Essential Russian Grammar


Book Description

DIVLogical, developmental presentation includes all the necessary tools for speech and comprehension and features numerous shortcuts and timesavers. Ideal as an introduction, supplement, or refresher. /div




Trinitarian Intelligibility - an Analysis of Contemporary Discussions


Book Description

The concern of this thesis is with the history of ideas; specifically, the history of recent theological ideas. This thesis is not a work of systematic theology but rather situates discourse about a theological problem within the matrix of some relevant contemporary thought. Its category then is the history of the development of ideas. In the late twentieth century many academic theologians found the intelligibility of the traditional language used about the Christian Trinitarian God to be problematic. This is the thesis' research problem. The research hypothesis is that these recent academic theologians sought to make trinitarian language used about the Christian Trinitarian God intelligible by replacing static definitions of 'person' with a dynamic relational model. The methodology of this thesis is essentially historical and hermeneutical. It draws on the hermeneutical philosophy of language of Paul Ricoeur as it developed around two key notions, his notion of text and his attention to the metaphorical process. Data is drawn from representative recent trinitarian works of a significant and scholarly nature written in and for the western arena at the end of the twentieth century. These sources are evaluated according to their ability, in Ricoeur's language, to redescribe the reality of the trinitarian symbol and refigure the world of contemporary Christian consciousness. The thesis presents an investigation of western academic trinitarian theology in terms of a structure of analysis and synthesis. Via an exploration of a series of responses made by these recent trinitarian theologians to categories of thought pertaining to the concept of person and their consequent theological appropriations, this thesis demonstrates the research hypothesis. It demonstrates that in recent trinitarian thought postmodern ideas on person as relational fuse with supportive biblical and derived patristic thought as theologians seek to make intelligible language used about the Christian Trinitarian God. In particular, the ancient concept of perichoresis is found by theologians to provide the necessary point of intersection. With a redefinition of person relationally, and in particular perichoretically, the Christian God is understood in communal terms. Renewed understanding of God as communal is a chief outcome of the use of the relational perichoretic model of person by theologians as they address their concern with trinitarian intelligibility. The thesis demonstrates that when theologians redefine person in relational terms and particularly in perichoretic terms, a redescription of the trinitarian symbol and a refiguration of Christian consciousness of trinitarian reality is seen to be possible. Such a refigured consciousness constitutes an active reorganisation of Christian being-in-the-world. The implications of this reorganisation form the stuff of future trinitarian research and provide the motivation for this thesis' research.




Soviet and East European Linguistics


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No detailed description available for "Soviet and East European Linguistics".




Predicate Agreement in Russian


Book Description




Subjects in Constructions – Canonical and Non-Canonical


Book Description

This volume analyzes constructions with non-canonical subjects in individual languages and cross-linguistically, drawing on insights from cognitive and discourse-functional linguistics. Prototypical subjects have often been characterized in terms of their semantic, syntactic and discourse features, such as animacy, agentivity, topicality, referentiality, definiteness and autonomy of existence of the subject referent. A non-canonical subject is one that lacks some of these features. This may be reflected in its meaning, grammatical coding, and/or discourse function. In discussing non-canonical subjects in individual languages and cross-linguistically, the chapters in the volume address the following more general topics: What kinds of grammatical, semantic and discourse criteria can be used to distinguish subjects from non-subjects? To what extent are subject criteria construction-specific? What kinds of constructions have non-canonical subjects? What are the semantic and discourse functions of constructions with non-canonical subjects? Are subjects which are grammatically non-canonical also atypical in terms of their discourse features?




Current Issues in Bilingualism


Book Description

As populations become more mobile, so interest grows in bi- and multilingualism, particularly in the context of education. This volume focuses on the singular situation in Israel, whose complex multiculturalism has Hebrew and Arabic as official languages, English as an academic and political language, and tongues such as Russian and Amharic spoken by immigrants. Presenting research on bi- and trilingualism in Israel from a multitude of perspectives, the book focuses on four aspects of multilingualism and literacy in Israel: Arabic-Hebrew bilingual education and Arabic literacy development; second-language Hebrew literacy among immigrant children; literacy in English as a second/third language; and adult bilingualism. Chapters dissect findings on immigrant youth education, language impairment in bilinguals, and neurocognitive features of bilingual language processing. Reflecting current trends, this volume integrates linguistics, sociology, education, cognitive science, and neuroscience.




