The English voice system has two passive auxiliaries: the canonical be-passive, and the more recent get-passive. Accounts of the get-passive in the linguistic literature draw from descriptive, historical, corpus linguistic, and variationist perspectives. Much existing work on the get-passive from the former three traditions notes semantic dissimilarities from the be-passive, suggesting that these two forms are not interchangeable and therefore do not constitute a typical sociolinguistic variable. Nonetheless, variationist work has treated the be- and get-passives as alternants expressing the same function. This latter work has focused on social factors alone, setting aside purported linguistic differences. This thesis provides a variationist account of the be- and get-passives, considering not only social factors, but also operationalizing as linguistic factors previously noted semantic characteristics, demonstrating which factors constrain variation and providing a holistic picture of the get-passive in vernacular English. The speakers in this study span a birth range of 1865 to 1996, providing a longitudinal scope from which to view the grammaticalization of the feature. Following the principle of accountability (Labov, 1972), instances of be- and get-passives were extracted from 108 speakers born and raised in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada (N=1716). Distributional and inferential results show a substantial increase in rates of get-passive over the last 130 years, indicating an active and ongoing change in progress. Social and linguistic factors alike are shown to play meaningful roles in variant selection, revealing a (largely) longitudinally stable variable grammar. The longitudinal scope of the study illuminates grammaticalization pathways into the 20th century and reinforces attested semantic links between the contemporary get-passive and its proposed lexical source(s). / Graduate / 2023-08-17

There is no abstract available for this dissertation. / Department of English

This dissertation has two main purposes: (a) to provide a contrastive analysis and theoretical background of the passive in English and Korean; (b) to investigate how Korean learners of English use the English passive in terms of forms, meanings, and functions.One major claim in this dissertation is that the passive is best accounted for by the notion of role prominence in both English and Korean. In addition, a significant difference is revealed in emotional (affective) functions of the passive in English and Korean, showing that the emotional function prevails in Korean far more than in English.After the discussion of theoretical background, Korean learners' actual use of the English passive is analyzed. The specific analysis of grammatical errors shows that Korean learners make local errors (errors significantly inhibiting communication) more than global errors (errors not significantly inhibiting communication). Pragmatic errors are divided largely into discourse functional errors (violation of role prominence, abrupt topic shift, and violation of defocusing) and affective functional errors. The results show that affective functional errors outnumber discourse functional errors. These results are accounted for in terms of not only language transfer and but also a socio-cultural factor, prestige of a passive sentence with respect to an active sentence. Of particular interest is the existence of a hierarchy of acceptability in pragmatic errors. Analysis of medio-passive errors suggests that the native language forms greatly affect the learners' target language forms.This dissertation plays particular attention to the pragmatic aspects of the passive, both theoretical and practical. It is argued that the learners' use of the passive in accordance with pragmatic principles will enhance cohesive writing, facilitating communication.Generally speaking, this dissertation contributes to several important areas of study in second language acquisition, including error analysis and contrastive analysis in terms of grammar and pragmatics. A major significance of this dissertation is its demonstration of the importance of pragmatics in understanding the acqusition of grammar. / Department of English

Academic scientific language is characterized by an impersonal and objective style. Due to this and the typical high information density of academic language, this style typically contains a high rate of noun phrases and passive structures. This is also true for the German scientific study Gefühlte Opfer, Illusionen der Vergangenheitsbewältigung by Ulrike Jureit and Christian Schneider. The first aim of this essay was to translate one chapter from the aforementioned book into Swedish and adapt the target language to culturally match a reader who would appreciate a text on German post-war history and sociology. The second aim was to quantify and analyse all occurrences of passive voice and similar structures. More specifically, the following research questions were investigated: How is the passive formed in the source and target language respectively? How often is a corresponding passive used in the translation? How often is a passive sentence translated into an active structure? There are many different ways of expressing the passive in German: the so-called Vorgangspassiv featuring the auxiliary werden, the so-called Zustandspassiv with sein, and finally passive-like constructions. There are corresponding ways to form the passive in Swedish, that is, structures with the auxiliaries bli and vara, but the more common way to express the passive voice is the morphological s-passive. Passive-like constructions can be found in Swedish as well. The most common passive structure in the source text, the werden-passive, was in most cases translated into the typical Swedish s-passive. The sein-passive was more often translated into a similar structure in the target text. All in all, almost a third of the passive voice sentences were translated into active structures. Keywords: translation, passive voice, academic language

published_or_final_version / abstract / Linguistics / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

