Clause Order Research Articles

Argument structure affects relative clause extraposition: corpus evidence from Persian

The extraposition of a relative clause creates a discontinuous dependency between the relative clause and its host noun phrase, as in A man just entered the bank who claimed to have a gun. Since discontinuous dependencies are known to increase processing effort, a key question is why speakers produce them in the first place. Some factors known to affect extraposition – for example, the length of the relative clause and the main verb phrase – have received processing-based explanations, but others haven’t. We focus on two factors described by previous research: verb type and the grammatical function of the noun phrase hosting the relative clause. Specifically, extraposition from grammatical subjects is more common with unaccusative and passive verbs in English; further, extraposition is more common from grammatical objects than subjects in Dutch and German. We replicate these findings using corpus data from Persian. Further, we propose that verb type and grammatical function can be linked to a single underlying notion: argument structure. We demonstrate that argument structure modulates the likelihood of extraposition in Persian. We suggest that this occurs because speakers choose to extrapose relative clauses in order to keep the main clause verb close to its internal arguments. This explanation extends previous findings in psycholinguistics on the role of argument structure in speech planning during language production.

Differential Object Marking in Structurally Complex Contexts in Spanish: Evidence from Bilingual and Monolingual Processing

This study examines whether Differential Object Marking (DOM) realization and word order in relative clauses (RCs) in Spanish affect processing and interpretation among monolinguals and highly proficient Catalan–Spanish bilinguals. RCs are parallel in Catalan and Spanish, but DOM is much more restricted in Catalan than in Spanish, and, interestingly, the distinction between subject and object RCs relies mainly on the presence/absence of DOM. To examine DOM optionality, we concentrate on the top portion of the animacy scale and test the human/non-human contrast. Exploring these two populations allows us to test whether they resort to different strategies for the following three reasons: (1) bilingualism places an increased burden on memory processes); (2) the partial overlap between both DOM systems might lead to the influence from Catalan into Spanish); and (3) optionality has been proposed to characterize bilingual grammars). Findings from a word-by-word non-cumulative self-paced reading task showed that DOM modulates RC processing. With [+human] obligatorily marked objects, both monolinguals and bilinguals read subject RCs faster than object RCs, suggesting a strategy favoring subject RCs. However, monolinguals solved the interpretation early while processing but bilinguals, despite the more restricted DOM character of Catalan, are sensitive to DOM albeit displaying delayed spill-over effects. With [−human] optionally marked objects, bilinguals performed faster than monolinguals. We suggest that the uneven experience with DOM in Catalan, particularly with the non-standard variety that frequently displays DOM and that our bilinguals also speak in everyday conversations, facilitates bilinguals’ adaptation to the optional marking of non-human objects in Spanish, much in the same manner that they accommodate the presence or absence of DOM with both human and non-human objects in other native language.

Students’ Difficulties in Writing in English Language

English language is no doubt one of the most used and influential languages around the world. In Albania, English language learning starts since 6-year-old age. Therefore, many studies and research have been done concerning English language and competences. When studying a foreign language, writing is considered as the most demanding and crucial competence. Based on previous studies in Albania, students tend to face difficulties during the writing process. They lack the necessary writing skills needed to have a successful writing performance and they claim that further attention and importance should be given to the writing process by teachers. Therefore, the purpose of this research is to identify the most common errors that Albanian students make in writing and what difficulties they have when it comes to it. The data is provided through a writing task in the form of an essay to second year English language students. There were 47 students of English Language at the Faculty of Foreign Languages, University of Tirana, taking part in the research. Based on the study data, students mostly made grammatical and vocabulary mistakes. They were aware of the patterns used in different writing types and they made less mistakes compared to other errors considered in the study. Even though they tend to be careful not to think in Albanian, its influence is obvious in their writing, especially when it comes to the word order of clauses and sentences. Considering the findings, some practical recommendations have been made in the end.

