on language retention and learner engagement. Findings suggest that students who engage with music show improved comprehension and increased motivation in language learning.

High and low level constructions in dictionaries and constructiCons: the interplay between lexical and syntactic information in CASA|Con

Abstract After outlining the concept of a constructiCon and discussing the relationship of lexicography and constructicography, the focus of this article lies on the CASA ConstruCtiCon project for the English language. The treatment of different types of constructions in CASA|Con is discussed such as argument structure constructions, sentence type constructions, and tense and aspect constructions. In contrast to such constructions at a high level of abstraction a few examples involving a low level of abstraction are being discussed and it is argued that such seemingly unidiomatic constructions constitute an important element of idiomatic language use. Finally, it is shown that the vast majority of constructions are related to lexical material and that thus bringing together what used to be separated into lexical and grammatical phenomena makes a lot of sense not only in terms of linguistic theory but also with respect to works of reference.

The Postmodern Transformation of Language through Social Media, Memes, Emojis, and GIFs: A Study Among Selected North Indian University Students

This study explores how digital communication technologies—a consequence of late capitalism—have changed language usage. The study looks at how GIFs, memes, emojis, and social media language have evolved and how postmodern cultural logic is embodied in these forms of communication. Based on Fredric Jameson's theory that postmodernism is the cultural logic of late capitalism, the study highlights the digital forms' inherent fragmentation, intertextuality, and pastiche. It focuses on how language has evolved to reflect postmodern society's hyperreal and dispersed structure by becoming more context-dependent, expressive, and visual. The study employs a mixed-methods approach to examine how social media content is analyzed and to obtain perspectives on various communicative forms from 300 university students in Delhi, Punjab, and Haryana. The findings imply that, in addition to changing language, digital communication technologies have also introduced new forms of expression that combine text, image, and emotion, challenging established linguistic theories. This study advances our knowledge of language in the digital era and has implications for the larger cultural shifts these developments signify.

NEGATIVE POLITENESS STRATEGIES IN ANDREA HIRATA’S NOVEL LASKAR PELANGI

This research delves into the intricate portrayal of negative politeness strategy in Andrea Hirata's novel Laskar Pelangi. Employing linguistic politeness theory by Brown and Levinson and a structuralism approach, the study aims to elucidate the connection between linguistics and literature within the novel's context. Utilizing a qualitative research methodology, the text is analyzed, focusing on instances of negative politeness strategies employed by characters in various social interactions. Through a descriptive qualitative approach, 53 instances of negative politeness strategies are identified in the novel. The literature review underscores the significance of negative politeness for maintaining rapport and respect in social interactions, particularly in contexts prone to imposition or conflict. Extracted examples from the novel illustrate how characters utilize negative politeness to navigate complex social dynamics and preserve harmonious relationships within their community. The findings reveal cultural nuances embedded in politeness strategies, reflecting Indonesian societal norms and values. Characters in Laskar Pelangi employ indirect speech acts, hedging language, and deferential expressions to mitigate threats to others' autonomy or comfort, contributing to the narrative's tone of warmth and sincerity. Overall, this research highlights the integral role of negative politeness strategies in shaping character interactions and reflecting cultural values in Laskar Pelangi. By employing these strategies, characters negotiate social hierarchies and navigate interpersonal relationships while demonstrating respect and consideration for others.

Linguistic Landscapes of Social Media Discourse: Exploring Language Practices and Identities on Jordanian Online Platforms

The present research is designed to investigate the language practices and identities of Jordanian users on the selected social media platforms of Facebook and Twitter. A total of 400 posts and tweets were selected from both social media platforms. Based on the Systemic Functional Linguistics theory, the study found that the users demonstrated various language practices on social media like code-switching, emojis, localized expressions, and identity affiliations like racism, patriotism, and feminism. Consequently, the study established that Jordanian Arabic is the most frequently-used language style, while the use of English and MSA as secondary language styles was considerably less popular. Additionally, code-switching was the most prevalent language practice. The study recommended educational policies to advocate bilingualism, while for social media, the strategies need to reflect linguistic characteristics to increase reach and engagement.

The didactic features of James Summers’s (1828–1891) research on Chinese*

Abstract James Summers (1828–1891) is distinguished as the first professor of Chinese in Britain to conduct systematic research on the Chinese language. During his tenure as a Chinese professor, Summers’s research on the Chinese language demonstrated a pronounced didactic emphasis. This was evident in his departure from rigidly following linguistic theories, his adoption of diverse linguistic ideas and methodologies from scholars of varied backgrounds, and his inclusion of multiple varieties of Chinese as target languages, particularly Nanjing Mandarin. Summers’s early missionary work in China, along with his role at King’s College London, where he trained student interpreters for the British Foreign Office, greatly shaped his pedagogical focus. The didactic feature of his works aligns with the broader pragmatic approach of British sinology, reflecting the trend of recruiting retired missionaries and diplomats with experience in China into European university faculties after the mid-19th century.