This paper proposes a diachronic and synchronic analysis of the extensive use of se in Spanish reflexive and passive constructions with se being discussed in relation to the Unaccusative Hypothesis in Arc Pair Grammar.Universals in Arc Pair Grammar, namely the Unaccusative Law, the 1-Advancement Exclusiveness Law and the Final 1-Arc Law will account for the similarities and differences, first between English and Spanish predicates; and second, between ordinary reflexive constructions and reflexive passive constructions.Evidence from Spanish, primarily synchronic, is presented to analyze reflexive constructions that come from an initial unaccusative stratum. A parallel between these constructions and reflexive passives is established to demonstrate that unaccusative predicates and reflexive passive constructions are very closely related.Diachronically the paper claims that there is a logical and clear evolution of se based on corefentiality, anaphoric chains, unspecified arguments, and self-erasing ghost arcs.Finally this paper attempts to explain why in some instances the predicate will not exhibit agreement with the corresponding nominal. The Chomeur relation and the introduction of ghost arcs according to Arc Pair Grammar Laws and Theorems will provide the basis for this explanation.

This dissertation explores the collaborative process and use of language that went into the creating the United States Constitution in 1787. From a technical communication perspective, the collaborative process explored did not develop any new theories on collaboration, but instead, allows scholars to track the emergence of a well-documented America collaborative process from the early period of the developing American nation on a document that has remained in use for over 235 years. in addition to examining this collaborative process, the author also discusses the use of passive voice and negative language in the first article of the Constitution.

published_or_final_version / Linguistics / Master / Master of Arts

本論文從詞彙語義的角度探討二語英語中的低被動化現象。本文將就常見的低被動化英語動詞，以動詞語義為基礎，進行類型劃分及解析。通過審視一個香港學習者語料庫中的低被動化結構，本文將確定二語英語中低被動化結構的性質以及分佈情況。基於一組因果及物性的語義特徵，語料庫中經常被學習者低被動化的動詞，將劃分為四類型：一）改變位置動詞，二）三方動詞，三）動態效應動詞，及四）非施事動詞；四主類型再劃分為九次類型。本論文將以語義特徵，例如力傳遞、因果關係和結束點，詳細解析每個低被動化動詞。這項就二語英語中低被動化動詞的類型劃分，不單能夠從語義的角度解析低被動化現象，亦可以用作分析其他與語態有關的二語現象，如泛被動化，以及應用於語言教學。 / This dissertation is a lexical semantic study of underpassivized verbs in L2 English. By adopting a verb-oriented and meaning-based approach to underpassivization, this study produces a lexical semantic classification and analysis of frequently underpassivized verbs. A Hong Kong learner corpus is examined in order to determine the nature and extent of underpassivized constructions in L2 English. Based on a set of semantic features of cause-effect transitivity, underpassivization-prone verbs in the corpus are classified into four types, namely 1) Change of position verbs, 2) Tripartite verbs, 3) Dynamic effect verbs and 4) Non-agentive verbs. A total of nine sub-types are identified, and each verb is analyzed according to semantic features such as force transmission, causation, affectedness and telicity. The typology not only provides a lexical semantic account of L2 underpassivization but can also be applied to analyze other voice-related L2 phenomena such as overpassivization and to inform pedagogical practices. / The present study is an initial attempt to apply findings from lexical semantics to the description and explanation of learner errors. Previous studies mainly regard L2 underpassivization as a syntactic phenomenon that can be accounted for using transfer, and argue that L2 underpassivization is the result of the transfer of the topic-comment structure in L1s such as Chinese and Japanese to English (Yip 1995). The transfer theory overlooks the role verb meaning plays in voice-related errors, and is limited in its ability to explain the L2 phenomenon fully. This study investigates underpassivization as a lexical semantic phenomenon, drawing from previous works on proto-roles (Dowty 1991), event structure (Croft 1994) and transitivity (Hopper & Thompson 1980; Tsunoda 1985), and following the tradition in lexical semantics of analyzing verb meaning based on argument alternations (Pinker 1989; Levin 1993). It is believed that when learners underpassivize verbs, they are detransitivizing and decausativizing an originally transitive event. Using the features of cause-effect transitivity, the study shows that reduced transitivity will cause problems for learners in their construal of the event’s cause-effect relation and hence their allocation of thematic roles in the verb’s argument structure, resulting in underpassivization. It is hoped that by focusing on argument structure and event dynamics, this study can offer insights into the impact of verb meaning in the construal of transitivity and the use and misuse of grammatical voice. / Detailed summary in vernacular field only. / Wong, Suzanne Shu-Shan. / Thesis (Ph.D.) Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2014. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 225-235). / Abstracts also in Chinese. / Wong, Suzanne Shu-Shan.

