The role of DO-auxiliary in subject-auxiliary inversion: Developing Langacker’s notion of existential negotiation

2016 ◽  
Vol 27 (2) ◽  
pp. 269-287 ◽  
Author(s):  
Patrick Duffley

AbstractThis paper builds on Langacker’s (in press. How to build an English clause. Journal of Foreign Language Teaching and Applied Linguistics 2(2)) analysis of subject-auxiliary inversion (SAI) as involving “existential negotiation”. Langacker’s account is completed by relating it to full verb inversion (FVI). In FVI, non-core elements are fronted, resulting in inversion without an auxiliary, as in Into the room walked Mary; however, non-core elements are also frontable in SAI, as in Bitterly did we regret our decision. Do is treated as denoting full actualization and SAI is accounted for by focus on an exceptionally intense mode of actualization, whence the use of do to explicitly express what is focused on. The role of into the room in the FVI example is to define a locus into which an entity is introduced. Since this does not involve focus on the fact or manner of the verbal event’s actualization, do is not used. This leads to a different division of inverted structures than that of Chen (2013. Subject auxiliary inversion and linguistic generalization: Evidence for functional/cognitive motivation in language. Cognitive Linguistics 24. 1–32), who distinguishes those that merely reverse subject and auxiliary (argued to denote non-indicative mood) from those where the inverted auxiliary-subject order is accompanied by fronting of a non-subject element (treated as involving focus on the fronted item). It is argued here that fronting do-auxiliary marks focus on the actualization of the verbal event itself.

1981 ◽  
Vol 11 ◽  
pp. 246-257
Author(s):  
A.G. Sciarone

Applied Linguistics is generally regarded as a multidisciplinary field in which didactics, psychology and linguistics participate. It is remarkable that within the context of foreign language teaching the focus is mainly on the didactic experiment and on the construction of psycholinguistic hypotheses. Yet for a linguistic-didactic experiment to be relevant, insight in what is to be taught, viz. language,is necessary. Many variants of language teaching could have been avoided with a better linguistic insight. Moreover, a better linguistic understanding in applied linguis-tics leads to a better distinction between the views of linguists on language didactics and psycholinguistics and the descriptions of language they give. In this paper the relation between grammar and vocabulary is discussed. It is argued that this distinction is based more on definition than on reality. Stressing the importance of the role of vocabulary does not imply denying or minimising the importance of grammar. On the contrary, the traditional task division in linguistics between grammar and lexicology has led to a sterile grammatical description. Recent tendencies in linguistics now show a more integrated description of grammar and vocabu-lary. Finally, with regard to the didactically important problem of vocabu-lary selection, some remarks are made concerning the difference between selection on the basis of linguistic properties and selection on the basis of usually arbitrary non-linguistic idiosyncrasies of words and the influence of this on teaching material. This is illustrated with examples from language courses.


2019 ◽  
pp. 213-226
Author(s):  
Adam Szeluga

The article deals with the most important relations between Foreign Language Didactics and the main theoretical models in modern linguistics, especially the Applied Linguistics of second- and foreign-language teaching. Theories and models of modern linguistics have often laid the theoretical foundations of foreign language teaching, as we can observe in the individual methods and learning techniques (from structuralism to generative grammar, communicativepragmatic turn of the 60s and 70s, cognitive linguistics and to F. Grucza's anthropocentric theory of languages). In this perspective, the purpose of this article is to raise and discuss the question of how modern linguistic theories can improve the effectiveness of language teaching.


In this interview, Professor Hu showed his insights in the linguistic basis of language education. Among the various schools of linguistic theories, he lays special emphasis on the influence of communicative grammar, systemic functional linguistics, pragmatics and cognitive linguistics on language education, in particular on foreign language teaching and learning in China. According to him, language education should fall within the scope of applied linguistics, and there should be a combination of the narrow-sense applied linguistics and the machine-oriented applied linguistics for better development of language education research and practice. Educational linguistics is considered as able to integrate language studies that focuses on the way to teach first, second or foreign language and education studies that emphasizes how to use a language in teaching different courses. Professor Hu highlighted the important role of functional linguistics in foreign language education in China, and drew our attention to the positive role of social semiotics in language teaching at all levels of education. He advocated to apply to language education the principle of Halliday’s “appliable linguistics”, according to which we should learn to find out for what purpose, under what condition and with what result a theory is better than other theories in practices in general and in language teaching in particular, while the task of an experienced teacher is to choose an appropriate approach to cope with a particular problem and the teacher himself/herself is expected to be a resource in language teaching. Professor Hu summarized the major stages of foreign language education since the founding of new China, and highlighted the shift of the objective in foreign language education in China from literature to language. He reminded us of the major challenges to foreign language education in China in the new century: including those due to the need of cross-discipline and crossspecialty personnel, the new development of technology, and the increasing importance of multiple intelligence and Internet education in foreign language learning. He also advocated the adoption of new teaching approaches in teaching Chinese as foreign language.


2003 ◽  
Vol 36 (3) ◽  
pp. 225-225

03–535 Hellermann, John (Southern Illinois U., Carbondale, USA; Email: [email protected]). The interactive use of prosody in the IRF exchange: Teacher repetition in feedback moves. Language in Society (Cambridge, UK), 32, 1 (2003), 79–104.03–536 Wendt, Michael (Universität Bremen, Germany). Kontext und Konstruktion: Fremdsprachendidaktische theoriebildung und ihre Implikationen für die Fremdsprachenforschung. [Context and construction: Theory building in foreign language teaching and its implications for foreign language research.] Zeitschrift für Fremdsprachenforschung (Berlin, Germany), 13, 1 (2002), 1–62.03–537 Weppelman, Tammy, L., Bostow, Angela, Schiffer, Ryan, Elbert-Perez, Evelyn and Newman, Rochelle, S. (U. of Iowa, USA). Children's use of the prosodic characteristics of infant-directed speech. Language and Communication (Oxford, UK), 23, 1 (2003), 63–80.


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