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28 Jun 2010
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Analytical paper on Frankenstein

Thesis - 2 pages - Linguistics & languages

In Mary Shelley's novel Frankenstein, she discusses many of the tensions between the exceptional individual, referring to the monster Victor Frankenstein created, and society. It is easily compared to acclaimed author John Stuart Mill's book, On Liberty. In his novel he emphasizes the importance...

28 Feb 2010
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Dynamics and characteristics of language evolution

Thesis - 2 pages - Linguistics & languages

The development of language was both supported by and supplementary to the evolution of “fully modern” human intelligence. Lingual evolution can be divided into its anatomical and social developments, so that there is a distinction between language as an anatomical capacity, and...

16 Feb 2010
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Evolutionary phonology: Review, assess and critique evolutionary phonology: The emergence of sound platforms by Juliette Blevins

Thesis - 20 pages - Linguistics & languages

Phonology is essentially the examination of sound patterns of languages and in every language, sound patterns will inherently characterize composition of words and phrases. These sound patterns will encompass contrasts in expression, distribution of features and variable contextual realizations....

18 May 2009
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The religion card

Thesis - 5 pages - Linguistics & languages

Marx's theory of the trajectory of the dialectic relationship between the bourgeoisie and proletariat argues that internal homogeneity within each class is a crucial prerequisite to class action/revolution. This is because internal homogeneity gives rise to class consciousness within each class;...

17 May 2009
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Linguistic diversity in Europe: Strength or weakness?

Case study - 5 pages - Linguistics & languages

In 1919, after many debates, the British Prime Minister David Lloyd George concluded that the Versailles treaty would be written both in French and English. Since then, English has imposed itself in diplomacy, economic exchanges, Medias and so on. Nowadays, it seems that this language has gained...

17 May 2009
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The place of the French language in our society

Thesis - 11 pages - Linguistics & languages

The French language is one those languages which are spoken all around the world. It's the 11th most used language through the world, the second most commonly-taught second language in the world (after English) and the official language in 29 countries . According to some estimations, more than...

27 Apr 2009
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Foreign language inadequacies in America

Thesis - 7 pages - Linguistics & languages

What do you call a person who speaks more than two languages? Multilingual. What do you call a person who speaks two languages? Bilingual. And what do you call a person who only speaks one language? An American. So goes the oft-told joke, particularly loved by my European friends (all of whom...

16 Apr 2009
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Fighting fire with fire

Tutorials/exercises - 4 pages - Linguistics & languages

The antebellum viewpoint on slavery remains controversial. Presaging the Civil War, a fierce political debate took place between the Southern defenders of slavery and the Northern abolitionists. The two sides argued over the political, economic, social, religious, biological, and racial...

15 Apr 2009
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Barack Obama's use of the indefinite article /a/

Thesis - 6 pages - Linguistics & languages

The purpose of my research project was to examine Barack Obama's use of and pronunciation of the indefinite article /a/ during his speeches for the 2008 presidential campaign. I examined this element because I wanted to find out if there was any correlation between Obama's use of the indefinite...

07 Apr 2009
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Kristevan themes in "Sula" and "The Bluest Eye"

Thesis - 6 pages - Linguistics & languages

When Morrison describes her attempt to express black feminine subjectivity in The Bluest Eye, she claims that, “the problem, of course, was language”(211). According to Morrison, “ ‘civilized' languages debase humans”(Afterward, 216). Pauline, Pecola's mother, finds...

26 Feb 2009
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Breaking up the body: Dissecting the Baroque period

Thesis - 7 pages - Linguistics & languages

During the Baroque period, things fell apart; the center of beliefs, institutions, and truisms could no longer hold. Indeed, not even one's body was free of speculation, debate, and change; with scientific discoveries and experiments, as well as the thinkers and philosophers challenging...

16 Jan 2009
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The difference between sentences that are evaluated by linguistic significance alone and sentences that are evaluated by linguistic significance and other circumstances

Essay - 16 pages - Linguistics & languages

Significant differences among sentences of natural language certainly occur. It is not a matter of theoretical philosophy or theoretical linguistics but simply common sense. The difference I would like to focus on is the one between sentences that are evaluated using linguistic significance alone...

10 Sep 2008
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The Mohawk people

Essay - 7 pages - Linguistics & languages

The Mohawk are survivors. From the days of their early ancestors to the present day, the Mohawk have dwindled in number but have lived on. This is an exploration of the history and culture of the Mohawk. In this paper I will attempt to explain the past and present state of the Mohawk nation:...

09 Sep 2008
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Language evolution: Anthropology

Essay - 8 pages - Linguistics & languages

Its tops, it's the queens square, it's fabulous, it's cool, it's off the hook. All of these phrases mean the same thing, “It's great”. This is one of many phrases that have taken the twists and turns of the ages through our youth. Throughout history human language continues to evolve...

04 Aug 2008
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Second language processing and the access question

Essay - 8 pages - Linguistics & languages

The rest of the paper will be spent expositing and, when necessary, critiquing, some of the literature on second language processing. I will pay particular attention to the recent Shallow Structure Hypothesis (SSH), due to Clahsen and Felser. In contrast to squabbles about the vague notion of...

