Ethnopragmatics: A fresh approach to studying discourse practices in cultural context. Thhis project applies an innovative and rigorous linguistic framework to the study of culturally-shaped ways of speaking, using case studies of Malay, Australian English, and several other languages. Cultural differences in ways of speaking - e.g. a tolerance of sarcasm, a preference for subtlety or for directness or for hyperbole - run deep and cause much intercultural misunderstanding. They are usually deepl ....Ethnopragmatics: A fresh approach to studying discourse practices in cultural context. Thhis project applies an innovative and rigorous linguistic framework to the study of culturally-shaped ways of speaking, using case studies of Malay, Australian English, and several other languages. Cultural differences in ways of speaking - e.g. a tolerance of sarcasm, a preference for subtlety or for directness or for hyperbole - run deep and cause much intercultural misunderstanding. They are usually deeply rooted in societal atitudes and cultural assumptions. The findings will have important implications for intercultural communication (both within a multicultural Australia, and in trade and international relations) and for the teaching of languages in cultural context.Read moreRead less
The Semantics of Canonical Parallelism: Oral composition among Rotinese poets, eastern Indonesia. The pairing of words, known in linguistics as parallelism, is a critical feature of the oral traditions of the world. This strict use of couplets for oral compositions is a characteristic of the vibrant traditions of verbal communication on all the islands of eastern Indonesia. This project focuses on the oral traditions of the island of Roti, Australia's closest Indonesian neighbour. Using new anal ....The Semantics of Canonical Parallelism: Oral composition among Rotinese poets, eastern Indonesia. The pairing of words, known in linguistics as parallelism, is a critical feature of the oral traditions of the world. This strict use of couplets for oral compositions is a characteristic of the vibrant traditions of verbal communication on all the islands of eastern Indonesia. This project focuses on the oral traditions of the island of Roti, Australia's closest Indonesian neighbour. Using new analytic techniques applied to an extensive recorded corpus, it seeks to identify underlying mechanisms of verbal composition that may be applied comparatively to other oral traditions throughout the world, thus locating Australia at the forefront of the international study of oral traditions.Read moreRead less
Lexical typology, a new integrated approach to semantics: a reciprocal case study. This proposal will bring out Professor Leila Behrens (U. Cologne), one of the co-founders of a new approach to linguistics, Lexical Typology, which looks at how all of a language's expressive components interact, instead of just focussing on one element such as grammar or vocabulary. With the CI she will develop this theory further, with respect to the expression of reciprocal relationships in English, German, Hun ....Lexical typology, a new integrated approach to semantics: a reciprocal case study. This proposal will bring out Professor Leila Behrens (U. Cologne), one of the co-founders of a new approach to linguistics, Lexical Typology, which looks at how all of a language's expressive components interact, instead of just focussing on one element such as grammar or vocabulary. With the CI she will develop this theory further, with respect to the expression of reciprocal relationships in English, German, Hungarian, Tagalog, Vietnamese, Indonesian, and the Australian Aboriginal languages Kayardild, Bininj Gun-wok and Dalabon.Read moreRead less
Australians and Americans talking: culture, interaction and communication style. No relationship is more important to Australia than our relationship with the United States of America, yet remarkably, there has been no systematic study of how Australians and Americans interact differently. This project identifies and explains these differences in a way that is rigorous, accessible, and useful to non-specialists.
