Stephen R Anderson
Dados Biográficos
| ID | 409417 |
|---|---|
| NOME | Stephen R Anderson |
| PRENOMES | Stephen R |
| SOBRENOME | Anderson |
| ASSINATURA | ANDERSON S R |
| AFILIAÇÕES | Yale University |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-4477-1635 |
| VERIFICADO | Sim |
| TOTAL DE OBRAS | 38 |
| TOTAL DE CITAÇÕES | 161 |
| TOTAL COMO AUTOR | 38 |
| TOTAL COMO EDITOR | 0 |
| PRIMEIRO ANO DE PUBLICAÇÃO | 1972 |
| ANO MAIS RECENTE DE PUBLICAÇÃO | 2026 |
| ÍNDICE H | 7 |
On the Notion of Subject in Ergative Languages
In traditional grammar, syntactic analysis is almost exclusively based on categories revealed directly in surface structures. In particular, morphologically unified categories of constituents are often taken to be the only ones that could possibly have any importance for the description of sentence structures. If a notion like “subject of” is to have any syntactic importance, then, it must be possible to associate it with a category of the langua…
Goals in teaching the history of linguistics
While once a required part of programs in Linguistics, courses in the history of the field have largely fallen into desuetude. When such courses are offered, they tend to attempt to cover thousands of years of history or a vast range of diverse related fields in a single term. There is perhaps a place for such courses, but I argue here that a rather more limited and focused offering has a particularly important role to play in the education of fu…
Morris Swadesh (1934), ‘The phonemic principle’
The article being reprinted in this issue, Swadesh 1934a (initially a paper presented at the December 1933 annual meeting of the Linguistic Society of America), is generally considered one of the foundational works in the development of the American theory of the phoneme. Joos (1957:37) describes its significance thus: At this time the only Americans who had a fair chance to learn linguistic method were apprentices under one of the few leaders in…
The first biolinguist
In 1930s Germany, Georg Schwidetzky (1875-1952) produced several works attempting to derive modern human languages by reconstruction from the vocalizations of non-human primates. This work was suppressed by other biologists under the Third Reich, not just because both the biology and the linguistics were ridiculously bad, but because Schwidetzky's views on the origin of races were in conflict with Nazi ideology. While almost comically wrong-heade…
Romansh (Rumantsch)
After a brief outline of the principal episodes in the external history, the chapter surveys the principal aspects of a Romance language which (in a standardized form) is one of the official languages of Switzerland, surveying the phonology, morphology and syntax and of its dialects (notably Surselvan, Surmiran, and Engadinish). It covers: vowels; consonants; syllable structure and stress; the unsuually rich system of morphophonological alternati…
Words and Paradigms
A comprehensive review of linguistic accounts of the structure of words and their relation to one another would of course have to begin long ago, with the work of grammarians in the classical Sanskrit, Greek, Latin, Arabic and other traditions. As a starting point for an understanding of the views on morphology held by linguists today, though, it seems reasonable to focus on the development of this field over the course of the twentieth century, …
Synchronic Versus Diachronic Explanation and the Nature of the Language Faculty
The nineteenth-century conception that linguistic structure was to be explained by recourse to the histories of languages was largely abandoned with the rise of synchronic theories in the twentieth century, but has recently returned to prominence. Whereas traditional generative theories of language have tended to attribute crosslinguistic regularities to constraints imposed on the class of possible grammars by the human Language Faculty, some sch…
The Morpheme
This chapter considers the nature and history of the notion of the morpheme in linguistic analysis, and the suitability of that concept to linguistic analysis. The historical origins of the term are traced, especially as it was used in American Structuralist work, and a range of problems with the literal application of the traditional concept to actual languages sketched. The role played by a notion of morpheme in a range of recent theories is th…
Topicalization in Breton
Proceedings of the Seventh Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society (1981), pp. 27-39
Stem alternations in Swiss Rumantsch
This chapter continues the defence of the analysis of stem alternations in Swiss Rumantsch, especially in the Surmiran of Savognin and environs, as an instance of suppletion conditioned phonologically (by predictable stress) rather than morphomically. The Surmiran evidence for this account is reviewed and formulated explicitly. Evidence from parallel alternations outside the verbal system is adduced, and arguments apparently favouring the morphom…
Failing One’s Obligations
This chapter examines the Surmiran dialect which is a form of Swiss Rumantsch. Surmiran is a Romance language which is one of the spoken languages in the canton of Graubünden in Switzerland. The emphasis of this chapter is on a single verb which lacks many of the forms other verbs possess, hence forcing the speakers to use a distinct, but almost synonymous verb as an alternative. Treated within a broader context, the verb dueir in Sumiran which i…
Letters to Language
