11 research outputs found
Nominal and verbal gerunds in Present-day English: Aspectual features and nominal status
No full textIn this paper we want to add to the comparative description of Present-day English nominal and verbal gerundive nominalizations, by presenting the results of a quantitative, corpus-based analysis of their aspectual features. It will be shown that, in general, the claim that gerunds designate unbounded activities or activities that are in progress cannot be upheld – because a significant number of both nominal and verbal gerunds denote non-durative situations (achievements, semelfactives) or telic ones (accomplishments), and because most gerunds lack explicit markers of ‘completeness’ or ‘ongoingness’. As regards the distinction between nominal and verbal gerunds, it will be shown that nominal gerunds are attested significantly more often with activities and are more often explicitly marked for temporal bounding or for ongoingness, whereas, compared to nominal gerunds, verbal gerunds represent significantly more often achievements or semelfactives and they are more often than nominal gerunds neutral or unmarked in terms of temporal bounding. These findings are shown to tie in with a number of recent functional-semantic accounts of the English gerund and shed new light on the categorial gradience between nominal and verbal gerunds.sponsorship: The research presented in this paper has been made possible by the FWO-grant G0A5412N "The development of nominal and verbal gerunds from Middle to Late Modern English: Towards a semantic and discourse -functional analysis" (Anouk Buyle) and by KU Leuven Research Fund grant OT/13/045 "The use of nominal and verbal gerunds in Present-day English. A multifunctional comparative analysis" (Charlotte Maekelberghe). (FWO|G0A5412N, KU Leuven Research Fund|OT/13/045)status: Publishe
Meaning in a changing paradigm: the semantics of you and the pragmatics of thou
No full textMany European languages have two pronouns for singular address. For such languages, Brown and Gilman (1960) propose a model that can explain pronominal choice, arguing that the pronouns allow speakers to construe the speaker-hearer relation with respect to two major social dimensions–power and solidarity. Pronominal choice then functions as a major resource for realizing social deixis in dialogic interaction. However, discussions of the Modern English thou/you contrast have criticized the power-and-solidarity model by emphasizing the language-specific peculiarities of the Modern English system. Thou and you appear to deviate in meaning from the second person pronouns in other languages. You can be used to address virtually anyone and in many contexts seems to be a neutral form, rather than a form signalling speaker deference or social distance. Thou is associated with emotional language and seems to express speaker agitation. However, in this paper we argue that the peculiarities of the Modern English system may have been overstated. Using evidence from dialogic interactions in Modern English comedies, it is shown that as long as thou is available as a systemic option, you retains its value of signalling deference or social distance, even in contexts where thou could not appear. As for thou, it is argued that the association with speaker agitation can be interpreted as a pragmatic side effect of the form's dwindling frequency. Both arguments bring the Modern English thou/you contrast back closer in line with the general power-and-solidarity model.sponsorship: We are grateful to the editors of Language Sciences, the guest editors of this volume and the anonymous reviewers who commented on an earlier version of this paper. We would also like to thank the audience at ICEHL19 in Duisburg-Essen, as well as Minna Nevala, Teresa Fanego, Kristin Davidse and Jean-Christophe Verstraete, who offered helpful comments on our work at various stages. The first author gratefully acknowledges the financial support of the FWO-Research Foundation Flanders. Finally, our paper contributes to a collaboration funded by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (grant FFI2014-52188-P; PI: Teresa Fanego). (FWO-Research Foundation Flanders, Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness|FFI2014-52188-P)status: Publishe
Come here vs. will you come here: A corpus investigation of the social value of requests
No full textCome here vs. will you come here: A corpus investigation of the social value of requests
No full textCome here vs. will you come here: A corpus investigation of the social value of requests
No full textReflectance transformation imaging, outil de documentationet moyen d'investigation en conservation-restauration des documents graphiques
No full textsponsorship: RICH Project, KU Leuven
Illuminare, Centre for the Research of Medieval Art
http://www.illuminare.be/rich_project
https://portablelightdome.wordpress.com/author/portablelightdome/
The RICH project is funded by the Hercules Foundation (2012-2018)status: Publishe
Nominal and verbal gerunds in present-day English: aspectual features and nominal status
No full textToward a complete reemployment of aggregates from demolition work in situ
No full textThe recycled concrete aggregates (RCA) produced by the demolition of old buildings seem to be an option in order to construct new buildings and to preserve the environment by the reusing of inert materials, reducing the resort to the natural materials and the disposal in landfills. Numerous countries are multiplying studies concerning this subject and evolving their regulations consequently. These days, it seems fundamental to go further in the environmental protection by minimizing the impact of road transport through the implementation, on the same urban site, of the following process: in a first phase the demolition, then recycling, then storing and finally reconstructing the buildings. In fact, the increase of the recovery rates of recycled concrete aggregates seems globally meeting the current environmental constraints. However, the transportation of the demolition wastes from the site to the recycling plant and potentially their return are still problems, which are not correctly considered in environmental assessments. Research of the briefest possible short loop is not really developing in France. This study is devoted to understanding the stumbling blocks to this development. If the aim of the financial viability of the short loop is obvious, the study shows that the complexity of project building in urban refurbishment is the first block to remove. The role of the various operators of the project doesn’t comply with the global coherence provided by short loop circuits. The study highlights several technical blocks concerning the recycling organization in situ, the storing of recycled concrete aggregates and finally their reuse in order to produce new concretes
Prospective multicentre feasibility study of a quality of care indicator for intravenous to oral switch therapy with highly bioavailable antibiotics
No full textBackground: Enhanced oral (po) bioavailability of antimicrobial drugs allows conversion to po therapy once a patient meets defined clinical criteria. This can reduce length of hospital stay, healthcare costs and risk of complications related to intravenous (iv) access. We developed a quality indicator for assessing the appropriate iv-to-po switch of bioavailable antibiotics and evaluated its feasibility and clinical relevance across acute healthcare systems. Methods: The study was designed as a multicentre, multinational observational audit. The indicator was the proportion of inappropriate iv treatments at any point in time in adult patients treated with fluoroquinolones, clindamycin, linezolid or metronidazole. Treatments were prospectively evaluated by a trained physician or clinical pharmacist using predefined clinical criteria. The feasibility of the indicator was evaluated by measuring data availability, data collection workload and sensitivity to improvement. Results: Data were collected over a 3 month period in five university hospitals in Austria, Belgium and Germany and iv treatment was assessed in 211 patients. The indicator was measurable in 99.1% of cases. By intention-to-treat analysis, 37.0% (95% CI 30.5-43.9) of treatments were inappropriate, ranging from 17.5% to 53.8% across hospitals. The median time needed for case assessment and documentation was 29 min. Conclusions: This quality indicator was found to be generally feasible in hospitals across three European countries, and informative about the local need for clinical quality improvement. © The Author 2012. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the British Society for Antimicrobial Chemotherapy. All rights reserved.SCOPUS: ar.jinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishe
