Jan Don

Research / Onderzoek

Zero-derivation (or Conversion); Distributed Morphology; Lexical Categories; Issues in the acquisition of morphology (and categories).

Parts-of-Speech

Empirical and theoretical advances

Edited by Umberto Ansaldo, Jan Don and Roland Pfau

University of Hong Kong / University of Amsterdam

Parts of Speech are a central aspect of linguistic theory and analysis. Though a long-established tradition in Western linguistics and philosophy has assumed the validity of Parts of Speech in the study of language, there are still many questions left unanswered. For example, should Parts of Speech be treated as descriptive tools or are they to be considered universal constructs? Is it possible to come up with cross-linguistically valid formal categories, or are categories of language structure ultimately language-specific? Should they be defined semantically, syntactically, or otherwise? Do non-Indo-European languages reveal novel aspects of categorical assignment? This volume attempts to answer these and other fundamental questions for linguistic theory and its methodology by offering a range of contributions that spans diverse theoretical persuasions and contributes to our understanding of Parts of Speech with analyses of new data sets.

These articles were originally published in Studies in Language 32:3 (2008).

Bestuur / Organisatie / Organisational duties

• programme director Research MA Linguistics 
• member of University Committee Education (UCO)
• lid editorial board SKASE Journal of Theoretical Linguistics

Leerstoelgroep Nederlandse taalkunde

Slovak Association for the Study of English

Amsterdam Center for Language and Communication

Research MA Linguistics