Laura A Michaelis
Datos Biográficos
| ID | 755181 |
|---|---|
| NOMBRE | Laura A Michaelis |
| NOMBRES | Laura A |
| APELLIDO | Michaelis |
| FIRMA | MICHAELIS L A |
| AFILIACIONES | University of Colorado Boulder |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-8391-2731 |
| VERIFICADO | Sí |
| TOTAL DE OBRAS | 29 |
| TOTAL DE CITAS | 65 |
| TOTAL COMO AUTOR | 28 |
| TOTAL COMO EDITOR | 1 |
| PRIMER AÑO DE PUBLICACIÓN | 1991 |
| AÑO MÁS RECIENTE DE PUBLICACIÓN | 2025 |
| ÍNDICE H | 4 |
The Cambridge Handbook of Construction Grammar
Construction Grammar is one of the fastest-growing branches of functional syntax. Bringing together an international team of scholars, this handbook provides a complete overview of the current issues and applications in this approach. Divided into six thematic parts, it covers the fundamental notions of Construction Grammar, its conceptual origins and the basic ideas that unite its various branches, its solid empirical grounding and affinities wi…
Combining Signs in Sign-Based Construction Grammar
This article revisits Charles Fillmore’s vision of the lexicon as the control center of grammar, advancing the claim that idioms are ordinary linguistic objects. Within Sign-Based Construction Grammar (SBCG), idiomatic expressions – whether fixed phrases, idiomatically combining forms, or formal idioms – are modeled as typed feature structures licensed by lexical entries and constructions. This unified architecture dissolves the traditional bound…
Staying terminologically rigid, conceptually open and socially cohesive
When he introduced the framework now known as Construction Grammar, Charles Fillmore said: “Grammatical Construction Theory differs from [...] other frameworks [...] in its insistence that syntactic patterns are often tightly associated with interpretation instructions” ( Fillmore 1989 : 17). Construction Grammarians view the patterns, the associations and the interpretive instructionsas a matter of linguistic convention-a fact not generally appr…
Exclamative constructions
Verbing and Linguistic Innovation
Denominal verbs are produced by a syntactic category shift, conversion , in which the word’s inflectional and combinatory potential change while its internal composition does not ( Valera, 2015 : 322). Perhaps no language owes as many of its verbs to the conversion strategy as English ( Koutsoukos, 2021 ), the majority being denominal (noun-derived) verbs, e.g., Widespread seedless cultivars typically fruit twice yearly in the Caribbean . Denomin…
By now
We examine the constellation of factors – lexical, aspectual, temporal and conversational – that give rise to evidential implications from assertions. We target intensional and inferential meanings associated with a certain class of present-tense state sentences: those containing a temporal adverb headed by by , e.g. The American traveling public is pretty mature by now . We ask why present-tense sentences containing by temporal adverbs (BTAs) ar…
Lessons from the English auxiliary system
The English auxiliary system exhibits many lexical exceptions and subregularities, and considerable dialectal variation, all of which are frequently omitted from generative analyses and discussions. This paper presents a detailed, movement-free account of the English Auxiliary System within Sign-Based Construction Grammar (Sag 2010, Michaelis 2011, Boas & Sag 2012) that utilizes techniques of lexicalist and construction-based analysis. The result…
Match, mismatch, and envisioning transfer events
Prior studies suggest that language users perform motoric simulations when construing action sentences and that verbs and constructions each contribute to simulation-based representation ( Glenberg & Kaschak 2002 ; Richardson et al. 2003 ; Bergen et al. 2007 ; Bergen & Wheeler 2010 ). This raises the possibility that motorically grounded verb and construction meanings can interact during sentence understanding. In this experiment, we use the acti…
What is this, sarcastic syntax
This study considers sarcasm as a linguistic genre, and explores the use of constructions to capture conventions of sarcastic speech. It does so by examining the English Split Interrogative (SI), e.g., What are you, a senior? , What is this, Spain? We argue that lexical, syntactic and semantic idiosyncrasies of SI require us to recognize it as a distinct grammatical construction with two related conversational functions. In its basic, or sincere,…
Stative by construction
Fundamental to narrative is the ability to indicate what events overlapped what other events. Crucial to this ability is stativization: only stative situations can include (as opposed to being included within) reference time. But how exactly are stative type-shifts effected, and what does it mean for an event to be ‘turned into ’ a state? There are two purported paths to stativity: use of a compositional type-shifting device (1), and coercion, th…
A constructional account of genre-based argument omissions