Letters to Language Geoffrey K. Pullum and Stephen R. Anderson Language accepts letters from readers that briefly and succinctly respond to or comment upon either material published previously in the journal or issues deemed of importance to the field. The editor reserves the right to edit letters as needed. Brief replies from relevant parties are included as warranted. Response to Anderson February 16, 2009 To the Editor: In the article derived …
The Logical Structure of Linguistic Theory
The object of inquiry in linguistics is the human ability to acquire and use a natural language, and the goal of linguistic theory is an explicit characterization of that ability. Looking at the communicative abilities of other species, it becomes clear that our linguistic ability is specific to our species, undoubtedly a product of our biology. But how do we go about determining the specifics of this Language faculty? There are two primary ways …
Verb Second, Subject Clitics, and Impersonals in Surmiran (Rumantsch)
Biology and language
In a recent review article in this journal, Everett (2005) finds our book Anderson & Lightfoot (2002) (as well as Givón 2002) seriously lacking and unpersuasive in the case it attempts to make for the importance of an understanding of the human language faculty as an aspect of our species' biology. Negative reviews are of course a feature of academic life, but Everett's piece exhibits enough misconceptions and misrepresentations, both of our work…
Aspects of the Theory of Clitics
1. Introduction 2. What is a Clitic? 3. The Phonology of Cliticization 4. Special Clitics and Their Grammar 5. Theories of Special Clitics 6. An Optimal Theory of Clitic Positioning 7. Verb Second as Alignment 8. Pronominal Clitics 9. Clause Structure and the Grammar of Incorporation
How to put your clitics in their place, or why the best account of second-position phenomena may be something like the optimal one
Article How to put your clitics in their place, or why the best account of second-position phenomena may be something like the optimal one was published on January 1, 1996 in the journal The Linguistic Review (volume 13, issue 3-4)
Wackernagel's Revenge
Jakob Wackernagel is well known for the observation that clitic elements generally appeared in second position in their clause in early Indo-European languages. It is less well known that he also proposed this as the basis of the ‘Verb Second’ phenomenon. Finite Verbs in main clauses were apparently accentless in Indo-European, and he suggested that they were therefore treated as clitics and located in second position. This paper examines the pos…
A-Morphous Morphology
In A-Morphous Morphology, Stephen Anderson presents a theory of word structure which relates to a full generative grammar of language. He holds word structure to be the result of interacting principles from a number of grammatical areas, and thus not localized in a single morphological component. Dispensing with classical morphemes, the theory instead treats morphology as a matter of rule-governed relations, minimizing the non-phonological intern…
The Grammar of Icelandic Verbs in -st
Rules and Representations in Morphology
Proceedings of the Sixteenth Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society (1990), pp. 17-29
The Sounds of French
The Computer and the Mind
Cognitive science brings together psychology, computing, linguistics, anthropology, artificial intelligence, neurophysiology and philosophy. This book addresses the central questions of cognitive science: how does the mind work, and what is it that enables us to have thoughts, or feelings? The book shows that the mind depends on a brain in th same way that the execution of a programme depends on a computer. It describes its origins, and outlines …
Morphology as a parsing problem
Disjunctive ordering in inflectional morphology
The Logical Structure of Linguistic Theory
The object of inquiry in linguistics is the human ability to acquire and use a natural language, and the goal of linguistic theory is an explicit characterization of that ability. Looking at the communicative abilities of other species, it becomes clear that our linguistic ability is specific to our species, undoubtedly a product of our biology. But how do we go about determining the specifics of this Language faculty? There are two primary ways …
Wackernagel's Revenge
Jakob Wackernagel is well known for the observation that clitic elements generally appeared in second position in their clause in early Indo-European languages. It is less well known that he also proposed this as the basis of the ‘Verb Second’ phenomenon. Finite Verbs in main clauses were apparently accentless in Indo-European, and he suggested that they were therefore treated as clitics and located in second position. This paper examines the pos…
Nasal Consonants and the Internal Structure of Segments
Phonetic theory has generally been based on the assumption that speech can be divided into discrete segments, each phonetically homogeneous with respect to all linguistically significant parameters. Among the nasal consonants, however, are segments which must have internal sequential structure. Primary nasal consonants are first discussed here, and it is concluded that these should be described as non-continuants. Various possible characterizatio…
On representations in morphology case, agreement and inversion in Georgian
Disjunctive ordering in inflectional morphology
The Analysis of French Shwa
A number of classical problems in the phonology of French are considered, especially as they relate to the vowel ‘shwa’ (e-muet). From the rule of Closed Syllable Adjustment (which relates shwa and [ε]), it is concluded that French phonology must be described in terms of representations making explicit provision for syllabic, as well as segmental, structure. The formal representation of syllable structure is discussed, and a concrete proposal is …