Examining Cross-linguistic Influence of Japanese Word Order: An Eye-Tracking Study on L2 English Learners’ Text Comprehension

Cross-linguistic influence is a systematic and unavoidable feature of language learning. This study aimed to investigate whether prepositive word order in Japanese noun clauses can serve as a cross-linguistic influence element in the acquisition of relative clauses (a form of a postpositive modifier) in English. To test this hypothesis, this study conducted an eye-tracking experiment with native Japanese speakers and showed the following results statistically. First, Japanese participants generally paid more attention to modifier clauses than the noun phrases they modified when reading English sentences with relative clauses. Second, when interpreting accusative relative clauses, longer fixations were observed both in the modifier clauses and in the antecedents, likely due to their complexity for Japanese L2 learners of English, as evidenced by the lowest accuracy rate. Finally, and most notably, the findings revealed that the participants who had not fully acquired the relative clause construction focused more on the left side of the relative pronoun than those who had. This tendency was most prominent when interpreting subjective relative clauses, a result that supports the hypothesis that prepositive L1 modifiers could be a CLI element in the acquisition of English postpositive modifiers.

Comprehension of complex sentences containing temporal connectives: How children are led down the event-semantic kindergarten-path.

Children up to school age are known to have difficulty comprehending complex sentences with temporal connectives, but the reasons remain controversial. We tested six- to twelve-year-old children to assess how the iconicity of event-language mapping, type of connective, and clause order mediate the comprehension of temporal sentences. Sixty monolingual Greek-speaking children and 15 adult controls completed a picture-sequence selection task in which they judged after- and before-sentences in iconic and non-iconic order. Up to age twelve, children did not reach full adult-like comprehension of the connectives; performance in non-iconic after-sentences was significantly lower than in the other three conditions across all ages. We conclude that neither iconicity, connective, nor clause order can fully explain these findings and propose an account based on the interaction of iconicity and clause order: non-iconic, sentence-medial after requires revision of the initial event representation, resulting in an event-semantic kindergarten-path that children find difficult to overcome.

Motivations for Using Non-Initial Conditionals and Their Pragmatical Functions

There has been a lack of attention to the order of conditional clauses and resultant clauses in the study of conditional sentences in the Chinese research field. One commonality of human languages is that the conditional clause precedes the resultant clause. Previous researchers have given comprehensive explanations for the predominant antecedent order of initial conditional clauses, but there is still a research gap concerning the motivations for using non-initial conditionals and their pragmatical functions. With the help of the corpus, this paper focuses on the phenomenon of non-initial conditionals and explores the motivation for using them and their pragmatic functions. The current study finds that there are 2 main motivations for the use of non-initial conditional clauses, namely, to maintain discourse coherence and to act as post hoc complements; there are four main pragmatic functions of non-initial conditionals: boundary function, assessment function, euphemism function, and supplementary function. Similar microscopic studies help us reconceptualize conditional sentences’ actual role in communication to further reveal the dynamic nature of natural language communication.

The Application of the Public Order Clause on the Financial Market as One of the Elements for Building Sustainable Finance in a Comparative Perspective

Abstract The public order clause is an instrument of private international law that limits the possibility of applying the law of a designated country in cross-border contractual relations. The role of the clause is to protect the specific interests and values of a given legal order, the importance of which is so significant that it justifies refusing to apply foreign law or limiting the scope of its application. From the point of view of the subject of this study, the public order clause could potentially be applied by national supervisory authorities in a situation of a threat to the security and stability of a given financial market. Thus the purpose of this article, in which the author uses the functional approach of the comparative legal method, the historical-descriptive method and the dogmatic method, is to verify the thesis about the possible use of the public order clause as an instrument supporting the process of building sustainable finance, along with its limitations in the form of the French concept of effet atténué and also from a comparative and cross-border perspective.

Research on Spatial Concept Transfer - the Order of Adverbial Clauses of Time from Chinese English Learners at Different Educational Levels

The research on spatial concept transfer as a cognitive paradigm of language transfer aims to explain the factors that learners may encounter in second language acquisition (SLA) and promote the development of SLA. This research uses a corpus-based approach to reveal the features of English learners’ distribution of inflectional order in When, While, and Once-led adverbial clauses of time at different levels of education and to validate the theoretical framework of spatial concept transfer.

