Linguistics Commons^™

Xnl-Soar, Incremental Parsing, And The Minimalist Program, Deryle W. Lonsdale, Lareina Hingson, Jamison Cooper-Leavitt, David W. Casbeer, Rebecca Madsen

Faculty Publications

Minimalist Principles (Chomsky 1995)

Hierarchy of Projections (Adger 2003)

Features play a central role

NP, VP symmetry including shells

Thinking For Speaking About Motion: L1 And L2 Speech And Gesture, Gale Stam

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Interactional Competence And The Use Of Modal Expressions In Decision-Making Activities: Ca For Understanding Microgenesis Of Pragmatic Competence, Midori Ishida

Faculty Publications

Interlanguage pragmatics (Kasper & Blum-Kulka, 1993) is a research area that is concerned with what second language (L2) learners do with the target language, and how their competence in using the language develops over time. However, until 1996 when Kasper and Schmidt put out agendas for more developmentally oriented investigations, research on interlanguage pragmatics had been predominated by studies focusing on the former, L2 use at a point in time. This research area has matured more by now in the area of developmental interlanguage pragmatics, as reviewed in Kasper and Rose (2002). Along with an increased attention to longitudinal development …

Future Foreign Language Teachers' Social And Cognitive Collaboration In An Online Environment, Nike Arnold, Lara Ducate

Faculty Publications

Discussion boards provide an interactive venue where new and future language teachers can reflect, evaluate, solve problems or simply exchange ideas (e.g., Bonk, Hansen, Grabner-Hagen, Lazar, & Mirabelli, 1996; DeWert, Babinski, & Jones, 2003; Kumari, 2001; Pawan, Paulus, Yalcin, & Chang, 2003). In addition, encouraging future teachers to learn with technology before teaching with it allows them to become comfortable using various computer applications.

This article examines transcripts from a semester-long asynchronous discussion between foreign language methodology classes at two different universities. Social and cognitive presence in the discussions was analyzed using Garrison, Anderson, and Archer's Framework of a Community …

Learning In Minimalism-Based Language Modeling, Deryle W. Lonsdale

Faculty Publications

The natural language version of the Soar cognitive modeling system (Newell, 1990) has enabled a number of language modeling applications from on-line parsing behavior (Lewis, 1993) to simultaneous interpretation (Lonsdale, 1997, 1998) to robotic control (Benjamin, Lonsdale, & Lyons, 2004). The system supports an integrated approach to incremental comprehension and generation. Learning mechanisms account for processes in language performance from deliberate, explicit reasoning to automatic, recognitional expertise.

Syntactic processing in prior versions of the system followed the Principles and Parameters approach to syntax.

English Adjective Comparison And Analogy, Dirk Elzinga

Faculty Publications

There are two strategies for forming the comparative degree of adjectives in English; a synthetic strategy which suffixes -er to the adjective stem, and an analytical strategy which uses more in composition with the adjective. Many analyses of the choice between analytical and synthetic comparison have been proposed, but all face difficulties. In this paper I show that analogy can not only account for the distribution of analytical and synthetic comparison as well as traditional rule-based approaches, but can also provide a psychologically plausible model for the choice which speakers make.

A Computational Analysis Of Navajo Verb Stems, David Eddington, Jordan Lachler

Faculty Publications

One of the principal goals of linguistics is to find, classify, and describe relationships between words. Many formal mechanisms such as rules and constraints have been devised in order to show systematic relationships. Inflectional paradigms are a crucial component of a linguistic analysis that has applications for pedagogical grammars. For example, over the past 20 years there have been numerous Navajo textbooks produced that are aimed at beginning learners of the language. These include works such as Diné Bizaad Bóhoo'aah (Navajo Language Institute 1986), Diné Bizaad: Speak, Read, Write Navajo (Goossen 1995), and The Navajo Verb: A Grammar for Students …

Negative Prestige And Sound Change: A Sociolinguistic Study Of The Assibilation Of /Χ/ In Piauí Portuguese, David Eddington, Michael Taylor

Faculty Publications

In standard Brazilian Portuguese (BP), when the phoneme /χ/ appears post-vocalically in coda position it is realized with a variety of allophones [r, h, x, χ, ʁ, ʁ̥, ɣ] (Parkinson 1988). On the surface there appears to be free variation between the pronunciations although the variation is affected by regional and social factors (Netto 2001). Our study focuses on the Brazilian Portuguese of Piripiri (BPP), which is spoken in a small town in the rural state of Piauí in the northeast part of the country. Perhaps the most salient regional characteristic of BPP is that when /χ/ appears in coda …