Reducing interpretative ambiguity in an educational environment with ChatGPT

The study posits that both concrete and abstract words are crucial for effective communication, particularly in educational contexts where the interplay between these forms of language intersects with linguistic, cognitive, and social stratification theories. A key challenge is balancing the efficiency of abstract language in conveying complex concepts with the accessibility of concrete language, which enhances student comprehension. Generative languages, with their capacity to manipulate symbols, offer a way to navigate this challenge by facilitating the structured and systematic representation and exploration of abstract concepts within their contexts. The central research question was: “How can generative languages assist educational stakeholders in articulating their ideas and actions more clearly by identifying and refining abstract terms?” To explore this, a protocol in English was developed for ChatGPT-4, featuring structured guidelines and prompts aimed at helping users achieve specific educational goals. In a pilot study involving 13 participants, ChatGPT-4 provided feedback, suggested improvements, and guided users through text interactions. One of the authors observed the participants, took notes on their behavior, and conducted brief post-exercise discussions to gauge their experiences. After the session, participants were asked to reflect on their experience and share their thoughts via email. The process helped participants refine their responses from abstract to more concrete terms, enhancing clarity and engagement with educational content. The ChatGPT-4 protocol effectively bridges the gap between abstract pedagogical theories and practical classroom application, training teachers to use vivid descriptions, relatable scenarios, and tangible examples. This study illustrates how artificial intelligence can successfully integrate teaching principles and learning theories to enhance educational practices.

A Comparative Study of Subordinate Conjunctions in Azerbaijani and English: A Typological Perspective

This study presents a comprehensive comparative analysis of subordinate conjunctions in Azerbaijani and English, examining their syntactic structures, semantic functions, and frequency of usage. Drawing from a diverse corpus of literary, academic, and spoken texts, the research reveals significant typological differences between the two languages. Azerbaijani, with its agglutinative and head-final structure, uses flexible clause positioning and morphological markers, whereas English adheres to a fixed, head-initial clause arrangement. The semantic analysis categorizes conjunctions into causal, conditional, temporal, and adversative types, highlighting unique patterns and preferences in each language. Additionally, frequency analysis shows a higher density of conditional conjunctions in Azerbaijani, reflecting cultural emphasis on hypothetical relationships. These findings have important implications for translation, language teaching, and linguistic theory, offering practical tools and insights for both academic and applied linguistics. The study also identifies limitations, such as the focus on written texts, and suggests directions for future research, including analysis of spoken language and digital communication.

Language learners, chess champions, and piano prodigies – insights from research on language contact and expert behavior

Abstract One of the central assumptions in Cognitive Linguistics is that the cognitive mechanisms underlying our language use are domain-general and thus apply to human behavior beyond language. Examples of such cognitive mechanisms are, among others, our ability to focus attention, to memorize and categorize, as well as processes related to chunking, generalization, and inhibitory control. Testing this core assumption, however, is often difficult, as it requires us to move beyond linguistic research and to actively look for links between our language use and other areas of human cognition. This paper is an illustration of what such links could look like, particularly focusing on links between research on (Dutch-German) language contact and expert behavior. In doing so, it shows (a) that there are many shared links, for example, regarding the cognitive mechanisms of entrenchment and chunking, and (b) that these shared links (as well as potential differences across the fields) can be used to improve our linguistic theorizing. In particular, I argue that linguistic research can benefit from the insights from research on expert behavior, especially from its more advanced insights modelling individual variation, and that the shared links can help us to test the core assumption that the cognitive mechanisms underlying our language use are indeed domain-general.

EXPLORING THE ROLE OF L1 LITERACY SKILLS IN L2 READING COMPREHENSION AND VOCABULARY DEVELOPMENT AMONG SENIOR HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS IN GHANA

This study investigated the relationship between first language (L1) literacy skills and second language (L2) reading comprehension and vocabulary development among students in Ghana. The study was grounded in Cummin’s (1970) Linguistic Interdependence Theory (LIT). The qualitative approach was adopted, and three instruments- focus group discussions, interviews and classroom observations- were used to obtain data from the sample of 300 secondary school students and 40 teachers. The researcher assessed participants' views in L1 literacy domains (phonological awareness, orthographic knowledge, and reading fluency) as well as their views on L2 (English) reading comprehension and vocabulary. The findings revealed a significant positive correlation between students' L1 literacy skills and their achievement in L2 reading comprehension and vocabulary. Those with more advanced abilities in their native language consistently demonstrated higher levels of reading comprehension and broader English vocabulary knowledge. This underscores the critical role of strong foundational literacy in the first language as a precursor to successful second language acquisition. The study also identified key instructional strategies that could help bridge the gap for ESL learners, such as explicit instruction in L1 literacy, structured opportunities for cross-linguistic transfer, and the incorporation of culturally relevant, mother-tongue materials into the curriculum. The implications of these findings for policymakers, curriculum designers, and teachers working to improve educational outcomes for linguistically diverse student populations are discussed.<p> </p><p><strong> Article visualizations:</strong></p><p><img src="/-counters-/soc/0799/a.php" alt="Hit counter" /></p>

Pragmatic Analysis of Undergraduate Male and Female Students’ Politeness Strategies in Initiating and Terminating Conversations Online

This study examines the politeness strategies employed by male and female undergraduate students in online interactions, focusing on conversation initiation and termination. A pragmatic analysis was conducted using House and Kasper's (1981) linguistic politeness theory alongside Miles and Huberman's model for data interpretation. The findings indicate that male students predominantly used committers, consultative devices, and downtoners to initiate conversations, while employing downtoners, understaters, and politeness markers for termination. In contrast, female students utilized committers, consultative devices, politeness markers, and playdowns for initiation, and committers, playdowns, and politeness markers for termination. Applying Brown and Levinson's (1987) politeness theory, male students mainly favored positive politeness, negative politeness, and bald-on-record strategies during initiation, while employing both positive and negative strategies for termination. Female students exhibited a preference for positive and negative politeness strategies, along with off-record strategies for initiation, relying solely on positive politeness for termination. These findings highlight distinct gender-specific communication patterns in online environments, providing valuable insights for linguistics, communication studies, and gender studies. The results can guide educators, policymakers, and practitioners in developing inclusive and effective communication strategies tailored to digital learning contexts.