This book provides a new perspective on prosodically marked declaratives, wh-exclamatives, and discourse particles in the Madrid variety of Spanish. It argues that some marked forms differ from unmarked forms in that they encode modal evaluations of the at-issue meaning. Two epistemic evaluations that can be shown to be encoded by intonation in Spanish are obviousness and mirativity, which present the at-issue meaning as expected and unexpected, respectively. An empirical investigation via a production experiment finds that they are associated with distinct intonational features under constant focus scope, with stances of (dis)agreement showing an impact on obvious declaratives. Wh-exclamatives are found not to differ significantly in intonational marking from neutral declaratives, showing that they need not be miratives. Moreover, we find that intonational marking on different discourse particles in natural dialogue correlates with their meaning contribution without being fully determined by it. In part, these findings quantitatively confirm previous qualitative findings on the meaning of intonational configurations in Madrid Spanish. But they also add new insights on the role intonation plays in the negotiation of commitments and expectations between interlocutors.

English sentence prosody provides cues to both focus structure and speaker attitude. Taking the phonological model of intonation developed by Pierrehumbert (1880 et seq.) as point of departure, this work illuminates the communicative function of English pitch contours by (1) giving a detailed survey of phrase-final contours found in statements and questions, and (2) investigating what attitudinal features determine choice of phrasal tones in these utterance types. This comprehensive study will be of interest to linguists in a number of fields, ranging from prosody to semantics, pragmatics, and discourse analysis.

Insubordinate clauses present a challenge for grammatical analysis. This is owed to their unusual combination of subordinate structure with main clause use. This volume brings together a collection of articles on the form and function of insubordination in a range of languages – providing an up-to-date overview of current research on the topic.

Intonation, rhythm, and general “melody” of language are among the first aspects of speech that infants attend to and produce themselves. Yet, these same features are among the last to be mastered by adult L2 learners. Why is this, and how can L2 learners be helped? This book first presents the latest linguistic theories of intonation, in particular, how intonation functions in discourse not only to signal sentence types and attitudinal meanings but also to provide turn-taking and other conversational cues. The second part of the book examines the research in applied linguistics on the acquisition of L2 phonology and intonation. The third section offers practical applications of how to incorporate the teaching of intonation into L2 instruction, with a focus on using new speech technologies. The accompanying CD-ROM makes a unique addition in allowing for simultaneous audio playback and visual display of the pitch contours of utterances contained in the book. Users can start or stop the playback at any point in the utterance and can observe first-hand how such visual and audio representations could be useful for L2 learners.

Pragmatics – the study of language in context, and of how we understand what other people say – is a core subject in English language, linguistics, and communication studies. This textbook introduces the key topics in this fast-moving field, including metaphor, irony, politeness, disambiguation, and reference assignment. It walks the reader through the essential theories in pragmatics, including Grice, relevance theory, speech act theory, and politeness theory. Each chapter includes a range of illustrative examples, guiding readers from the basic principles to a thorough understanding of the topics. A dedicated chapter examines how research is conducted in pragmatics, providing students with resources and ideas for developing their own projects. Featuring exercises, a comprehensive glossary, and suggestions for further reading, this book is accessible to beginner undergraduates, including those with no prior knowledge of linguistics. It is an essential resource for courses in English language, English studies, and linguistics.

This book is an introduction to the relationship between the morphosyntactic properties of sentences and their associated illocutionary forces or force potentials. The volume begins with several chapters dedicated to important theoretical and methodological issues, such as sentence and utterance meaning, illocutionary force, clause types, and cross-linguistic comparison. The bulk of the book is then composed of chapter-length case studies that systematically investigate typologically prominent clause types and their forces, such as declaratives and assertions, interrogatives and questions, and imperatives and commands. These case studies begin with an overview of the necessary theoretical foundations, followed by a discussion of the grammatical structures of English, and an assessment of the relevant cross-linguistic facts. Each chapter ends with a succinct summary of the most important findings, practice exercises, and recommendations for further reading and research. Overall, the book works towards developing a gradient model of clause types that goes substantially beyond the traditional distinction between major and minor clause types. It draws on insights from linguistics, philosophy, and sociology, and may be used as a textbook for undergraduate or graduate courses in semantics, pragmatics, and morphosyntax.

The revised edition of David Brazil's seminal work The Communicative Value of Intonation in English.

Your inner Chimp can be your best friend or your worst enemy...this is the Chimp Paradox Do you sabotage your own happiness and success? Are you struggling to make sense of yourself? Do your emotions sometimes dictate your life? Dr. Steve Peters explains that we all have a being within our minds that can wreak havoc on every aspect of our lives—be it business or personal. He calls this being "the chimp," and it can work either for you or against you. The challenge comes when we try to tame the chimp, and persuade it to do our bidding. The Chimp Paradox contains an incredibly powerful mind management model that can help you be happier and healthier, increase your confidence, and become a more successful person. This book will help you to: —Recognize how your mind is working —Understand and manage your emotions and thoughts —Manage yourself and become the person you would like to be Dr. Peters explains the struggle that takes place within your mind and then shows you how to apply this understanding. Once you're armed with this new knowledge, you will be able to utilize your chimp for good, rather than letting your chimp run rampant with its own agenda.

David Brazil's pioneering work on the grammar of spoken discourse ended at A Grammar Of Speech (1995) due to his untimely death. Gerard O'Grady picks up the baton in this book and tests the description of used language against a spoken corpus. He incorporates findings from the last decade of corpus linguistics study, notably concerning phrases and lexical items larger than single orthographic words and ellipsis. He demonstrates the added communicative significance that the incorporation of two systems of intonation ('Key' and 'Termination') bring to the grammar. O'Grady reviews the literature and covers the theory before moving on to a practical, analytic section. His final chapter reviews the arguments, maps the road ahead and lays out the practical applications of the grammar. The book will be of great interest to researchers in applied linguistics, discourse analysis and also EFL/ESL.