522 Syllabus

Wednesdays, 2:30-4:45, Douglass 206

Spring, 2000

Who: Dr. Heidi Harley (http://w3.arizona.edu/~ling/hh)

Office: Douglass 208

Email: hharley@u.arizona.edu

Phone: 626-3554

Course Location: Social Sciences 308

Office Hours: Monday, 2-3 pm, or by appointment

Course Home Page (you're here!): http://w3.arizona.edu/~ling/hh/522

LinguistList bibliography of lexical semantics references

Location of Reserves: http://www.u.arizona.edu/ic/polis/spring00/Course-Homesite.cgi?LING_522

 

Click on the appropriate date below to get to the lecture notes for that date.

All theories of grammar incorporate some type of lexicon: the most basic step in characterizing the sound-meaning pairing that constitutes language is to identify phonological strings with concepts. The structure of the lexicon and the type of operations that are included in it can vary widely from theory to theory. The relationship of the lexicon to the rest of the grammar is a central topic for any linguistic model, and we will look at the question from several angles: morphological, syntactic, psychological, semantic and cross-linguistic.

Course Requirements:

Graduate Students:

30 %: assignments

20 %: short paper (4-8 pages) Due: March 22nd, 1st class after spring break

10 %: class participation

10 %: presentation

30%: long paper (10-15 pages) Due: May 10th, first Wed. after last class

Undergraduates:

50 %: assignments

40 %: short paper (5-10 pages) Due: May 10th, first Wed. after last class

10 %: class participation

N.B. Both graduates and undergraduates may and are encouraged to turn in drafts of papers early, for comments and suggestions; the grade will be based on the final draft, which is due on the dates above.

Reading availability:

Readings will be placed in the shelves outside my office (Douglass 208, to the left) for photocopying; when you borrow them to copy, please (a) sign them out with the sign-out sheet and (b) return them as quickly as possible. They will also be available on line through the electronic reserve service of the library; when I get it arranged, I'll give you a password, and you will be able to log in to the web site and print out the paper, which the library will have scanned in. More on this next week.)

Approximate Schedule of Topics:

 

Basics: (Anti-)lexicalism, linking, semantic encoding

 

Jan. 12 Intro

 

Jan 19

Jackendoff: Semantics and Cognition. Lexical Semantics and Syntactic Structure. in Lappin, ed., The Handbook of Contemporary Semantic Theory, Blackwell, London. (carry over)

 

Levin, B. (1993) ``Introduction: The Theoretical Perspective'', in B. Levin, English Verb Classes and Alternations: A Preliminary Investigation, University of Chicago Press, Chicago, IL, 1-19.

 

Jan 26

Pustejovsky, J. (1995) Chapter 2 of ``The Generative Lexicon'' MIT Press

Marantz, Alec. 1997 "No escape from syntax: don't try morphological analysis in the privacy of your own lexicon.

Marantz, Alec. 1999. Lecture notes from morphology class

(Harley, H and R. Noyer, "Distributed Morphology," GLOT 4)

Jackendoff, Ray 1992. Chapter 1 of "Semantic Structures": Overview of conceptual semantics

 

Handed out: Assignment #1

Conceptual Structure: atomism vs. decomposition, semantic vs. syntactic bootstrappingg

 

Feb 2

Fodor, J.A., 1998. Chapter 3 of Concepts: Where Cognitive Science Went Wrong. Oxford: Clarendon Press

L Gleitman, `The Structural Source of Verb Meanings', Language Acquisition, Vol. 1(1), pp. 3-55, 1990

Gropen, Jess, Steven Pinker, Michelle Hollander and Richard Goldberg, 1993, Affectedness and Direct Objects

 

Argument Structure, Linking

 

Feb 9

Dowty, D.R. (1991) ``Thematic Proto-Roles and Argument Selection'', Language 67, 547-619.

Hale, Ken and Samuel Jay Kesyer The basic elements of argument structure

Hale, Ken and Samuel Jay Keyser On Argument Structure and the Lexical Expression of Syntactic Relations

Carter, Richard. On Linking

Handed out: Assignment #2

Feb 16

 

Bierwisch, Manfred, and Robert Schreuder. 1992. "From concepts to lexical items." Cognition 42, 23-60

Kiparsky, Paul. 1997. Remarks on Denominal Verbs. In Alex Alsina, JoanBresnan & Peter Sells (eds.) Complex Predicates, 473-499. Stanford: CSLIPublications.

Harley, Heidi. 1999. "Denominal verbs and aktionsart".

Feb 23

 

Fodor, J.A. and Ernie Lepore, also Hale, Ken and Samuel Jay Keyser "Impossible Words?" and Response

Event structure

 

Dowty, David R. 1979. Word Meaning and Montague Grammar. Reidel, Dordrecht. Chapter 2: The Semantics of Aspectual Classes of Verbs in English. 37-132.

 

Jackendoff, R. 1991 'Parts and Boundaries' Cognition 41 (same as Levin&Pinker edited volume, cited above)

 

Levin, B. and M. Rappaport Hovav (1991) ``Wiping the Slate Clean: A Lexical Semantic Exploration'', Cognition 41, 123-151. (same as Levin&Pinker edited volume, cited above)

 

Mar. 1 Dr. Harley gone. Guest lecture?

 

Mar. 8 Dr. Harley gone. Guest lecture?

 

Mar 15 Break

 

Causation, external arguments

 

Mar 22

 

Wunderlich, Dieter. 1997. Cause and the Structure of Verbs. LinguisticInquiry 28.1: 27-68

Kratzer, Angelika. 1996. Severing the External Argument from its Verb.In Johan Roorijck & Laurie Zaring (eds.), Phrase-Structure and the Lexicon, 109-137. Dordrecht: Kluwer.

 

Mar 29

 

Fodor, J.A. 1971 .Why "kill" doesn't mean "cause to die"

(cf. Jackendoff's discussion of decomposition)

Pesetsky, David 1995. Chapter 2 of "Zero Syntax": Linking Problems with Experiencer Predicates

Harley, H. Possession and the double object construction, ms.

 

April 5 GUEST LECTURE: Montse Sainz on Spanish telicity

 

 

Naming, Lexicalizaiton patterns

 

April 12 GUEST LECTURE: Massimo P-P on Fodorian atomism

 

April 19

Talmy, L., 1985. Lexicalization patterns: semantic structure in lexical forms. In T. Shopen (ed.), Language Typology and Syntactic Description, Vol.3: Grammatical Categories and the Lexicon, 57-149. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Bloom, Paul. 1994. Possible names: The role of syntax-semantics mappings in the acquisition of nominals. Lingua 92:297-329. (acquisition)

 

Presentations

 

April 26

 

May 3

 

Wierzbicka, A. 1988. What's in a Noun? Chapter 9 of The Semantics of Grammar. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

 

 

Harley, Heidi Chapter 3 Section 2 of "Subjects, Events and Licensing"