This project explores feature mismatches, including both grammatical and procedural units, and the interpretive processes by which such mismatches are resolved. The interesting cases are those in which the combination of clashing features leads to systematic and predictable changes, whose explanation requires a notion of composition that can account for these changes without abandoning the principle of compositionality (Asher & Pustejovsky 2006; Pustejovsky & Jezek 2008).
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In the literature, feature mismatches have been analysed between predicates and arguments, or between lexical and grammatical aspect. The novel factor in this project consists in its cross-cutting nature, examining in detail specific cases of mismatches in various other environments and categories (phonological and syntactic marks associated with sentence type or informative function; clashes in nominal, adjectival and verbal domains that affect quantification; clashes in copular verb plus adjective combinations, among others). The aim is to establish generalizations related to the reinterpretation processes, their overarching properties and the consequences that can be derived from all these elements for linguistic theory and for the grammar/semantics / pragmatics interface.
The research questions are as follows:
The proposal has a clear interdisciplinary focus. It brings together specialists in traditionally separate areas such as formal syntax, semantics, pragmatics, phonology, psycholinguistics, language learning and acquisition. In this way a synergy is sought out by establishing contact among these fields of study, as well as the variety of methodological perspectives, thus allowing for a contrast of predictions made from a theoretical point of view with empirical corpus studies, measurement of processing costs or learning challenges.
The foreseen outputs include:
In this way we hope to take advantage of the approaches pertaining to several fields so as to improve grammatical description, refine the design of linguistic theory, advance in the understanding of mental processes involved in utterance interpretation and propose several practical applications for language teaching and learning.
The research questions are as follows:
- What are the conditions that allow the combination of clashing features? With which units and at which levels do mismatches occur? How are they detected?
- What are the status and the consequences of the operations that resolve mismatches? What are the limitations that bind these processes?
- What are the implications and consequences for linguistic theory in general, and for the semantics/pragmatics interface? What do they entail regarding the management and representation of meaning in the human mind? How do they affect language acquisition and learning?
The proposal has a clear interdisciplinary focus. It brings together specialists in traditionally separate areas such as formal syntax, semantics, pragmatics, phonology, psycholinguistics, language learning and acquisition. In this way a synergy is sought out by establishing contact among these fields of study, as well as the variety of methodological perspectives, thus allowing for a contrast of predictions made from a theoretical point of view with empirical corpus studies, measurement of processing costs or learning challenges.
The foreseen outputs include:
- identifying features that bring about conflict and establishing constraints and hierarchies;
- modeling inferential processes involved in resolving semantic mismatches: properties and limits;
- identifying differences between the processing of expressions with and without mismatches;
- establishing developmental patterns for interpretive strategies and processes in L1;
- analyzing L2 difficulties for the detection of mismatches and for the deployment of the required interpretation strategies.
In this way we hope to take advantage of the approaches pertaining to several fields so as to improve grammatical description, refine the design of linguistic theory, advance in the understanding of mental processes involved in utterance interpretation and propose several practical applications for language teaching and learning.