01 Aug 2008
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Multiple Wh -Questions: Logical form and paired list readings

Essay - 10 pages - Linguistics & languages

In her paper “Multiple Wh Questions,” Veneeta Dayal takes a comprehensive approach to the topic of questions involving multiple wh-elements. She begins the paper by discussing the way in which a study of multiple wh-questions might provide valuable insight into important theoretical...

30 Jul 2008
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Linguistic adaptation, English instruction, and the second generation Latino immigrant

Tutorials/exercises - 6 pages - Linguistics & languages

Since colonial times, the U.S. has been a nation both divided and united by its ethnic and linguistic diversity. Benjamin Franklin himself regarded the German minority of Pennsylvania as linguistically and racially inferior, yet also printed the first German newspaper in Philadelphia (Baron,...

19 Jun 2008
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A Radial Category Perspective on Mandarin Verb Complements

Essay - 6 pages - Linguistics & languages

In his treatment of Claudia Brugman's work on the English preposition over, Lakoff (1987) extends Brugman's analysis of that preposition as a radial category, one in which the different meanings of the word can be described in terms of a category structured radically, containing with a central...

19 Jun 2008
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The Rhetoric of Growth in Colorado: Reconciling Perceptions and Reality

Essay - 8 pages - Linguistics & languages

In 1990, Colorado was a state of about 3.3 million (U.S. Census Bureau, 2001b). By 2000, Colorado's population had grown to 4,301,261 (U.S. Census Bureau, 2001b). Colorado's new residents spurred development in areas once sparsely inhabited. The population of Superior in Boulder County, for...

19 Jun 2008
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Gender Representation and the Curation of Chicano Visions

Essay - 3 pages - Linguistics & languages

The Chicano Art Movement began in part as an effort on the part of Chicanos to take agency in their own representation. Before the Movement, most available representation of Mexicans and Mexican-Americans cast them in a negative light — often as servile or violent (Davalos 3). It is...

19 Jun 2008
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The Making of an Official Language : Chaofen Sun

Essay - 6 pages - Linguistics & languages

The foundation for the unification of Chinese has already come into being. It is none other than the standard form of Modern Chinese with the Beijing phonological system as its norm of pronunciation, Northern dialects as its base dialects, and looking to exemplary modern works in vernacular...

21 May 2008
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A Common Tongue: A Bit About Dialects in a Language

Essay - 3 pages - Linguistics & languages

Dialect is a variety of language used by people from a particular geographic area. This language is a complete system of verbal communication with its own vocabulary and grammar (“Dialect”).In America today, the common language is English. But what does English mean? While Standard...

18 Apr 2008
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The Humanity of the Greek Gods

Essay - 3 pages - Linguistics & languages

If you lived in Athens, Greece around the time when the great poet Homer lived, you probably would be acquainted with the many Greek gods. Homer's written compilation of the epic poems The Iliad and The Odyssey, which were formerly only told through oral tradition, would be easy for you to...

04 Jan 2008
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Are Theories Incommensurable Due to the Untranslatability of One Scientific Language to Another?

Essay - 3 pages - Linguistics & languages

The most famous exponent of the theory of incommensurability is Thomas Kuhn. To state his theory in the simplest form, incommensurability is simply the idea that theories within science are not compatible, and that the languages they use are, at least in part, mutually untranslatable. This is...

04 Jan 2008
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Does the Argument from the Systematicity of Thought to the Language of Thought Hypothesis Work?

Essay - 3 pages - Linguistics & languages

One of the main arguments to support the language of thought hypothesis (LOTH), as proposed by Fodor (1975), is that of the systematicity of thought. This argument consists of the idea that the ability to entertain certain thoughts is linked to the ability to entertain certain other thoughts....

04 Jan 2008
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Surf's Up, Dude: Cowabunga

Tutorials/exercises - 3 pages - Linguistics & languages

The mission lies before us: how are we, the American people, going to come together so that “cowabunga” is reinvigorated into mainstream conversation. It was not too terribly long ago, maybe 15 years, that this delightfully lighthearted interjection tickled the ears of various...

03 Jan 2008
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A Systematic Method for Interpreting Novel Compounds

Tutorials/exercises - 3 pages - Linguistics & languages

A novel word is one that is not found in the lexicon of the general population; in other words, it is a word that people have not heard or seen previously. A novel compound is a compound word formed out of two or more individual known words where the combination of these words has not previously...

03 Jan 2008
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Syntactic Movement and Locative Incorporation in Exocentric Compounds

Tutorials/exercises - 3 pages - Linguistics & languages

Most people will agree that there are two main types of compound words, endocentric and exocentric. Endocentric compounds are those where the rightmost constituent, called the grammatical head, is what defines the category of speech and the semantic interpretation of the word. Exocentric...

17 Dec 2007
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The Prominence of "ANIMAL for HUMAN" Metaphor

Essay - 3 pages - Linguistics & languages

The role metaphor plays in language is viewed differently by scholars in different fields. The extremes are the classical view based on Aristotle's writings about metaphor and the Romantic view. Those that follow the classical view see metaphor as a purely literary device used to decorate...

17 Dec 2007
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The Morpho-Semantics of English Compound Words: Formation, Meaning and Productivity

Essay - 3 pages - Linguistics & languages

The ability to compound words in the English language has always been a very productive method of adding new words to the lexicon. Compound words are generally formed in one of two ways, as root compounds or synthetically. Whichever way they are formed, the rightmost constituent is always the...