Authors like Fillmore 1986 and Goldberg 2006 have made a strong case for regarding argument omission in English as a lexical and construction-based affordance rather than one based on general semantico-pragmatic constraints. They do not, however, address the question of how grammatical restrictions on null complementation might interact with broader narrative conventions, in particular those of genre. In this paper, we attempt to remedy this over…
What is an action-based model of interpretation
Scholars of linguistic meaning have always talked about sentences in terms of the things that they instruct their interpreters to do, find or check, and so the idea of an action-based model of interpretation is not entirely new. In denotational or ‘realist’ semantics, a sentence tells its interpreter how to determine its truth or falsity. In representational semantics, a sentence tells its interpreter to retrieve an array of semantic frames and m…
Complementation by Construction
“The thing is, is” Is No Mere Disfluency
Type shifting in construction grammar
Implicit type shifting, or coercion, appears to indicate a modular grammatical architecture, in which the process of semantic composition may add meanings absent from the syntax in order to ensure that certain operators, e.g., the progressive, receive suitable arguments (Jackendo¤ 1997; De Swart 1998). I will argue that coercion phenomena actually provide strong support for a sign-based model of grammar, in which rules of morphosyntactic combinat…
NSM and cognitive-functional models of grammar
The Natural Semantic Metalanguage (NSM) approach articulated by Uwe Durst is a componential theory of meaning, and it inherits many of the strengths of such theories. This is especially evident when we compare NSM with componential models that share its view of linguistic cognition as a reflex of the human meaning-making capacity in general. One such strength is the model's ability to account for prototype effects in categorization judgments with…
Topicalization and left-dislocation
Valence Creation and the German Applicative
We provide a unified account of semantic effects observable in attested examples of the German applicative (‘be-’) construction, e. g. Rollstuhlfahrer Poul Schacksen aus Kopenhagen will den 1997 erschienenen Wegweiser Handiguide Europa fortführen and zusammen mil Movado Berlin berollen (‘Wheelchair user Poul Schacksen from Copenhagen wants to continue the guide ‘Handiguide Europe’, which came out in 1997, and roll Berlin together with Movado. ’).…
What is the Information Structure-Syntax Interface in Basque
Proceedings of the 25th Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society (2000)
Toward a Construction-Based Theory of Language Function
Through a detailed examination of a particular sentence type, we outline a formal model in which grammatical description includes the description of use conditions on form-meaning pairs. The sentence type at issue is an exclamative construction we refer to as Nominal Extraposition (NE). This construction, exemplified by the sentence It's AMAZING the DIFFERENCE, bears a superficial resemblance to Right Dislocation (RD). However, NE must be disting…
A Case of Constructional Polysemy in Latin
In this paper, I will examine the syntactic and semantic properties of a Latin correlative construction, the so-called comparative conditional. I will investigate the extent to which this construction inherits its formal and interpretive features from constructions needed independently in the grammar. While the syntactic properties of the comparative conditional are highly motivated, the semantics of the construction is idiosyncratic: there is ev…
On Nominal Extraposition
Proceedings of the Twentieth Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society: General Session Dedicated to the Contributions of Charles J. Fillmore (1994)
The ambiguity of the English present perfect
This study examines grammatical and discourse-pragmatic reflexes of the existential and resultative readings of the English present perfect. I present both negative and positive arguments in favor of the claim that the present perfect is ambiguous (rather than vague) with respect to these readings. In particular, I argue that the resultative present-perfect represents a formal idiom: a morphosyntactic form characterized by idiosyncratic constrain…
Expectation contravention and use ambiguity
‘Continuity’ within Three Scalar Models
This study represents an elaboration and revision of König's (1977) account of the synchronic interrelations among three senses of the English adverbial still. These senses at issue are those in which still serves as a marker of a state's continuation to a temporal reference point, as a concessive particle, and as an indicator of marginal membership within a graded category. I argue here that the three semanrically and grammatically distinct sens…
Topicalization and left-dislocation
Toward a Construction-Based Theory of Language Function
Through a detailed examination of a particular sentence type, we outline a formal model in which grammatical description includes the description of use conditions on form-meaning pairs. The sentence type at issue is an exclamative construction we refer to as Nominal Extraposition (NE). This construction, exemplified by the sentence It's AMAZING the DIFFERENCE, bears a superficial resemblance to Right Dislocation (RD). However, NE must be disting…
