5,662 research outputs found
On recursion
No full textIt is a truism that conceptual understanding of a hypothesis is required for its empirical investigation. However, the concept of recursion as articulated in the context of linguistic analysis has been perennially confused. Nowhere has this been more evident than in attempts to critique and extend Hauseretal's. (2002) articulation. These authors put forward the hypothesis that what is uniquely human and unique to the faculty of language—the faculty of language in the narrow sense (FLN)—is a recursive system that generates and maps syntactic objects to conceptual-intentional and sensory-motor systems. This thesis was based on the standard mathematical definition of recursion as understood by Gödel and Turing, and yet has commonly been interpreted in other ways, most notably and incorrectly as a thesis about the capacity for syntactic embedding. As we explain, the recursiveness of a function is defined independent of such output, whether infinite or finite, embedded or unembedded—existent or non-existent. And to the extent that embedding is a sufficient, though not necessary, diagnostic of recursion, it has not been established that the apparent restriction on embedding in some languages is of any theoretical import. Misunderstanding of these facts has generated research that is often irrelevant to the FLN thesis as well as to other theories of language competence that focus on its generative power of expression. This essay is an attempt to bring conceptual clarity to such discussions as well as to future empirical investigations by explaining three criterial properties of recursion: computability (i.e., rules in intension rather than lists in extension); definition by induction (i.e., rules strongly generative of structure); and mathematical induction (i.e., rules for the principled—and potentially unbounded—expansion of strongly generated structure). By these necessary and sufficient criteria, the grammars of all natural languages are recursive
Dr. Jeffrey Hass – Faculty Author Interview
No full textDr. Jeffrey Hass, Associate Professor of Sociology, discusses his new book, Power, Culture, and Economic Change in Russia: To the Undiscovered Country of Post-Socialism, 1988-2008. Utilizing cutting-edge theory and unique data, this book examines the role of power, culture, and practice in Russia’s story of post-socialist economic change, and provides a framework for addressing general economic change
Providence College Faculty Author Series 2018-2019: Jeffrey Johnson
No full textIn this installment of the Faculty Authors Series, Jeffrey Johnson (History, Providence College) discusses his newest book, The 1916 Preparedness Day Bombing: Anarchy and Terrorism in Progressive Era America
Providence College Faculty Author Series 2018-2019: Jeffrey Johnson
No full textIn this installment of the Faculty Authors Series, Jeffrey Johnson (History, Providence College) discusses his newest book, The 1916 Preparedness Day Bombing: Anarchy and Terrorism in Progressive Era America
Language Is a “Quite Useless” Tool: A Rejoinder to Fedorenko, Piantadosi, and Gibson’s “Language Is Primarily a Tool for Communication Rather Than Thought”
No full textContrary to the prevailing assumption that language is “primarily a tool for communication rather than thought”, I argue that language is, to invoke Oscar Wilde, “quite useless”. Arguing from aesthetic philosophy and the minimalist program for linguistic theory, I conject that language, like art, is not “for” anything—it simply is, conforming to aesthetic rather than utilitarian principles. Of course, like art, language can be a powerful instrument of communication, but its function is not that of expressing thought; it creates thoughts, “primarily” for communicating with oneself, engaging in Popperian critical rationalism, making thoughts (e.g., sentences, constructive proofs) to match Platonic objects (e.g., propositions, classical proofs)
Books piece on a reading by Jeffrey Lent, author of Lost Nation, that will b
No full textBooks piece on a reading by Jeffrey Lent, author of Lost Nation, that will be presented at the Portland Public Library July 31
University of Texas at Arlington (U. T. A.) President Spaniolo with author Jeffrey Toobin
No full textUniversity of Texas at Arlington (U. T. A.) President Spaniolo with author Jeffrey Toobin, legal analyst for The New Yorker, 03/2010https://mavmatrix.uta.edu/specialcollections_spaniolomaterials/1038/thumbnail.jp
An examination of materialism, conspicuous consumption and gender differences
No full textPeer reviewe
New Insights into Materialism and Conspicuous Consumption in China
No full textThis paper provides insights based on recent literature and findings that relate to materialism and conspicuous consumption among Chinese consumers. There is a specific focus on gender related issues and implications on consumer well-being. Our work is intended to assist in both conceptual and hypothesis development for other interested scholars.Peer reviewe
Enacting Ethnicity: Yiddishkeit Masked and Unmasked on the Contemporary American Stage
No full textTwo recent productions of American dramas employed provocative strategies for enacting Jewish ethnicity: National Asian American Theatre Company’s performance of Clifford Odets’s Awake and Sing! with an all-Asian American cast and New Yiddish Rep’s staging of Toyt fun a seylsman, a Yiddish translation of Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman. Each production entails a different approach to performing Jewishness that exemplifies these companies’ respective artistic agendas regarding the enactment of ethnicity, resulting in complex performances of masking and unmasking Jewishness. Moreover, their analysis illuminates how ethnicity is conceptualized and realized in the United States in the early decades of the twenty-first century. Yiddish appears strategically, if often obliquely, in the histories of composition, production, and reception for both dramas, emblematic of shifting notions of enacting ethnicity.Peer reviewe
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