Paradigm Uniformity And Analogy: The Capitalistic Versus Militaristic Debate, David Eddington

Faculty Publications

In American English, /t/ in capitalistic is generally flapped while in militaristic it is not due to the influence of capi[ɾ]al and mili[tʰ]ary. This is called Paradigm Uniformity or PU (Steriade, 2000). Riehl (2003) presents evidence to refute PU which when reanalyzed supports PU. PU is thought to work in tandem with a rule of allophonic distribution, the nature of which is debated. An approach is suggested that eliminates the need for the rule versus PU dichotomy; allophonic distribution is carried out by analogy to stored items in the mental lexicon. Therefore, the influence of the pronunciation of capital …

Automatic Creation Of Web Services From Extraction Ontologies, Deryle W. Lonsdale, Cui Tao, Yihong Ding

Faculty Publications

The Semantic Web promises to provide timely, targeted access to user-specified information online. Though standardized services exist for performing this work, specifying these services is too complex for most people. Annotating these services is also problematic. A similar situation exists for traditional information extraction, where ontologies are increasingly used to specify information used by various extraction methods. The approach we introduce in this paper involves converting such ontologies into executable Java code. These APIs act individually or compositionally as services for Semantic Web extraction.

Pronunciation Matters: English Consonant Production By Auap Students, K. James Hartshorn

Faculty Publications

Most Asia University students study English for at least six and a half years by the time they come to the United States to participate in the Asian University America Program (AUAP). For many, the AUAP experience is the realization of a dream to be able to forge new friendships and communicate successfully with Americans. However, despite their enthusiasm for learning, those participating in AUAP are not immune to the struggles experienced by most Japanese students as they endeavor to master English pronunciation (Purcell and Suter, 1980; Wells, 2000, Aoyama, K. Flege, J., Guion, S., Akahane-Yamada, R., Yamada, T., 2003). …

Modeling Russian Verbs Of Motion: An Analogical Account, Deryle W. Lonsdale, Inna Danielyan Dodge

Faculty Publications

This paper presents research into verb of motion (VOM) constructions in Russian. These constructions are difficult since they involve (i) selection of an appropriate verb (with possible prefixation); (ii) selection of an appropriate preposition; and (iii) selection of an appropriate case for marking the prepositional object. A brief sketch of relevant literature frames the problem. We then discuss how a few thousand instances of VOM usage were extracted from an online tagged corpus of Russian literature. The usage instances were then vectorized using a combination of lexical and semantic class features via automatic, semiautomatic, and hand-coded methods. The instance base …

An Operator-Based Account Of Semantic Processing, Deryle W. Lonsdale, C. Anton Rytting

Faculty Publications

This paper explores issues of psychological plausibility in modeling natural language understanding within Soar, a symbolic cognitive model. It focuses on constructing syntactic and semantic representations in simulated real time, with particular emphasis on word sense disambiguation (WSD). We discuss (i) what level of WSD should be modeled and (ii) how to use resources such as WordNet to inform these models. A preliminary model of coarse-grained WSD is included to show how syntactic, semantic, and other knowledge sources interact in Soar. Finally, we explore issues of interleaving, learning, and integrating other WSD approaches with Soar's native model of learning.

Assessing Geo-Location And Gender Information In Han Chinese Personal Names, Deryle W. Lonsdale, Bruce Brown

Faculty Publications

Brigham Young University is a particularly optimal academic institution for comparative cross-cultural onomastic research. There are over 65 nations represented by five or more students at BYU, and in fall semester of 2004, 10252 of the 29729 students had lived for two years in a foreign country.