On the interaction of phonological rules of various types
Discussions of linguistic structure generally accept a distinction between rules of sentence structure and rules of sound structure, but there is very little agreement on further subcategorization beyond this general dichotomy. Indeed, recent discussion in the area of syntax and semantics has been dominated, at least superficially, by the question of whether it is possible and/or desirable to distinguish within the rules of sentence structure bet…
Compensatory Lengthening
The class of phonetic changes in which the loss of a consonant is accompanied by the development of distinctive length in a nearby vowel has traditionally been designated by the term ‘compensatory lengthening’. We first discard cases in which the development of length and the loss of a consonant are in fact independent phenomena, and then analyse remaining examples. It is argued that such changes always involve loss of a consonant immediately adj…
The Morpheme
This chapter considers the nature and history of the notion of the morpheme in linguistic analysis, and the suitability of that concept to linguistic analysis. The historical origins of the term are traced, especially as it was used in American Structuralist work, and a range of problems with the literal application of the traditional concept to actual languages sketched. The role played by a notion of morpheme in a range of recent theories is th…
How to Get even
Various proposals for treating the word even in a transformational grammar of English are reviewed. It is shown that the word cannot be derived from a structure in which it is directly associated with that portion of the sentence which constitutes its semantic scope. An alternative account based on principles of interpretation of derived structure is sketched and motivated. The semantic content of the word is suggested as the source of limitation…
Synchronic Versus Diachronic Explanation and the Nature of the Language Faculty
The nineteenth-century conception that linguistic structure was to be explained by recourse to the histories of languages was largely abandoned with the rise of synchronic theories in the twentieth century, but has recently returned to prominence. Whereas traditional generative theories of language have tended to attribute crosslinguistic regularities to constraints imposed on the class of possible grammars by the human Language Faculty, some sch…
On the description of multiply-articulated consonants
Morris Swadesh (1934), ‘The phonemic principle’
The article being reprinted in this issue, Swadesh 1934a (initially a paper presented at the December 1933 annual meeting of the Linguistic Society of America), is generally considered one of the foundational works in the development of the American theory of the phoneme. Joos (1957:37) describes its significance thus: At this time the only Americans who had a fair chance to learn linguistic method were apprentices under one of the few leaders in…
Words and Paradigms
A comprehensive review of linguistic accounts of the structure of words and their relation to one another would of course have to begin long ago, with the work of grammarians in the classical Sanskrit, Greek, Latin, Arabic and other traditions. As a starting point for an understanding of the views on morphology held by linguists today, though, it seems reasonable to focus on the development of this field over the course of the twentieth century, …
Biology and language
In a recent review article in this journal, Everett (2005) finds our book Anderson & Lightfoot (2002) (as well as Givón 2002) seriously lacking and unpersuasive in the case it attempts to make for the importance of an understanding of the human language faculty as an aspect of our species' biology. Negative reviews are of course a feature of academic life, but Everett's piece exhibits enough misconceptions and misrepresentations, both of our work…
Notes on the Development of Phonological Theory
An analogy is drawn between the recent history of (generative) phonology and the history of the philosophy of mathematics. It is suggested that the formal project of Chomsky and Halle's Sound Pattern of English is closely parallel to the axiomatization of mathematics proposed by Whitehead and Russell. In these terms, the development of such restrictive theories as that of Natural Generative Phonology — and in general, the work characterized in Ba…
How to Get even
Various proposals for treating the word even in a transformational grammar of English are reviewed. It is shown that the word cannot be derived from a structure in which it is directly associated with that portion of the sentence which constitutes its semantic scope. An alternative account based on principles of interpretation of derived structure is sketched and motivated. The semantic content of the word is suggested as the source of limitation…
On keeping exchange rules in Czech
On the interaction of phonological rules of various types
Discussions of linguistic structure generally accept a distinction between rules of sentence structure and rules of sound structure, but there is very little agreement on further subcategorization beyond this general dichotomy. Indeed, recent discussion in the area of syntax and semantics has been dominated, at least superficially, by the question of whether it is possible and/or desirable to distinguish within the rules of sentence structure bet…
