Little Words is an interdisciplinary examination of the functions and change in the use of clitics, pronouns, determiners, conjunctions, discourse particles, auxiliary/light verbs, prepositions, and other "little words" that have played a central role in linguistic theory and in language acquisition research. Leading scholars present advanced research in phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics, discourse function, historical development, variation, and acquisition by children and adults. This unique volume integrates the views and findings of these different research areas into one professional source to be used within and across disciplines. Languages studied include English, Spanish, French, Romanian, German, Norwegian, Swedish, Slavonic, and Medieval Leonese.
Preface 1. IntroductionRonald P. Leow, Hector Campos, and Donna Lardiere Part I: History 2. From "Two" to "Both": Historical Changes in the Syntax and Meaning of Oba in SlavicAgnieszka azorczyk and Roumyana Pancheva 3. When Small Worlds Collide: Morphological Reduction and Phonological Compensation in Old Leonese ContractionsMinta Elsman and D. Eric HoltPart II: Phonology 4. Distinguishing Function Words from Content Words in Children's Oral ReadingCarol Lord, Robert Berdan, and Michael Fender5. Motivating Floating QuantifiersLisa RochmanPart III: Syntax 6. Applicative Phrases Hosting Accusative CliticsLuis Saez7.The Little DE of Degree ConstructionsRemus Gergel8. The Complementizer TheHeather Lee Taylor9. What is There When Little Words Are Not There?: Possible Implications for Evolutionary StudiesLjiljana Progovac10. Spanish Personal a and the AntidativeOmar Velazquez-Mendoza and Raul AranovichPart IV: Semantics 11.Predicting Argument Realization from Oblique Marker SemanticsJohn Beavers12. Aspect Selectors, Scales, and Contextual Operators: An Analysis of by Temporal AdjunctsMichael F. Thomas and Laura A. Michaelis13. Distributive Effects of the Plural Marker -tul in KoreanJong Un ParkPart V: Pragmatics 14. The Pragmatics of the French Discourse Markers donc and alorsStephanie Pellet15. "Little Words" in Small Talk: Some Considerations on the Use of the Pragmatic Markers man in English and macho/tio in Peninsular SpanishLaura Alba-Juez16. Little Words that Could Impact One's Impression on Others: Greetings and Closings in Institutional EmailsSigrun Biesenbach-LucasPart VI: Acquisition 17. Instructed L2 Acquisition of Differential Object Marking in SpanishMelissa Bowles and Silvina Montrul18. The Role of Pedagogical Tasks and Focus on Form in Acquisition of Discourse Markers by Advanced Language LearnersMaria Jose de la Fuente19. Article Acquisition in English, German, Norwegian, and SwedishTanja Kupisch, Merete Anderssen, Ute Bohnacker, and Neal Snape20. A Continuum in French Children's Surface Realization of AuxiliariesChristina D. Dye