Türkçedeki Zamansıl Ulaç Tümcelerinin Derlem Temelli İncelenmesi

The studies in cognitive and psycholinguistics have reported that the sentential position of converb clauses which are part of adverbial clauses is influenced by syntactic, semantic and discourse factors (Diessel, 2005, 2008; Verstraete, 2004; Wiechmann & Kerz, 2013). One of the semantic factors is the iconicity of sequence and the related iconicity principle states that linguistic structures mostly mirror the structure of conceptual order (Croft, 2003). In other words, the meaning relationships that the linguistic structures bear has an effect on the positioning of those structures. For example, the temporal meaning relationship that a construction has can have an effect on the linear structure of this construction. This study aims at investigating the positioning variations of temporal converb clauses in Turkish and at revealing whether or not it is consistent with the iconicity principle. There are several endings used as temporal converb clauses in Turkish. In the study, the following nine converb endings are analysed: -(y)IncA (when), -DığIndA (when), -DIğI zaman (when), -ken (while), -(A/I) r…-mAz (as soon as), -DIğIndAn beri (since), -mAdAn önce (before), -DIktAn sonra (after), and –DikçA (whenever). The data of the study were collected from the Turkish National Corpus (TNC) (Aksan et al., 2012) which contains 50 million words. After identifying 9000 samples of temporal converbs, these were first grouped based on the endings mentioned above. Then the data were analysed using chi-square test. The 2×3 X² analysis was employed to see the correlations between conceptual order and linear structure. The findings of the study show that temporal converb clauses in Turkish generally have a tendency to appear before the main clause. The clauses expressing priority, namely -(y)IncA (when), -DiğIndA (when), -DIğI zaman (when), -(A/I) r…-mAz (as soon as), -DIğIndAn beri (since) and -DIktAn sonra (after) and the clauses expressing simultaneity, namely, -DiğIndA (when), -DIğI zaman (when), -ken (while) and –DıkçA (whenever) are found to precede the main clauses, which is in line with iconic clause order. The converb constructions expressing posteriority, such as –DiğIndA (when), -DIğI zaman (when) and -mAdAn önce (before) appear to precede the main clause, which is not supported by the iconicity principle. These findings suggest that the iconicity of sequence has a role in the placement of temporal converb clauses in Turkish.

The syntactic status of V-final conjunct clauses in Old English: the role of priming

This study is a corpus-based investigation of the use of the V-final (VF) order in Old English conjunct (or coordinate) clauses. The aim of the analysis is to determine which of the two hypotheses formulated in earlier studies of the subject finds more convincing data support in the available corpora of Old English. According to one interpretation, conjunct clauses are a subtype of main clauses, and the VF order is used in both groups to signal continuation in discourse, especially with punctual, dynamic and relatively heavy verbs. Under the other view, VF conjunct clauses are syntactically subordinate, with the coordinating conjunction blocking verb movement like a complementiser. The present study shows that while both hypotheses are descriptively adequate, the main mechanism responsible for the use of the VF order in conjunct clauses is syntactic priming, with the VF order activated by a trigger clause (usually subordinate) and spreading to the following conjunct clause(s), which often results in long chains of subsequent VF clauses.