Nasal Consonants and the Internal Structure of Segments
Phonetic theory has generally been based on the assumption that speech can be divided into discrete segments, each phonetically homogeneous with respect to all linguistically significant parameters. Among the nasal consonants, however, are segments which must have internal sequential structure. Primary nasal consonants are first discussed here, and it is concluded that these should be described as non-continuants. Various possible characterizatio…
On the description of multiply-articulated consonants
Dictionary of Puget Salish
Systeme phonologique et phenomenes phonetiques dans le parler besney de Zennun Koyu
The Welsh Language
A Practical Writing System and Short Dictionary of Kwakw'ala (Kwakiutl)
Compensatory Lengthening
The class of phonetic changes in which the loss of a consonant is accompanied by the development of distinctive length in a nearby vowel has traditionally been designated by the term ‘compensatory lengthening’. We first discard cases in which the development of length and the loss of a consonant are in fact independent phenomena, and then analyse remaining examples. It is argued that such changes always involve loss of a consonant immediately adj…
Notes on the Development of Phonological Theory
An analogy is drawn between the recent history of (generative) phonology and the history of the philosophy of mathematics. It is suggested that the formal project of Chomsky and Halle's Sound Pattern of English is closely parallel to the axiomatization of mathematics proposed by Whitehead and Russell. In these terms, the development of such restrictive theories as that of Natural Generative Phonology — and in general, the work characterized in Ba…
The Analysis of French Shwa
A number of classical problems in the phonology of French are considered, especially as they relate to the vowel ‘shwa’ (e-muet). From the rule of Closed Syllable Adjustment (which relates shwa and [ε]), it is concluded that French phonology must be described in terms of representations making explicit provision for syllabic, as well as segmental, structure. The formal representation of syllable structure is discussed, and a concrete proposal is …
On representations in morphology case, agreement and inversion in Georgian
Disjunctive ordering in inflectional morphology
Morphology as a parsing problem
The Sounds of French
The Computer and the Mind
Cognitive science brings together psychology, computing, linguistics, anthropology, artificial intelligence, neurophysiology and philosophy. This book addresses the central questions of cognitive science: how does the mind work, and what is it that enables us to have thoughts, or feelings? The book shows that the mind depends on a brain in th same way that the execution of a programme depends on a computer. It describes its origins, and outlines …
The Grammar of Icelandic Verbs in -st
Rules and Representations in Morphology
Proceedings of the Sixteenth Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society (1990), pp. 17-29
A-Morphous Morphology
In A-Morphous Morphology, Stephen Anderson presents a theory of word structure which relates to a full generative grammar of language. He holds word structure to be the result of interacting principles from a number of grammatical areas, and thus not localized in a single morphological component. Dispensing with classical morphemes, the theory instead treats morphology as a matter of rule-governed relations, minimizing the non-phonological intern…
Wackernagel's Revenge
Jakob Wackernagel is well known for the observation that clitic elements generally appeared in second position in their clause in early Indo-European languages. It is less well known that he also proposed this as the basis of the ‘Verb Second’ phenomenon. Finite Verbs in main clauses were apparently accentless in Indo-European, and he suggested that they were therefore treated as clitics and located in second position. This paper examines the pos…
How to put your clitics in their place, or why the best account of second-position phenomena may be something like the optimal one
Article How to put your clitics in their place, or why the best account of second-position phenomena may be something like the optimal one was published on January 1, 1996 in the journal The Linguistic Review (volume 13, issue 3-4)
Aspects of the Theory of Clitics
1. Introduction 2. What is a Clitic? 3. The Phonology of Cliticization 4. Special Clitics and Their Grammar 5. Theories of Special Clitics 6. An Optimal Theory of Clitic Positioning 7. Verb Second as Alignment 8. Pronominal Clitics 9. Clause Structure and the Grammar of Incorporation
Verb Second, Subject Clitics, and Impersonals in Surmiran (Rumantsch)
Biology and language
In a recent review article in this journal, Everett (2005) finds our book Anderson & Lightfoot (2002) (as well as Givón 2002) seriously lacking and unpersuasive in the case it attempts to make for the importance of an understanding of the human language faculty as an aspect of our species' biology. Negative reviews are of course a feature of academic life, but Everett's piece exhibits enough misconceptions and misrepresentations, both of our work…
Philosophy (29 obras) · Linguistics (28 obras) · Computer Science (16 obras) · Syntax, Semantics, Linguistic Variation (13 obras) · Historical Linguistics and Language Studies (11 obras) · Linguistic Variation and Morphology (10 obras) · Epistemology (9 obras) · History (9 obras) · Phonetics and Phonology Research (9 obras) · Psychology (9 obras)