Crosslinguistically, questions frequently make crucial use of morphosyntactic elements which also occur outside of questions. Chief among these are focus, disjunctions, and wh-words with indefinite semantics. This paper provides a compositional account of the semantics of wh-, alternative, and polar questions in Yucatec Maya (YM), which are composed primarily of these elements. Key to the account is a theory of disjunctions and indefinites (extending work by others) which recognizes the inherently inquisitive nature of these elements. While disjunctions and indefinites are inquisitive, they differ from questions since they are also truth-conditionally informative. Compositionally, then, the role of focus in YM questions is to presuppose the informative component of an indefinite wh-word or disjunction, rendering the inquisitive component the question’s only new contribution to the discourse. In addition to deriving question denotations compositionally, the account also captures a potentially surprising fact: focused disjunctions in YM can function as either questions or assertions, depending solely on the discourse context.

This paper develops a formal model of correspondence between words sharing a Morphological Structure, but not sharing a lexeme. The empirical data used to advocate for this relation is explored using an analysis of nouns and verbs containing /a/ as a Root Vowel in General Modern Hebrew in positions where the corresponding form in Sephardic Modern Hebrew has a voiced pharyngeal. The emergence of Root Vowels reveals mora related generalizations: Root Vowels emerge only if their parallel paradigmatic consonant (consonant that occupies the same prosodic position in other roots of the same Morphological Structure) is in a coda position, i.e. it is moraic. The theory presented in this paper employs Output-to-Output constraints in order to account for surface phenomena which cannot be explained by standard Paradigm Uniformity theory.

In the era of globalization, the importance of English is well recognized by the Chinese government as the language will contribute to China’s modernization and competitiveness in the global economy (CMOEC, 2002). As a result, English as a Foreign Language (EFL) education in China has both a political and economic motivation (Q. Wang, 2007). To this end, this chapter is concerned with Chinese EFL teachers’ commitment to this vision, and the extent to which they embrace educational reform — in particular, innovations related to teaching of EFL reading comprehension. In this study, we discuss the development of university-level EFL teaching for students who are non-English majors, which is officially termed “College English,” highlighting some challenges to successful implementation of innovation, including cultural, contextual, and pragmatic factors. Next, we discuss the relevant literature and theoretical frameworks that underpin a study conducted in China, examining factors that account for teacher readiness to adapt to the recently introduced reform. Finally, we discuss the implications of our findings for pedagogy and teacher development, making a number of recommendations for the local Chinese context.

This book has two main objectives. One is to refine and further develop Brown and Levinson’s (1987) universal politeness theory; the other is to empirically test it using real Interlanguage data and subjects, particularly in the context of second language acquisition. To this end, theoretically refining Brown and Levinson’s (1987) theory by introducing the role of culture in expressing politeness is crucial. Furthermore, the quality of data seriously affects the validity of this study’s findings. Thus, in this chapter, I introduce a refined version of Brown and Levinson’s (1987) theory and model based on the theoretical discussion of the inclusion of culture in politeness expression. I also describe in detail the data collection process as well as the statistical test method employed.

This article ethnographically analyzes the everyday negotiations of a language policy at a private religious educational institution whose explicit educative mission is the transmission of religious beliefs, values, and practices. Specifically, it explores a Hebrew-only language policy at a Jewish day school located in New York City, and focuses on two interrelated questions: (1) how do students and teachers enact and challenge the Hebrew-only policy in daily classroom practices; and (2) how does this policy become a cultural practice in the classroom, and to what effect? My analysis highlights the paradoxical nature of religious language policy in education. Specifically, it shows that the students and teachers widely embrace the Hebrew-only policy, agreeing that Hebrew language education is critical to the educative mission of instilling Jewish identity. However, in practice, the policy presents challenges to teachers and students due to varied Hebrew proficiency among students and their teachers, and the complex reality of teaching and learning a language that is not widely known or used in the community. This tension between ideology and enactment produces a unique set of cultural practices in the school that results in questionable language learning achievements, but that paradoxically reinforces the underlying goals of the policy: a reaffirmation and strengthening of the students’ sense of religious identification. The article concludes with a discussion about the complexity of defining and implementing religious language educational policy.

Recent national reports have stressed the importance of teacher knowledge in teaching reading. However, in the past, teachers’ knowledge of language and literacy constructs has typically been assessed with instruments that are not fully tested for validity. In the present study, an instrument was developed; and its reliability, item difficulty, and item discrimination were computed and examined to identify model fit by applying exploratory factor analysis. Such analyses showed that the instrument demonstrated adequate estimates of reliability in assessing teachers' knowledge of language constructs. The implications for professional development of in-service teachers as well as preservice teacher education are also discussed.