This paper examines the polysemy in the English verb get, which can denote possession, movement, causation, obligation, and change of state among other senses. The analysis builds on a decomposition of get (based on the Benveniste/Freeze/Kayne analysis of possessive constructions) into [ingressive + ‘be’ + preposition]; this lexical entry allows the current polysemy to be derived from a number of reanalyses within different syntactic contexts. Using diachronic data, I show that possession leads to movement as well as stative uses (possession and obligation), movement develops into the causative and inchoative, from which the passive develops, and the infinitival causative gives rise to permission and ingressive aspect. The appearance of each new meaning-construction is motivated by context-dependent mechanisms of reanalysis which account for language change as the result of the language learner reanalyzing the correspondences between syntactic and semantic elements.

The paper rejects the standard view according to which every tensed verb in English agrees with its subject in person and number. It argues that person is irrelevant to all verbs except BE, and that past-tense verbs and modals (other than BE) have no number agreement features. It discusses agreement mismatches which reflect the subject's meaning, but rejects the idea that subject–verb agreement may be a semantic rule; it proposes instead a new feature ‘agreement-number’. This extra number feature applies only to the subject of a tensed verb and by default has the same value as the subject's ordinary number, while also allowing various kinds of mismatch (for I and you, and for cases of ‘semantic’ agreement). It also offers analyses of agreement with non-nominal subjects and dummy there, and shows how the analysis for Standard English generalizes easily to a range of variations found in nonstandard dialects. The theoretical basis for the analysis is Word Grammar, whose main advantage is that features are free to be assigned by rule because they are not used in classification.

Claims about the productivity of a given affix are generally made without differentiating productivity according to type of discourse, although it is commonly assumed that certain kinds of derivational suffixes are more pertinent in certain kinds of texts than in others. Conversely, studies in register variation have paid very little attention to the role derivational morphology may play in register variation.

This paper explores the relation between register variation and derivational morphology through a quantitative investigation of the productivity of a number of English derivational suffixes across three types of discourse in the British National Corpus (written language, context-governed spoken language, and everyday conversations). Three main points emerge from the analysis. First, within a single register, different suffixes may differ enormously in their productivity, even if structurally they are constrained to a similar extent. Second, across the three registers under investigation a given suffix may display vast differences in productivity. Third, the register variation of suffixes is not uniform, i.e. there are suffixes that show differences in productivity across registers while other suffixes do not, or do so to a lesser extent. We offer some tentative explanations for these findings and discuss the implications for morphological theory.

Using a 1.5-million-word sample from the CANCODE spoken English corpus, we present a description of the get-passive in informal spoken British English. Previous studies of the get-passive are reviewed, and their focus on contextual and interpersonal meanings is noted. A number of related structures are then considered and the possibility of a passive gradient is discussed. The corpus sample contains 139 get-passives of the type X get + past participle (by Y) (e.g. He got killed), of which 124 occur in contexts interpreted as adversative or problematic from the speaker's viewpoint. Very few examples contain an explicit agent or adverbials. Main verb frequency is also considered. Where contexts are positive rather than adversative, newsworthiness or focus of some kind on the subject and/or events is still apparent. The corpus evidence is used to evaluate the terms upon which an interpersonal grammar of English might be developed, and a contrast is drawn between deterministic grammars and probabilistic ones, with probabilistic grammars offering the best potential for the understanding of interpersonal features.

Trisyllabic shortening or TSS is one of the most controversial processes in the history of English. Time after time, claims have been made about quantity variations, attributing them either to trisyllabic shortening, closed syllable shortening, or other mechanisms. Our examination of the nature of TSS in the history of English leads us to conclude that it differs from closed syllable shortening, which is syllable based, and that the preference for a maximal foot has remained the underlying incentive for maintaining vowel quantity variations throughout the centuries. However, the prosodic system has undergone dramatic changes and many features of TSS in the older and modern stages are not the same. Older TSS affected mostly inflected native words, while in Modern English, TSS causes alternations in derivationally related words with Romance suffixes. Interacting with open syllable lengthening, older TSS led to quantity alternations in inflectional paradigms which were later levelled out. Romance loans, both suffixed and nonsuffixed forms, were borrowed in their entirety and constrained by the prosodic structure of the language. Only later, when these words came to be derivationally related, were quantity alternations observable with TSS operating as a constraint dictated by the prosodic structure of the modern language. Thus, throughout the history of English, TSS has served the same purpose: it led to the preferred prosodic structure of the word.

