Volume 10, Issue 1-2 -

This paper investigates the use of the German am -superlative in colloquial utterances such as am besten, du gehst jetzt . In a first approximation, this construction can be described as elliptically used am -superlative occurring on the left sentence periphery within an Operator-Skopus-Struktur (Barden/Elstermann/Fiehler 2001). As will be shown in the empirical core part of the study, a qualitative-quantitative analysis, the pattern appears to be characterized by different overlapping and interplaying tendencies in language use (e.g. the selection and frequency of pronouns and sentence mood). The data used for the qualitative-quantitative analysis is taken mainly from a large-scale web corpus (deTenTen13).

The present study employs a bibliometric analysis to examine the research trends in the field of evaluation , appraisal and stance . The bibliometric information of publications between 2000 and 2015 was retrieved from the Web of Science SSCI Core Collection database. The indicators analyzed include the number of publications by year, most frequently explored topics, most cited works, major individual contributors, publication venues, distribution among countries/regions and institutions. Our findings showed that the annual publications increased dramatically, revealing an upward trend in this research field. The results concerning the most frequently addressed topics suggested that EAP has been a fruitful domain in terms of the evaluative dimension of discourse. Besides, future research will feature more discipline-specific and language-specific empirical studies and comparative cross-linguistic studies. Pedagogical applications of evaluation research also need to be explored. Citation results indicated that the groundbreaking monographs in this field generate the highest citation counts, and that the most cited works cover a variety of sub-fields of linguistics, which may further prove the heterogeneous nature of the evaluative dimension of language.

This article investigates the possibility to form determiner complexes in English nominal groups and the potential of leftward transfer of functional elements in nominal groups. The research finds that it is not possible to form hypotactic determiner complexes; rather there are hypotactic numeral complexes, hypotactic Epithet adjective complexes, hypotactic Classifier noun complexes and hypotactic Thing noun complexes, and the words for all the slots have the potential to form paratactic complexes. The corpus-based research confirms the potential of leftward transfer in nominal groups. Thereby, four types of shifts were identified: the shift from the Thing noun to the Classifier noun or adjective is a process of metaphorization from the group rank to the word rank; (2) the shift from the Classifier adjective to the Epithet 2 adjective is a process of subjectification from the distinctive to the nondistinctive features of the Thing noun within the domain of ideational metafunction; (3) the shift from the Epithet 2 adjective to the Epithet 1 adjective is a process of subjectification from the domain of ideational metafunction to that of interpersonal metafunction; (4) the shift from the Epithet 1 adjective to the post-Deictic adjective is a process of grammaticalization from the open-set attitude adjectives to the closed-set attitude adjectives.

Clancy (1989. Form and function in the acquisition of Korean wh-questions. Journal of Child Language , 16(2), 323–47) claims that the developmental order of wh -questions in first language acquisition follows the order: what = where<who<how=why<when. Forner (1979. The mother as LAD: interaction between order and frequency of parental input and child production. In A. Hastings & F. R. Eckman (Eds.), Studies in first and second language acquisition (pp. 17–44). New York, NY: Newbury House Publishers) further argues that a mother’s order of introducing wh -questions might be influenced by her assumption of a child’s cognitive development. Similarly, the target age for picture books might also reflect an adult’s assumption of the child’s cognitive development. Accordingly, this study investigates a Japanese picture book corpus to determine whether the order of appearance for wh -words mirrors that of Clancy’s developmental order. As a result, the appearance of Japanese wh -words in the picture books were similar to Clancy’s (1989. Form and function in the acquisition of Korean wh-questions. Journal of Child Language , 16(2), 323–47) order except for the question dou ‘how’. Because dou and the English ‘how’ have different ranges of meaning, the data were reanalyzed which resulted in an order more similar to Clancy’s. These results suggest that the target age of picture books reflect the adult’s assumption of a child’s cognitive development. Picture books might also influence a caregivers’ order of introducing wh -words. In conclusion, this study implies external social factor such as picture books, together with other factors, might influence the children’s wh -developmental order.

Dative alternation is that sort of construction which requires a choice from two available choices; the double object (DOC) (i. e. Please give Mary the book) and the preposition construction (TOC) (i. e. Please give the book to Mary). Empirical evidence detailing the characteristics and motivations of dative choices in different varieties have been put forward in the literature. Albeit, nothing is known about the nature and motivations of this phenomenon in Nigerian variety of English, an important source of empirical evidence in the English-world-wide paradigm. With 739 sentences extracted from International Corpus of English, we examined the effects of 16 predictors on this construction in the Nigerian variety; showing how the behavior of these predictors compares with findings reported in other varieties. Among other findings, we found that overall Nigerian variety is closer to American variety than Indian variety, and pronominality as the strongest predictor, outweighing register as a reputable predictor.

Zusammenfassung In der deutschen Sprachreflexion des Barock und der Aufklärung wird der Terminus barbarisch zur Charakterisierung von einzelnen Sprachen und sprachlichen Erscheinungen in Geschichte und Gegenwart verwendet; der Wortgebrauch kombiniert dabei sowohl sachbezogene als auch bewertende Gesichtspunkte.

Zusammenfassung In dem Heidelberger Forschungsprojekt zur deutschen Sprachreflexion des Barock und der Aufklärung wurden einige Bemerkungen zu den Sprachen der Neuen Welt gefunden; diese werden hier gezeigt und kurz erläutert.