Concise Encyclopedia of Philosophy of Language and Linguistics


Book Description

The application of philosophy to language study, and language study to philosophy, has experienced demonstrable intellectual growth and diversification in recent decades. Concise Encyclopedia of Philosophy of Language and Linguistics comprehensively analyzes and evaluates many of the most interesting facets of this vibrant field. An edited collection of articles taken from the award-winning Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics, Second Edition, this volume acts as a single-stop desk reference resource for the field, comprising contributions from the foremost scholars of philosophy of linguistics in their various interdisciplinary specializations. From Plato's Cratylus to Semantic and Epistemic Holism, this fascinating work authoritatively unpacks the diverse and multi-layered concepts of meaning, expression, identity, truth, and countless other themes and subjects straddling the linguistic-philosophical meridian, in 175 articles and over 900 pages. - Authoritative review of this dynamic field placed in an interdisciplinary context - Approximately 175 articles by leaders in the field - Compact and affordable single-volume format




The Syntax of Nonsententials


Book Description

This volume brings the data that many in formal linguistics have dismissed as peripheral straight into the core of syntactic theory. By bringing together experts from syntax, semantics, pragmatics, philosophy of language, language acquisition, aphasia, and pidgin and creole studies, the volume makes a multidisciplinary case for the existence of nonsententials, which are analyzed in various chapters as root phrases and small clauses (Me; Me First!; Him worry?!; Class in session), and whose distinguishing property is the absence of Tense, and, with it, any syntactic phenomena that rely on Tense, including structural Nominative Case. Arguably, the lack of Tense specification is also responsible for the dearth of indicative interpretations among nonsententials, as well as for their heavy reliance on pragmatic context. So pervasive is nonsentential speech across all groups, including normal adult speech, that a case can be made that continuity of grammar lies in nonsentential, rather than sentential speech.




Formal Studies in Slavic Linguistics


Book Description

Formal Studies in Slavic Linguistics is a collection of selected papers presented at the Graduate Colloquia on Slavic Linguistics held at the Ohio State University, and as such presents current research of young scholars from top European and American universities. The present volume is a continuation of Issues in Slavic Syntax and Semantics (2008). Unlike its predecessor, Formal Studies in Slavic Linguistics exclusively focuses on synchronic analyses of challenging phenomena in various Slavic languages and expands its theoretical scope to include essays in virtually all areas of theoretical linguistics: phonetics, phonology, morphosyntax, syntax, semantics and pragmatics. The papers in this volume discuss consonant deletion in Russian and phonetic patterns in Russian loan words, properties of Slovenian clitics and the constructions involving the prefix na- in Slovenian, subjunctive clauses in Polish, Serbo-Croatian multiple wh questions, negative-contrastive ellipsis and impersonal constructions in Russian. The formal frameworks employed in the analyses of these phenomena range from optimality theory to minimalism. Given its broad empirical and theoretical scope, Formal Studies in Slavic Linguistics is bound to be of interest to Slavic scholars and general linguists alike.




The Diachronic Typology of Non-Canonical Subjects


Book Description

This volume is an important contribution to the diachrony of non-canonical subjects in a typological perspective. The questions addressed concern the internal mechanisms and triggers for various changes that non-canonical subjects undergo, ranging from semantic motivations to purely structural explanations. The discussion encompasses the whole life-cycle of non-canonical subjects: from their emergence out of non-subject arguments to their expansion, demise or canonicization, focusing primarily on syntactic changes and changes in case-marking. The volume offers a number of different case studies comprising such languages as Italian, Spanish, Old Norse and Russian as well as languages less studied in this context, such as Latin, Classical Armenian, Baltic languages and some East Caucasian languages. Typological generalizations in the form of recurrent developmental paths are offered on the basis of data presented in this volume and in the literature.