Exploring the nature of lexical representation. In order to comprehend and produce the words that we know, whether in speech or in writing, we must possess mental representations of each of those words (i.e., "lexical" representations). The aim of the proposed research is to elaborate on the nature of these representations in an attempt to understand more fully the cognitive mechanisms involved in proficient language use. The central idea to be explored is that underlying all lexical functioning ....Exploring the nature of lexical representation. In order to comprehend and produce the words that we know, whether in speech or in writing, we must possess mental representations of each of those words (i.e., "lexical" representations). The aim of the proposed research is to elaborate on the nature of these representations in an attempt to understand more fully the cognitive mechanisms involved in proficient language use. The central idea to be explored is that underlying all lexical functioning is an abstract phonological representation that is influenced by orthography. Furthermore, the possibility will be examined that poorer readers possess less abstract representations than do better readers.Read moreRead less
Are some languages better than others? It is important for the Australian community - speaking several hundred different indigenous and immigrant languages across the nation - to realise that each language has approximately (but not precisely) the same overall complexity as every other. One may have intricate word structure, while another has short words but elaborate rules for putting words together to make sentences. And, striding above 'political correctness', many people in Australia will be ....Are some languages better than others? It is important for the Australian community - speaking several hundred different indigenous and immigrant languages across the nation - to realise that each language has approximately (but not precisely) the same overall complexity as every other. One may have intricate word structure, while another has short words but elaborate rules for putting words together to make sentences. And, striding above 'political correctness', many people in Australia will be interested to know whether a certain language is a little more efficient than certain other languages for a particular purpose (for example, commercial business). Read moreRead less
Basic Linguistic Theory. The project is to write the first comprehensive monograph on basic linguistic theory, the theoretical model which underpins almost all grammatical descriptions and most work on typological universals of language (e.g. asking whether all languages have relative clauses, and how these differ between languages). Part 1 will focus on methodology, modes of argumentation and the components of a linguistic description, while Part 2 will profile grammatical categories and const ....Basic Linguistic Theory. The project is to write the first comprehensive monograph on basic linguistic theory, the theoretical model which underpins almost all grammatical descriptions and most work on typological universals of language (e.g. asking whether all languages have relative clauses, and how these differ between languages). Part 1 will focus on methodology, modes of argumentation and the components of a linguistic description, while Part 2 will profile grammatical categories and construction types (such as negation, interrogatives, causatives). This work will constitute both a major contribution to linguistic theory and also a practical manual for pursuing linguistic description and typological generalisations concerning the nature of human language.Read moreRead less
Natural Semantic Metalanguage (NSM): formalisation, computation, referential semantics. Meaning is what links language with culture, communication and cognition but strangely enough, most linguists do not regard semantics (the systematic study of meaning) as a central part of their discipline. This project pursues basic research in the leading meaning-based theory of language: the natural semantic metalanguage (NSM) theory, which has been originated and developed primarily in Australia. It aims ....Natural Semantic Metalanguage (NSM): formalisation, computation, referential semantics. Meaning is what links language with culture, communication and cognition but strangely enough, most linguists do not regard semantics (the systematic study of meaning) as a central part of their discipline. This project pursues basic research in the leading meaning-based theory of language: the natural semantic metalanguage (NSM) theory, which has been originated and developed primarily in Australia. It aims to make this theory more precise, to work out how it can be used by computers, and to connect it with other, more mathematically inspired approaches to meaning.Read moreRead less
Linguistic prehistory in Mainland Southeast Asia: 2000 years of language and culture contact between Austroasiatic and Chamic speakers. The project focuses on the Austroasiatic language groups, Bahnaric, Katuic and Khmer, and one Austronesian, Chamic, which are located in Vietnam, Cambodia and southern Laos. These languages have been in contact for around 2000 years. I will investigate the history of language contact and change, leading to improved understanding of the particular and general pro ....Linguistic prehistory in Mainland Southeast Asia: 2000 years of language and culture contact between Austroasiatic and Chamic speakers. The project focuses on the Austroasiatic language groups, Bahnaric, Katuic and Khmer, and one Austronesian, Chamic, which are located in Vietnam, Cambodia and southern Laos. These languages have been in contact for around 2000 years. I will investigate the history of language contact and change, leading to improved understanding of the particular and general processes involved, and the histories of the languages and their speakers. Outcomes will include improved reconstructions of proto-languages, papers describing in detail the typology and processes of language contact and change, and a substantial monograph on the (pre)history of Mainland Southeast Asia.Read moreRead less
The effects of sentence structure on consonant and vowel articulations. Whilst machine-generated speech is generally of good quality at the level of the single word, it is noticeably less natural-sounding at the level of the sentence. This project examines an important aspect of the naturalness of human speech, namely, the effect that sentence structure has on individual consonants and vowels. A break-down of this naturalness is seen in some speakers who have suffered traumatic brain injury: suc ....The effects of sentence structure on consonant and vowel articulations. Whilst machine-generated speech is generally of good quality at the level of the single word, it is noticeably less natural-sounding at the level of the sentence. This project examines an important aspect of the naturalness of human speech, namely, the effect that sentence structure has on individual consonants and vowels. A break-down of this naturalness is seen in some speakers who have suffered traumatic brain injury: such speakers perform well when asked to utter a short word, but struggle when asked to produce a longer string of sounds. A better understanding of the interaction between speech sounds and sentence structure will lead to improvements in the treatment of speech disorders, and in the quality of human-machine communication.Read moreRead less