This paper seeks to redefine apposition, a term that is often used in the literature with a remarkable lack of precision. Starting from paradigmatic instances of apposition (Romulus, the legendary founder; Santiago, the capital of Galicia), the main resemblances to the paradigm are analysed in an attempt to measure the validity of a general syntactic relation that is often put on a par with co-ordination and dependency. Paradigmatic appositions and other related nominal patterns are shown to be structures of nonrestrictive modification (i.e. not really appositions) which are best understood in reference to the concept of a Local Domain. The second unit of these structures has its scope in the local domain of the first unit, of which it is an expansion, not in the larger domain of the sentence. By contrast, most instances of non-nominal apposition (e.g. He ran – absolutely raced – up the hill; Burton-Roberts, 1975) are seen as true appositions, as defined in this paper, namely as structures whose two units relate independently to a Sentence Domain without forming a superordinate node in it. Crucial to the distinction between the Local and the Sentence domains is the role of intonation boundaries. These are strongly obligatory only with those structures which have been considered paradigmatic appositions in the literature (Romulus, the legendary founder), and their role is to isolate the second unit within them from the remainder of the sentence, thus preventing it from having a function in it. The intonation boundaries are also responsible for the most distinctive feature of these structures, namely the predicative relationship binding the two units together (Dupont, 1985; Koktová, 1985; Longrée, 1987; Forsgren, 1988).

Salkie & Reed (1997) offer a ‘pragmatic hypothesis’ of tense in reported speech which runs counter to Jespersen's & Comrie's quotative or ‘sequence of tenses’ analysis as well as to the more semantically based analysis proposed by Declerck (1990b, 1991a). In doing so they also cast doubt on the model of the English tense system which was proposed by Declerck (1991a) and has since been further refined and elaborated in a number of articles and in Declerck (1997).

The present article goes into the many arguments that S&R advance, refutes them, and adduces additional evidence for D's theory and against S&R's ‘pragmatic hypothesis’.

The nominalizing -er suffix has been extremely productive throughout the history of English, and in Present-day English it has developed a wide range of base and referent types. Yet most formal linguistic treatments account satisfactorily for only a fraction of the types of -er nominals actually found. I propose a cognitive model which not only addresses the problems with verb-based forms that are encountered in other models, but includes an account of all the nonverb-based -er nominals as well.

This paper investigates all aspects of the orthography of the Ormulum in relation to the phonology of the late twelfth-century south Lincolnshire dialect which Orm's spelling system was designed to reflect. We show that Orm's adaptations of what he found in existing orthographic systems provided a set of graphic symbols that was fully capable of representing phonological contrasts in the vocabulary of the dialect and which thus in many respects resembled the inventory that an analysis on phonemic principles might provide. However, Orm's system has more orthographic symbols than an analysis of distinctive oppositions in speech would have required. All of these additions are in some measure attributable to following precedent. In this aspect of his spelling system, as in his innovations, nearly all of which also have parallels within the English orthographic tradition, we discern a spelling reformer who, in due consideration of transparency of the system as perceived by the reader, took pains to depart as little as possible from the familiar.

This paper examines subject omission in English finite clauses. Contrary to what is claimed in Haegeman (1997), it is shown that embedded subject omission is attested in diary-style registers. These data pose a problem for the theory of empty categories in the Principles and Parameters framework. The main body of the paper describes the contexts in which subjects of embedded finite clauses are omitted. No syntactic constraints have been identified. Based on the observation that the omission of embedded subjects coincides with pronoun omission of reflexives, we tentatively suggest that in specific registers pronoun ellipsis is licensed by a specifier–head relation with a head carrying agreement features.

This paper examines an English construction which is very common in speech, but rare in writing. This construction is referred to as the thing is construction, as in: The thing is, is we've got to be strong. First, similarities between this construction and specificational pseudocleft constructions are noted, and it is proposed that the constructions are related. Then, five differences between the two construction types are discussed. An analysis is presented which accounts for the similarities and differences. Central to the analysis is the fact that thing is constructions contain ‘theta-role by recognition’ (Stowell, 1981), or appositive nouns (claim, problem, feeling, etc.), which allows the initial Wh-word to become optional. The paper also considers reduced thing is constructions such as: Our kids are great on vacations, but when they come back, is, they need to play, claiming that these, in a continuum along with clefts and thing is constructions, demonstrate the extreme case of a tendency for be to be used as a focus marker in spoken English.

Andrew Radford, Syntactic theory and the structure of English: a minimalist approach. Cambridge textbooks in linguistics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 1997. Pp. xii + 558. Hardback £50, US$69.95, ISBN 0 521 47125 7; paperback £16.95, US$24.95, ISBN 0 521 47707 7.

Until recently I was convinced that by far the best textbook ever written on Generative Grammar was Perlmutter and Soames' Syntactic argumentation and the structure of English (1979). Unfortunately, the theory advanced there died out. As concerns its successor, namely GB-theory, I still believe that Andrew Radford's pioneering Transformational syntax (1981) is one of the best introductions to Chomsky's Pisa lectures, despite the plethora of competing textbooks that have appeared over the years. Now that Radford has presented his most recent book, Syntactic theory and the structure of English, I am inclined to believe that it should be considered a competitor to Perlmutter and Soames' book. Not only the similarity to Perlmutter and Soames' title, but also the pedagogical and systematic orientation of the new book invites comparison. As both books meet the highest standards with regard to clarity of expression and exposition, I recommend Radford's book as the best textbook for up-to-date syntactic theory, and I am convinced that it will play the same influential role as an introduction to the Minimalist theory as did the 1981 book for GB theory.