Unifying Language Modeling Capabilities For Flexible Interaction, Deryle W. Lonsdale, Rebecca Diane Madsen

Faculty Publications

Dialogue processing has taken several different forms in recent years; in this paper we address a cognitive modeling approach to the problem. We begin by sketching some of our work in this area and how it derives from prior research in cognition, modeling, natural language processing, and discourse recipe compilation. We then note that, whereas the complexities of natural language— especially spoken language—have been primarily addressed by technologies that target lower-level linguistic processing, higherlevel processing has been less well studied. We introduce our approach, which is to use an agent-based cognitive modeling architecture for dialogue processing. We mention some of …

Toward Ontology Generation From Tables, Deryle W. Lonsdale, Yuri A. Tijerino, David W. Embley, Yihong Ding, George Nagy

Faculty Publications

At the heart of today’s information-explosion problems are issues involving semantics, mutual understanding, concept matching, and interoperability. Ontologies and the Semantic Web are offered as a potential solution, but creating ontologies for real-world knowledge is nontrivial. If we could automate the process, we could significantly improve our chances of making the Semantic Web a reality. While understanding natural language is difficult, tables and other structured information make it easier to interpret new items and relations. In this paper we introduce an approach to generating ontologies based on table analysis. We thus call our approach TANGO (Table ANalysis for Generating Ontologies). …

Progress On Nl-Soar, And Introducing Xnl-Soar, Deryle W. Lonsdale, Jamison Cooper-Leavitt, Warren C. Casbeer

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Using Computer-Mediated Communication To Establish Social And Supportive Environments In Teacher Education, Nike Arnold, Lara Ducate, Lara Lomicka, Gillian Lord

Faculty Publications

This article examines social presence in virtual asynchronous learning communities among foreign language teachers. We present the findings of two studies investigating cross-institutional asynchronous forums created to engage participants in online dialogues regarding their foreign language teacher preparation experiences in and out of the classroom. Both studies took place during Fall 2003 and were conducted between first-time teacher/graduate students in four methodology courses at three large state universities. In the first study, students participated in weekly online exchanges in the form of dialogue journals for reflective teaching. In the second study, students were provided with specific topics to address using …

Maximizing Learning During Study Abroad: Some Research-Based Programmatic Suggestions, Dan Dewey

Faculty Publications

The purpose of this paper is to provide the reader with some useful suggestions for preparing Japanese language learners for study abroad, assisting them while abroad and facilitating the transition process upon and after return. Where possible, these suggestions will be based on research conducted in Japanese. While a clearer picture of the study abroad in Japan experience is beginning to emerge with recent and on-going research efforts, much more evidence regarding the nature of study abroad is available in other settings— in particular in European-language contexts. As I make suggestions in this paper based on work in other languages, …

Preaspiration And Gemination In Central Numic, Dirk Elzinga, John E. Mclaughlin

Faculty Publications

The Numic (Uto-Aztecan) languages are well known for consonant gradation, which each language shows to some degree. Three consonantal series have been reconstructed for Proto-Numic: Geminating, Nasalizing, and Spirantizing. The Central Numic languages Timbisha, Shoshoni, and Comanche have preserved these three consonantal series and added a fourth, Aspirating. The Aspirating series is historically derived from the Geminating series, but it is synchronically distinct from it. On the basis of verb class behavior in Central Numic, we show that the Central Numic Aspirated series is a straight forward consequence of Proto-Uto-Aztecan stress patterns as reflected in pre-Proto-Central Numic.

Little Sisters: An Exploration Of Agency, Cultural Borderlands, And Institutional Constraints In The Lives Of Two Teenage Girls, Rosemary C. Henze

Faculty Publications

Part of a special issue on challenging corporate control of schools and communities. The writer discusses her experience with the Big Brothers and Big Sisters organization in Oakland, California, of mentoring two teenage girls who live in poverty and encounter crises and hardship almost daily. She examines the concepts of agency and social and cultural borderlands to help explain the divergent school performances of the two girls and investigates the concepts' utility in the pursuit of social justice for young women. She conducts her exploration within the broader context of dynamic change.

Word-Formation As Creativity Within Productivity Constraints: Sociolinguistic Evidence, Don William Chapman, Pavol Stekauer, Slávka Tomaščíková, Štefan Franko

Faculty Publications

Productivity has been one of the central topics in the field of word-formation in recent decades. Heretofore, productivity has been mainly, if not solely, discussed in formal terms, such as which affixes can be used with which stems, the productivity of rival affixes, etc. Such a formal approach leaves out the speakers’ needs for creating new words. Accounting for speakers’ word-formation needs requires a re-evaluation of the notion of creativity. In our approach to word-formation, this notion emphasizes the active role of language users, reflecting the fact that, in each act of naming, there is more or less significant space …

Analogical Modeling And Morphological Change: The Case Of The Adjectival Negative Prefix In English, Don William Chapman, Royal Skousen

Faculty Publications

This article examines the usefulness of Skousen’s Analogical Modeling (AM) for explaining morphological change. In contrast to previous accounts of analogy, AM constitutes a general unified model of language that accounts for both sporadic and systematic changes. AM also provides explicit constraints on analogy that allow explanation of how morphological changes begin, which forms most likely serve as patterns for analogy, and which forms are most likely to change.

