10.1547, Qs: Sentence processing, Against uniformitarianism

[LINGUIST Network]

LINGUIST List:  Vol-10-1547. Mon Oct 18 1999. ISSN: 1068-4875.

Subject: 10.1547, Qs: Sentence processing, Against uniformitarianism

Moderators: Anthony Rodrigues Aristar: Wayne State U.<aristar at linguistlist.org>
            Helen Dry: Eastern Michigan U. <hdry at linguistlist.org>
            Andrew Carnie: U. of Arizona <carnie at linguistlist.org>

Reviews: Andrew Carnie: U. of Arizona <carnie at linguistlist.org>

Associate Editors:  Martin Jacobsen <marty at linguistlist.org>
                    Ljuba Veselinova <ljuba at linguistlist.org>
		    Scott Fults <scott at linguistlist.org>
		    Jody Huellmantel <jody at linguistlist.org>
		    Karen Milligan <karen at linguistlist.org>

Assistant Editors:  Lydia Grebenyova <lydia at linguistlist.org>
		    Naomi Ogasawara <naomi at linguistlist.org>
		    James Yuells <james at linguistlist.org>

Software development: John H. Remmers <remmers at emunix.emich.edu>
                      Chris Brown <chris at linguistlist.org>
                      Qian Liao <qian at linguistlist.org>

Home Page:  http://linguistlist.org/


Editor for this issue: Jody Huellmantel <jody at linguistlist.org>
 ==========================================================================

We'd like to remind readers that the responses to queries are usually
best posted to the individual asking the question. That individual is
then  strongly encouraged to post a summary to the list.   This policy was
instituted to help control the huge volume of mail on LINGUIST; so we
would appreciate your cooperating with it whenever it seems appropriate.

=================================Directory=================================

1)
Date:  Sun, 17 Oct 1999 16:04:30 -0400
From:  Kentaro Nakatani <knakatan at fas.harvard.edu>
Subject:  Previous studies in sentence processing

2)
Date:  Sun, 17 Oct 1999 16:47:19 -0700 (PDT)
From:  Frederick Newmeyer <fjn at u.washington.edu>
Subject:  Against uniformitarianism

-------------------------------- Message 1 -------------------------------

Date:  Sun, 17 Oct 1999 16:04:30 -0400
From:  Kentaro Nakatani <knakatan at fas.harvard.edu>
Subject:  Previous studies in sentence processing

Dear colleagues,

I am a grad student in linguistics.  Recently I'm interested in
the relationship between morphological complexity of predicates
and complexity of sentence processing, in Japanese and English.

If anybody could give me suggestions on where I could find
previous studies on this matter, I would appreciate it very much.

Specifically, I would like to find literature on:

(1)  the relationship between sentence processing and English
     verbal morphology/incorporation;
(2)  the relationship between sentence processing and Japanese
     verbal morphology/incorporation.
(3)  syntactic complexity of Japanese predicates including
     "-temiru", "-tekuru", "-teiku", "-teiru", "-tearu", etc.

Thank you in advance.

Sincerely,
Ken Nakatani
knakatan at fas.harvard.edu


-------------------------------- Message 2 -------------------------------

Date:  Sun, 17 Oct 1999 16:47:19 -0700 (PDT)
From:  Frederick Newmeyer <fjn at u.washington.edu>
Subject:  Against uniformitarianism


I am interested in knowing about serious linguistically-informed
proposals that argue against 'uniformitarian' assumptions in
linguistics. I intend for that term to be interpreted in a fairly
broad sense, so I am interested in people calling my attention to
proposals that:

1. argue that the typological distribution of grammatical elements has
changed over time.

or

2. argue that 'purely' grammatical features correlate non-accidentally
with aspects of culture, climate, and so on.

Here are a few examples that I am aware of:

1. Perkins (1992) argues that less complex cultures tend to have more
complex deixis systems.
2. A variety of scholars for a variety of reasons argue that there has
been a general mostly unidirectional 'drift' from OV order to VO order
(Vennemann 1973; Bichakjian 1991; Givón 1979; Newmeyer in press).
3.  Hombert and Marsico (1996) argue that complex vowel systems are fairly
recent historical developments.
4. Nettle (1999) suggests that typologically rare features are
concentrated in languages with small numbers of speakers.

I would appreciate hearing about more proposals of this sort. I'll
summarize.

Thanks,
Fritz Newmeyer
fjn at u.washington.edu

REFERENCES
Bichakjian, Bernard H. (1991). Evolutionary patterns in linguistics.
Studies in language origins II,  ed. by  Walburga von Raffler-Engel and
Jan Wind. Amsterdam: John Benjamins, pp. 187-224.
Givón, Talmy (1979). On understanding grammar. New York: Academic Press.
Hombert, Jean-Marie and Egidio Marsico (1996). Do vowel systems increase
in complexity? Evolution of Human Language Conference, Edinburgh.
Nettle, Daniel (1999). Linguistic diversity. Oxford: Oxford University
Press.
Newmeyer, Frederick J. (in press). On reconstructing 'proto-world' word
order. The emergence of language,  ed. by  Chris Knight, James Hurford,
and Michael Studdert-Kennedy, .
Perkins, Revere D. (1992). Deixis, grammar, and culture. Typological
Studies in Language 24. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Vennemann, Theo (1973). Explanation in syntax. Syntax and semantics, vol.
2 ed. by  John Kimball. New York: Seminar Press, pp. 1-50.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------
LINGUIST List: Vol-10-1547