Barbara H. Partee has played a central role in developing the now-flourishing field of formal semantics, bringing the formal semantic approach developed by logicians together with a linguistically sophisticated account of the syntax of natural languages. She has continued to be a major contributor to semantics, offering general ideas that have helped to clarify the character of the enterprise as well as imaginative and persuasive detailed analyses. Compositionality in Formal Semantics is a collection of Partee's papers that have been influential in the field but are not all readily available, and includes a new introductory essay in which Partee reflects on how her thinking and the field of semantics have developed over the past 35 years. This collection is invaluable both for understanding the history and evolution of the field and for its contribution to ongoing research.
The theory of formal languages is widely accepted as the backbone of theoretical computer science. It mainly originated from mathematics (combinatorics, algebra, mathematical logic) and generative linguistics. All human problem solving capabilities can be considered in a certain sense as a manipulation of symbols and structures composed by symbols, which is actually the stem of formal language theory. Language – in its two basic forms, natural and artificial – is a particular case of a symbol system.
Edited by: Fruchtzwerg - 24 October 2008
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Comparison across formal languages is an essential part of formal linguistics. The study of closely-related varieties has proven extremely useful in illuminating relations between cross-linguistic syntactic differences that might otherwise appear unrelated, and has helped to identify the core principles of Universal Grammar.
Syntactic Theory: A Formal Introduction is unlike any other
introductory textbook on the market. Targeting students with strong
formal/mathematical skills, but assuming no particular previous
background, this book focuses on the development of precisely
formulated grammars whose empirical predictions can be directly tested.
The book begins with the inadequacy of context-free phrase structure
grammars, motivating the introduction of feature structures, types and
type constraints as ways of expressing linguistic generalizations. Step
by step, students are led to discover a grammar that covers the core
areas of English syntax that have been central to syntactic theory in
the last quarter century, including: complementation, control, 'raising
constructions', passives, the auxiliary system, and the analysis of
long distance dependency constructions. Special attention is given to
the treatment of dialect variation, especially with respect to African
American Vernacular English, which has been of considerable interest
with regard to the educational practice of American school systems.
On the Pragmatics of Communication
Jürgen Habermas
Edited by Maeve Cooke
Jürgen Habermas's program in formal pragmatics fulfills two main functions. First, it serves as the theoretical underpinning for his theory of communicative action, a crucial element in his theory of society. Second, it contributes to ongoing philosophical discussion of problems concerning meaning, truth, rationality, and action. By the "pragmatic" dimensions of language, Habermas means those pertaining specifically to the employment of sentences in utterances. He makes clear that "formal" is to be understood in a tolerant sense to refer to the rational reconstruction of general intuitions or competences. Formal pragmatics, then, aims at a systematic reconstruction of the intuitive linguistic knowledge of competent subjects as it is used in everyday communicative practices. His program may thus be distinguished from empirical pragmatics--for example, sociolinguistics--which looks primarily at particular situations of use.
This anthology brings together for the first time, in revised or new translation, ten essays that present the main concerns of Habermas's program in formal pragmatics. Its aim is to convey a sense of the overall purpose of his linguistic investigations while introducing the reader to their specific details, in particular to his theories of meaning, truth, rationality, and action.
