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published_or_final_version / abstract / toc / Chinese / Master / Master of Philosophy

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This thesis has explored English loan words in modern Japanese, in terms of phonological aspects and attempted to find the causes for the sound change in the English words when they were incorporated into Japanese. This thesis has also exemplified differences between English and Japanese sound systems and syllabic systems. In addition, the thesis has discussed causes for ellipsis of loan words and ten principles governing the occurrence of ellipsis and, finally, the thesis touched upon limitation of ellipsis.

The present thesis focusses on the structure of PP's in English and Polish, and the occurrence of PP's in subject and object positions. The main theoretical references are the X-bar Theory of syntactic categories and the Government Binding framework (GB). A consideration of English data corroborates Jackendoff's and Emonds' claim that apart from an NP, prepositions can take a PP and an S′ complement or no complement at all, though details of Jackendoff's analysis are revised. Polish prepositions allow the same range of complements, including no complement, although,with a greater variety of complex prepositions and with intransitive prepositions modified by relative and appositive clauses, the P-PP and the P-S′ structures are less common in Polish than in English. Subject and object PP's have so far received little attention. Like PP objects of prepositions, they are used if the intended meaning cannot be expressed by a suitable NP. The appearance of subject PP's in raising and passive sentences poses a problem for classical Transformational Grammar, though not for a slightly revised version of GB – another category-based framework. The analysis proposed here involves a particular view of the representation of Case, and a revised Case Filter. The Case Filter rules out not merely any lexical NP with no Case but any lexical XP which requires Case but has not been assigned Case. Thus, the properties of being an NP and requiring Case are independent of each other. It emerges from the investigation (i) that prepositions in English and Polish are more alike than one might expect, given the obvious differences between the two languages; (ii) that prepositions and PP's are like verbs and VP's – as Jackendoff emphasizes – but in some respects they show greater resemblance to other categories; and (iii) that syntactic categories are less important for the distribution of phrases than is commonly assumed, and that the meaning of phrases is of central importance for their distribution.

Landman (1989) introduced contemporary linguistics to the as-phrase. An as-phrase is a qualifier, introduced in English by "as." "John is corrupt as a judge," for instance, contains the as-phrase "as a judge." Philosophical discourse is full of examples of as-phrase sentences. Their presence can make it difficult to distinguish valid from invalid arguments, a perennial concern for philosophers. Landman proposed the first formal semantic theory of as-phrases, based on a set of seven intuitively-valid patterns of inference involving as-phrases. Szabó (2003), Jaeger (2003), Asher (2011) each attempt to improve upon Landman's theory. Chapter 1 reviews and criticizes a temporal account of as-phrase semantics, while tracing some precedents and motivations for my approach. Chapters 2-3 criticize Szabó's and Asher's theories. Szabó's theory shows problems handling the future tense and intensional contexts. Asher's complex theory solves these problems, but resorts to the obscure notions of relative identity and bare particulars. Chapter 4 argues that neither Szabó's nor Asher's theory is clearly superior, because implicitly, they focus on different classes of sentences, which I call "Type A" and "Type B." From John Bowers' syntactic research, I argue that the element common to Type A and Type B is Pr, a predication head pronounced "as" in some contexts. Chapter 5 develops a formal semantic theory tailored to Type A sentences that solves the problems of Szabó's theory while avoiding Asher's assumptions. On my approach, the semantic properties of Type A sentences resolve into an interaction among generic quantifiers, determiner-phrase interpretation, and one core quantifier based on a principal ultrafilter. It is the interaction-effects of these elements that give rise to the many unusual readings we find in these as-phrase sentences. This result supports my motivating view that linguistic research helps to solve semantic problems of philosophical interest.