The ambiguity of the English present perfect
This study examines grammatical and discourse-pragmatic reflexes of the existential and resultative readings of the English present perfect. I present both negative and positive arguments in favor of the claim that the present perfect is ambiguous (rather than vague) with respect to these readings. In particular, I argue that the resultative present-perfect represents a formal idiom: a morphosyntactic form characterized by idiosyncratic constrain…
Aspect and the semantics-pragmatics interface
Stative by construction
Fundamental to narrative is the ability to indicate what events overlapped what other events. Crucial to this ability is stativization: only stative situations can include (as opposed to being included within) reference time. But how exactly are stative type-shifts effected, and what does it mean for an event to be ‘turned into ’ a state? There are two purported paths to stativity: use of a compositional type-shifting device (1), and coercion, th…
Lessons from the English auxiliary system
The English auxiliary system exhibits many lexical exceptions and subregularities, and considerable dialectal variation, all of which are frequently omitted from generative analyses and discussions. This paper presents a detailed, movement-free account of the English Auxiliary System within Sign-Based Construction Grammar (Sag 2010, Michaelis 2011, Boas & Sag 2012) that utilizes techniques of lexicalist and construction-based analysis. The result…
Expectation contravention and use ambiguity
By now
We examine the constellation of factors – lexical, aspectual, temporal and conversational – that give rise to evidential implications from assertions. We target intensional and inferential meanings associated with a certain class of present-tense state sentences: those containing a temporal adverb headed by by , e.g. The American traveling public is pretty mature by now . We ask why present-tense sentences containing by temporal adverbs (BTAs) ar…
Temporal priority and pragmatic ambiguity
On deviant case-marking in Latin
The Comparative Conditional in Latin
Proceedings of the Eighteenth Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society: General Session and Parasession on The Place of Morphology in a Grammar (1992), pp. 166-179
Aspect and the semantics-pragmatics interface
‘Continuity’ within Three Scalar Models
This study represents an elaboration and revision of König's (1977) account of the synchronic interrelations among three senses of the English adverbial still. These senses at issue are those in which still serves as a marker of a state's continuation to a temporal reference point, as a concessive particle, and as an indicator of marginal membership within a graded category. I argue here that the three semanrically and grammatically distinct sens…
A Case of Constructional Polysemy in Latin
In this paper, I will examine the syntactic and semantic properties of a Latin correlative construction, the so-called comparative conditional. I will investigate the extent to which this construction inherits its formal and interpretive features from constructions needed independently in the grammar. While the syntactic properties of the comparative conditional are highly motivated, the semantics of the construction is idiosyncratic: there is ev…
On Nominal Extraposition
Proceedings of the Twentieth Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society: General Session Dedicated to the Contributions of Charles J. Fillmore (1994)
The ambiguity of the English present perfect
This study examines grammatical and discourse-pragmatic reflexes of the existential and resultative readings of the English present perfect. I present both negative and positive arguments in favor of the claim that the present perfect is ambiguous (rather than vague) with respect to these readings. In particular, I argue that the resultative present-perfect represents a formal idiom: a morphosyntactic form characterized by idiosyncratic constrain…
Expectation contravention and use ambiguity
Toward a Construction-Based Theory of Language Function
Through a detailed examination of a particular sentence type, we outline a formal model in which grammatical description includes the description of use conditions on form-meaning pairs. The sentence type at issue is an exclamative construction we refer to as Nominal Extraposition (NE). This construction, exemplified by the sentence It's AMAZING the DIFFERENCE, bears a superficial resemblance to Right Dislocation (RD). However, NE must be disting…
What is the Information Structure-Syntax Interface in Basque
Proceedings of the 25th Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society (2000)
Valence Creation and the German Applicative