SHAREHOLDERS’ AGREEMENTS AND UNIDROIT PRINCIPLES OF INTERNATIONAL COMMERCIAL CONTRACTS

The article examines the issue of the foreign law as an applicable law of shareholders’ agreement at companies established under the laws of Ukraine. The emergence of shareholders’ agreement in the legal system of Ukraine, as well as the changes that have taken place during the last decades regarding the possibility of applying foreign law to contractual corporate relations, have been studied. Because of authority of English common law among Ukrainian legal practitioners, there is an attitude among them to choose it as the foreign law that will be applied to shareholders’ agreement. At the same time, there are significant differences in the basic principles of common law and continental legal family, which includes the legal system of Ukraine. On the other hand, the law of Ukraine will remain the applicable law for the rest of corporate relations in the relevant companies insofar as it is its lex societatis (i.e. everything with except of obligations of the parties to the shareholders’ agreement). Taking into account all the above, a conclusion was made to introduce a document equidistant from both legal systems and able to ensure a high quality regulation of general issues of contract law, namely the UNIDROIT Principles of International Commercial Contracts, among instruments providing regulation of relations under shareholders’ agreement. It is proposed to use one of the standard UNIDROIT clauses in order to determine the hierarchy between the provisions of foreign national law and the UNIDROIT Principles, as well as their correlation with the provisions of the shareholders’ agreement itself. It was also concluded that the UNIDROIT Principles might be applied to shareholders’ agreement even in the absence of a foreign element to establish a regulation of a contractual relations at the level of the best international standards.

The Competition Between Processing and Discourse-Pragmatic Factors in Children's and Adults' Production of Adverbial When-Clauses.

This is the first study to investigate the combined effects of processing-based factors (i.e., clause length and clause order) and discourse-pragmatic factors (i.e., information structure) on children's and adults' production of adverbial when-clauses. In a sentence repetition task, 16 three-year-old and 16 five-year-old children as well as 17 adults listened to and watched an animated story and then were asked to repeat what they had just heard and seen. Each story contained an adverbial when-clause and its main clause. The sentences were manipulated for their clause order, information structure, and clause length. Adults tended to change main-when clause orders to when-main in their repetitions, and they showed a strong preference for the given-new order of information. In contrast, 3-year-olds tended to change when-main clause orders to main-when, and they showed a preference for the new-given order of information. In addition, 3-year-olds tended to produce short-long clause orders irrespective of what they had heard, whereas adults produced both short-long and long-short orders in line with the input. In general, 5-year-olds were more adultlike in their production compared to 3-year-olds. Young children were strongly affected by processing-based factors in their production of complex sentences. They tended to order main and when-clauses in a way that requires less planning and processing load. However, they have not yet attained an adultlike sensitivity to discourse-pragmatic factors. https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.24422635.

A typological study on the syntactic variations of counterfactual clauses

ABSTRACT This paper differs from previous studies that focused on counterfactual markings by establishing a typological classification of counterfactuals (CFs) based on syntactic variations. By taking this approach, the paper is able to answer questions surrounding the downgrading of counterfactuals and its effects on clause linkage, clause order and TAM expression. The author proposes a new working definition that emphasizes meaning while also considering form. Through a survey of 155 languages, the paper provides evidence that the syntax of counterfactuals is more diverse than previously thought, challenging mainstream views on their connection to conditional frameworks. Non-conditional CFs like coordination or insubordination which tend to get marginalized in linguistic analysis and description are also explored in the paper. The preliminary systematization of data presented here will encourage an overall rethinking of the syntactic variations of counterfactuals.

A Corpus-Based Study of Korean EFL Learners’ Use of Subordinate Conjunctions in Argumentative Writing: With Focus on if, when, and because

The use of subordinating conjunctions in L2 writing has been widely studied with regard to frequency of occurrence, grammatical accuracy, and relative ordering of subordinate and main clauses. However, relatively few studies investigated the diverse aspects of the L2 use of subordinating conjunctions within a single study. The present study analyzed three representative subordinating conjunctions, if, when, and because as used in a proficiency-stratified Korean EFL written corpus in terms of their frequency of occurrence, grammatical accuracy, and linear ordering relative to the main clause. The results revealed that the proficiency effect on frequency and grammatical accuracy varied among the three subordinating conjunctions, whereas that on linear ordering of subordinate clauses was uniform across conjunctions. The findings provide implications for a better understanding of L2 adverbial subordinate clauses and its application to teaching practice.