Verhandeling ingelewer vir die graad Magister in die Lettere en Wysbegeerte aan die Universiteit van Zululand, 2000. / Eng =: In this thesis I report the results of a survey that I made of the contributions that linguists had made in the course of the previous century regarding the description of the Afrikaans prepositional phrase construction. My research revealed that the first generation of Afrikaans linguists for ideological reasons were preoccupied with the origin and development of Afrikaans, and that Afrikaans prepositions were only referred to during discussions regarding the extent to which Afrikaans was considered to be a pure Germanic language, or a creolised language that obtained its characteristic features at the southern tip of Africa under the influence of contact languages such as Malay-Portuguese and Khoe. My research further revealed that De Villiers and Raidt were the first of the second generation Afrikaans linguists that understood that prepositions were constituents of a grammatical construction, the prepositional phrase construc¬tion. My main finding was that Ponelis is the central figure in the description of the grammar of Afrikaans, and that he made the biggest contribution to the description of the Afrikaans prepositional phrase construction in that capacity. Finally I concluded that De Wet and De Stadler are transitional figures to a new approach, according to which prepositions are characterised as elements of case grammar. Of De Stadler I concluded that his work on the Afrikaans partitative construction and the Afrikaans dative construction have created a bridge for analysing the Afrikaans prepositional phase construction within an emerging new approach, Cognitive Grammar. Afri: = In hierdie verhandeling doen ek verslag oor 'n bestekoJlname wat ek gemaak het van die bydraes wat taalkundiges in die loop van die vorige eeu gemaak het t.o.v. die beskrywing van die Afrikaanse setselgroep. My navorsing het aan die lig gebring dat die eerste generasie Afrikaanse talkumliges om ideologiese redes gemoeid was met die ontstaansgeskiedenis van Afrikaans, en dat Afrikaanse setsels slegs ter sprake gekom het tydens besprekings oor die mate waarin Mrikaans 'n suiwer Germaanse taal sou wees, of 'n gekreoliseerde taal wat aan die suidpunt van Afrika onder invloed van kontaktale soos Maleis-Portugees en Khoekoens sy kenmerkende taaleienskappe gekry het. Verder het my navoring aan die lig gebring dat De Villiers en Raidt die eerste taalkundiges van die tweede generasie was wat getoon het dat setsels as konstituente van 'n bepaalde grammatikale struktuur,die setselgroep, gebruik word. My hootbevinding is dat Ponelis die hooffiguur in die beskrywing van die grammatika van Afrikaans is en dat hy in daardie hoedanigheid die grootste bydrae gelewer het tot die beskrywing van die Mrikaanse setselgroep. Laastens het ek bevind dat De Wet en De Stadler oorgangsfigure is na 'n nuwe benadering waarvolgens setseIgroepe as deel van die kasusgrammatika beskryf word. Gor De Stadler het ek bevind dat sy werk oor die Afrikaanse partitietkonstruksie en die Afrikaanse datietkonstruksie 'n brug skep vir die bestudering van die Mrikaanse setselgroep binne 'n ontwikkelende nuwe benadering, die Kognitiewe Grammatika. / National Research Foundation (NRF),

Mémoire numérisé par la Direction des bibliothèques de l'Université de Montréal.

Previous research into sporting events and broadcast commentary have been consistent in showing that there are clear differences in prevalence of commentary topics when a commentator is describing a male athlete and a female athlete. Among these differences are sexualized and ambivalent language towards female athletes, gender marking, and language that suggests male athlete superiority to that of female athletes. Although sporting events such as the Summer and Winter Olympics and NCAA Men's and Women's Basketball Championship games have repeatedly been sites for exploration, the world's largest single-event sporting competition, the World Cup, remains relatively untouched. Keeping this in mind, using a systematic content analysis, this thesis analyzed the broadcast commentary provided by play-by-play and color commentators in FIFA World Cup and FIFA Women's World Cup final matches to discern whether or not the sex of the athlete competing resulted in a difference in the descriptive evaluations employed by commentators. Findings of this study revealed that there were few differences in the prevalence of descriptive evaluations based on the gender of the athletes competing. Implications of the results and recommendations for future research into broadcast commentary and World Cup final matches are addressed. / Master of Arts / Previous research into the role of broadcast commentary in sporting events has shown that not only are there differences in what sports commentators say about male and female athletes, but also in how often specific types of commentary occur. Through the examination of pinnacle athletic competitions, findings have revealed a higher frequency of sexualized and contradictory language towards female athletes, an increase in gender marking, and language that suggests the superiority of male athletes to that of female athletes, among other things. Despite the wide range of athletic competitions that have garnered research attention, one event that has remained relatively ignored is the FIFA World Cup. Because of this, by examining the broadcast commentary provided during FIFA World Cup and FIFA Women’s World Cup final matches, this study looked to discover if the sex of the athlete competing impacted how often certain evaluation types occurred during game action. Findings showed that there were few differences in the prevalence of these evaluations based on the sex of the athlete competing. In addition to discussing the findings of this study, recommendations for future research are also addressed.