We provide a unified account of semantic effects observable in attested examples of the German applicative (‘be-’) construction, e. g. Rollstuhlfahrer Poul Schacksen aus Kopenhagen will den 1997 erschienenen Wegweiser Handiguide Europa fortführen and zusammen mil Movado Berlin berollen (‘Wheelchair user Poul Schacksen from Copenhagen wants to continue the guide ‘Handiguide Europe’, which came out in 1997, and roll Berlin together with Movado. ’).…
Topicalization and left-dislocation
NSM and cognitive-functional models of grammar
The Natural Semantic Metalanguage (NSM) approach articulated by Uwe Durst is a componential theory of meaning, and it inherits many of the strengths of such theories. This is especially evident when we compare NSM with componential models that share its view of linguistic cognition as a reflex of the human meaning-making capacity in general. One such strength is the model's ability to account for prototype effects in categorization judgments with…
Type shifting in construction grammar
Implicit type shifting, or coercion, appears to indicate a modular grammatical architecture, in which the process of semantic composition may add meanings absent from the syntax in order to ensure that certain operators, e.g., the progressive, receive suitable arguments (Jackendo¤ 1997; De Swart 1998). I will argue that coercion phenomena actually provide strong support for a sign-based model of grammar, in which rules of morphosyntactic combinat…
What is an action-based model of interpretation
Scholars of linguistic meaning have always talked about sentences in terms of the things that they instruct their interpreters to do, find or check, and so the idea of an action-based model of interpretation is not entirely new. In denotational or ‘realist’ semantics, a sentence tells its interpreter how to determine its truth or falsity. In representational semantics, a sentence tells its interpreter to retrieve an array of semantic frames and m…
Complementation by Construction
“The thing is, is” Is No Mere Disfluency
A constructional account of genre-based argument omissions
Authors like Fillmore 1986 and Goldberg 2006 have made a strong case for regarding argument omission in English as a lexical and construction-based affordance rather than one based on general semantico-pragmatic constraints. They do not, however, address the question of how grammatical restrictions on null complementation might interact with broader narrative conventions, in particular those of genre. In this paper, we attempt to remedy this over…
Stative by construction
Fundamental to narrative is the ability to indicate what events overlapped what other events. Crucial to this ability is stativization: only stative situations can include (as opposed to being included within) reference time. But how exactly are stative type-shifts effected, and what does it mean for an event to be ‘turned into ’ a state? There are two purported paths to stativity: use of a compositional type-shifting device (1), and coercion, th…
What is this, sarcastic syntax
This study considers sarcasm as a linguistic genre, and explores the use of constructions to capture conventions of sarcastic speech. It does so by examining the English Split Interrogative (SI), e.g., What are you, a senior? , What is this, Spain? We argue that lexical, syntactic and semantic idiosyncrasies of SI require us to recognize it as a distinct grammatical construction with two related conversational functions. In its basic, or sincere,…
Match, mismatch, and envisioning transfer events
Prior studies suggest that language users perform motoric simulations when construing action sentences and that verbs and constructions each contribute to simulation-based representation ( Glenberg & Kaschak 2002 ; Richardson et al. 2003 ; Bergen et al. 2007 ; Bergen & Wheeler 2010 ). This raises the possibility that motorically grounded verb and construction meanings can interact during sentence understanding. In this experiment, we use the acti…
Lessons from the English auxiliary system
The English auxiliary system exhibits many lexical exceptions and subregularities, and considerable dialectal variation, all of which are frequently omitted from generative analyses and discussions. This paper presents a detailed, movement-free account of the English Auxiliary System within Sign-Based Construction Grammar (Sag 2010, Michaelis 2011, Boas & Sag 2012) that utilizes techniques of lexicalist and construction-based analysis. The result…
By now
We examine the constellation of factors – lexical, aspectual, temporal and conversational – that give rise to evidential implications from assertions. We target intensional and inferential meanings associated with a certain class of present-tense state sentences: those containing a temporal adverb headed by by , e.g. The American traveling public is pretty mature by now . We ask why present-tense sentences containing by temporal adverbs (BTAs) ar…
Exclamative constructions
Linguistics (24 obras) · Computer Science (22 obras) · Philosophy (22 obras) · Syntax, Semantics, Linguistic Variation (22 obras) · Language, Metaphor, and Cognition (15 obras) · Language, Discourse, Communication Strategies (12 obras) · Psychology (12 obras) · Grammar (6 obras) · History (6 obras) · Natural Language Processing Techniques (6 obras)