(201–202) Proposals regarding the definition of original material (Article 9.4)

(201–202) Proposals regarding the definition of original material (Article 9.4)

Structure preservation in complex prefields: A note on Müller (2018)

Cases of apparent V3 order in German finite main clauses are commonly attributed to remnant VP movement to SpecC. The remnant VPs posited in this approach are headed by a trace, left behind by a verb that evacuated from VP prior to the movement of VP. Müller (2018) argued that such remnant VPs are subject to a process of restructuring that removes the verb’s trace and reassociates the phrases that depended on that head prior to its removal. This commentary discusses novel observations about operator scope which lend further support to the remnant movement approach to apparent V3, but which at the same time are inconsistent with the assumption that remnant VPs in the German prefield are always subject to restructuring.

Constituent Order of Clauses in the Bima Language and Its Typological Indication

Constituent Order of Clauses in the Bima Language and Its Typological Indication

Glosa do wyroku Naczelnego Sądu Administracyjnego z 16 lutego 2022 r., sygn. akt II OSK 128/19

In the commented order, the Supreme Administrative Court held that the state is obliged to grant Polish citizenship to a person whose parents are of the same sex, which results from the birth certificate submitted by them, and that the implementation of this obligation does not threaten the public order of the Republic of Poland. The use of the public order clause in such a case is not legally justified and constitutes a form of discrimination against the child on the basis of the content of international instruments.

漢語史를 기반으로 한 ‘角’의 인지언어학적 분석

This article is based on the history of the Chinese language and discloses the characteristics of the meaning derivation and main mechanism of Jiao(horns) at the individual level. The main contents of this article are as follows:First, from the point of view of the history of the Chinese language, this article re-establishes the order of the semantic clauses and derivations in the meaning of Shuowen Jiezi, Ancient Chinese Dictionary, The capitalist age Dictionary, Modern Chinese Dictionary, Chinese Dictionary and Chinese Origin Dictionary to construct a semantic map of Jiao(horns)Next, this article discusses the meaning derivation tendency and interpretation of Jiao(horns) from a cognitive semantic point of view based on the semantic map of the history of the Chinese language:First, referring to the derive-in-meaning process of Jiao(horns), it was classified into macroscopic and microscopic categories. Macroscopically, it was revealed that there are tendencies of people, things, activities, space, and cultural elements. Microscopically, the conceptual hierarchy of terms of meaning belonging to each category and the conceptualization process of metaphor, metonymy, and metaphtonymy were discussed. Second, the N-V conversion of Jiao(horns’, its meaning derivation, and metaphtonymy were revealed. Third, the case where the semantic term corresponds to two or more concepts was confirmed through the diagram, and it was revealed that it was conceptualized as metaphtonymy. Fourth, the process of derive the meaning of Jiao(horns) due to cultural factors was discussed together in the pragmatic aspect of connotation. Fifth, the grammaticalization process in which Jiao(horns) diverges into a measure word was analyzed, and it was confirmed that it was in the hierarchy of the most abstract concept.

New perspectives on grammatical change in heritage Norwegian

This study introduces two speaker types, which have not yet been studied, to the study of heritage Norwegian: one adult (48, i.e., not elderly) and one adolescent speaker (16), “Kari” and “Jess”. They are both North American, English-dominant heritage speakers of Norwegian (AmNo), but differ from an older, previously studied cohort of American Norwegian speakers (old AmNo) in several respects. Kari and Jess have had more continuous contact with Norway throughout their lives. They are both Norwegian-literate and consume Norwegian-language media. Jess has attended Norwegian language courses in Norway, which motivates seeing her as a heritage language relearner. In this pilot study, we test the hypothesis that such extra-linguistic factors lead to grammatical differences between the groups. The hypothesis is tested by the analysis of three variables previously studied in old AmNo speakers: verb-second word order in non-subject initial clauses, possessive placement, and grammatical gender. We drew data from a 48-minute semi-structured speech recording. The study found that Kari and Jess indeed differ from old AmNo speakers. Kari’s language shows very little grammatical innovation, placing her among the most stable AmNo speakers. Jess’ language, in contrast, shows strongly innovative tendencies in all studied variables. To explain the innovations in Jess’ language, we appeal to heterogeneous input during childhood acquisition and cross-linguistic influence from English. Both factors, we argue, are active in the process of heritage language relearning.