AM is then tested on the case of the adjectival negative prefix in English (in-, un-, dis-, etc.), using the Middle and Early Modern English portions of the Helsinki corpus as …

Review Of The Software "La Chaise Berçante", Lara Lomicka

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Teaching Reading To Speakers Of Non-Romanized Languages, Scott Alkire

Faculty Publications

Speakers of non-Romanized languages face special challenges in learning to read English: a new alphabet, the left-to-right direction of English text (new to many of these learners), and, most significantly, the letter-sound correspondences of English, which are relatively complex among Romanized languages. Fortunately, strategies for overcoming these challenges are presented in a text by the famous linguist Leonard Bloomfield and the lexicographer Clarence Barnhart (Bloomfield & Barnhart, 1961). Though Bloomfield and Barnhart’s text was designed for teaching native-English-speaking children to read, with minor modifications it can be used to successfully teach speakers of non-Romanized languages to read as well. This …

Combining Learning Approaches For Incremental On-Line Parsing, Deryle W. Lonsdale, Michael B. Manookin

Faculty Publications

This paper discusses the integration of two different machine learning approaches to modeling language, NL-Soar and analogical modeling (AM). The resulting hybrid system is capable of functionality that is not possible when using only one of the systems in isolation. After a brief introduction of each system, an explanation is given of how AM is used to provide information useful to NL-Soar for two tasks. Examples are given, and related issues are outlined.

A Comparison Of Reading Development By Learners Of Japanese In Intensive Domestic Immersion And Study Abroad Contexts, Dan Dewey

Faculty Publications

To investigate the role of context in reading development, a comparison of reading comprehension and processes was conducted between learners of Japanese as a second language in study abroad (SA; n = 15) and intensive domestic (in the United States) immersion (IM; n = 15) contexts. A significant difference was found between contexts in pretest to posttest gains on only one measure of reading comprehension, a self-assessment. Differences on the two other measures of comprehension—free-recall and vocabulary knowledge—were not significant. The self-assessment measure indicated that SA students felt more confident reading the second language than their IM counterparts. In terms …

Context Of Learning And Second Language Fluency In French: Comparing Regular Classroom, Study Abroad And Intensive Domestic Immersion Programs, Barbara F. Freed, Norman Segalowitz, Dan Dewey

Faculty Publications

We compared the acquisition of various dimensions of fluency by 28 students of French studying in three different learning contexts: formal language classrooms in an at home (AH) institution, an intensive summer immersion (IM) program, and a study abroad (SA) setting. For the purpose of oral data collection, students participated in oral interviews (similar to the Oral Proficiency Interview) at the beginning and the end of the semester and provided information regarding language use and interactions. Analyses included comparisons of gain scores as a function of the learning context and as a function of the time reported using French outside …

Resolving Automatic Prepositional Phrase Attachments By Non-Statistical Means, Deryle W. Lonsdale, Michael B. Manookin

Faculty Publications

Prepositional-phrase attachment is a topic of active research in the field of computational linguistics. Properly attaching prepositional phrases to their pertinent constituent proves straightforward for humans, but inferring these attachments in a cognitive modeling system becomes difficult. For example, in the sentence, ‘Ralph threw the frisbee to John,’ the prepositional phrase ‘to John’ will attach to the verb phrase ‘threw’. In another example, ‘Joe saw the dog with fur,’ the prepositional phrase ‘with fur’ will attach directly to the noun phrase ‘the dog.’ Humans would have little difficulty resolving these examples, but for computers this would be difficult.

Combining Learning Approaches For Incremental On-Line Parsing, Deryle W. Lonsdale, Michael B. Manookin

Faculty Publications

This paper discusses the integration of two different machine learning approaches to modeling language, NL-Soar and analogical modeling (AM). The resulting hybrid system is capable of functionality that is not possible when using only one of the systems in isolation. After a brief introduction of each system, an explanation is given of how AM is used to provide information useful to NL-Soar for two tasks. Examples are given, and related issues are outlined.