The multifaceted and heterogeneous category of common ground is central to theories of pragmatics, sociolinguistics, discourse and context. This book addresses current approaches to common ground from the novel perspective of lexical markers.

Approaches to Discourse Particles serves as a unique reference by presenting the spectrum of approaches to discourse particles / markers in their richness and variability, whilst ensuring that the differences and similarities between the approaches are clear and comparable. With the hundreds of studies now published on discourse particles / markers, it is becoming increasingly difficult to make such comparisons.

This easy-to-use guide illuminates key concepts and terms in semantics and pragmatics and the study of meaning as it is conveyed through language.

Recent developments in the European integration process have raised, amongst many other things, the issue of linguistic diversity, for some a stumbling block to the creation of a European democratic polity and its legal and social institutions. The solution to the 'question of language', involves an understanding of the role played by natural languages and the consequent design of policies and institutional mechanisms to facilitate inter-linguistic and intercultural communication. This is not an exclusively European problem, and nor is it entirely new, for it is also the problem of linguistic majorities and minorities within unitary nation-states. However, the effects of globalization and the diffusion of multiculturalism within nation-states have given renewed emphasis to the question of language in diverse societies. Facing the question anew involves reconsidering traditional ideas about social communication and the public sphere, about opinion-formation and diffusion, about the protection of cultural and linguistic minorities, and about the role that language plays in the process of formation of political and legal cultures. This volume is intended as a multidisciplinary contribution towards studying and assessing the range of problems that form the 'language question' in Europe and diverse societies.

Third or Additional Language Acquisition examines research on the acquisition of languages beyond the L2 within four main areas of inquiry: crosslinguistic influence, multilingual speech production models, the multilingual lexicon and the impact of bi/multilingualism on cognitive development.