by Jihua Zhou. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 1991. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 112-115). / ACKNOWLEDGMENT --- p.i / ABSTRACT --- p.ii / TABLE OF CONTENTS --- p.iii / LIST OF TABLES --- p.vii / LIST OF FIGURES --- p.ix / Chapter CHAPTER 1 --- INTRODUCTION --- p.1 / Chapter 1.1 --- Aims and Scope --- p.1 / Chapter 1.2 --- Significance --- p.2 / Chapter 1.3 --- The Organization of the Study --- p.4 / Chapter CHAPTER 2 --- APPROACHES TO THE PASSIVE： LINGUISTIC ANALYSIS AND SOME ACQUISITION ISSUES --- p.5 / Chapter 2.0 --- Introduction --- p.5 / Chapter 2.1 --- Approaches to the Analysis of the Sentential Passive --- p.6 / Chapter 2.1.1 --- The Syntactic Structures and the Aspects Approach --- p.7 / Chapter 2.1.2 --- The Lexical Approach --- p.9 / Chapter 2.1.3 --- The Modular Approach --- p.10 / Chapter 2.1.4 --- Semantic Constraints On Theta-Role Assignment in the Sentential Passive --- p.14 / Chapter 2.2 --- The Analyses of the Nominal Passive --- p.16 / Chapter 2.3 --- Passive Related Structures --- the Ergative and the Middle --- p.19 / Chapter 2.4 --- Empirical Studies on the Passive Acquisition --- p.23 / Chapter 2.4.1 --- Studies on L1 acquisition --- p.23 / Chapter 2.4.1.1 --- Maratsos et al. (1985) --- p.23 / Chapter 2.4.1.2 --- Pinker et al. (1987) --- p.26 / Chapter 2.4.1.3 --- Gordon and Chafetz (1990) --- p.29 / Chapter 2.4.2 --- Studies on L2 passive acquisition --- p.31 / Chapter 2.4.2.1 --- Zhou (1989) --- p.31 / Chapter 2.4.2.2 --- Zobl (1989) --- p.32 / Chapter 2.5 --- Acquisition Issues --- p.34 / Chapter CHAPTER 3 --- RESEARCH DESIGN AND PROCEDURE --- p.39 / Chapter 3.0 --- Introduction --- p.39 / Chapter 3.1 --- Research Hypotheses --- p.40 / Chapter 3.2 --- Subjects --- p.43 / Chapter 3.3 --- Test Design --- p.44 / Chapter 3.3.1 --- Test1 --- p.44 / Chapter 3.3.2 --- Test2 --- p.46 / Chapter 3.3.3 --- Test3 --- p.48 / Chapter 3.3.4 --- Test4 --- p.50 / Chapter 3.4 --- Test Procedure and Test Scoring --- p.51 / Chapter CHAPTER 4 --- RESULTS --- p.54 / Chapter 4.1 --- Results of Test1 --- p.55 / Chapter 4.1.1 --- Learners' Sensitivity to the Conditions for NP-Movement Is Relatively Low --- p.57 / Chapter 4.1.2 --- Context-dependence of Learners' Sensitivity to the Requirements of Case Theory --- p.60 / Chapter 4.1.3 --- Learners' Sensitivity to NP-Movement in Sentences with or without the by-phrase --- p.64 / Chapter 4.1.4. --- Learners' Sensitivity to NP-Movement is Related to the Actionality of the Verb --- p.66 / Chapter 4.2 --- Results of Test2 --- p.68 / Chapter 4.2.1 --- The Interpretation of Thematic Roles --- p.68 / Chapter 4.2.2 --- The Acceptability of Thematic Role Pairs Violating THC --- p.71 / Chapter 4.2.3 --- The Thematic Interpretation of the Subject --- p.73 / Chapter 4.3 --- Results of Test3 --- p.76 / Chapter 4.3.1 --- Lower Sensitivity to NP-Movement in Nominal Passives --- p.79 / Chapter 4.3.2 --- Learners' Performance on Some Other Aspects of the Nominal Passive --- p.80 / Chapter 4.4 --- Results of Test4 --- p.83 / Chapter 4.5 --- Summary --- p.90 / Chapter CHAPTER 5 --- DISCUSSION --- p.92 / Chapter 5.1 --- The Availability of UG Principles in the Acquisition of the Passive Structure --- p.92 / Chapter 5. 2 --- Affectedness Constraint Posing a Very Difficult Learning Problem --- p.98 / Chapter 5.3 --- The Passive Related Structures and Learnability Issues --- p.101 / Chapter CHAPTER 6 --- CONCLUSION --- p.107 / REFERENCES --- p.112 / APPENDICES --- p.116