Carolina Working Papers in Linguistics

Table of Contents:
 

Reviewers:
On behalf of the contributors to the Carolina Working Papers, we wish to thank the following individuals who took their valuable time to review the submissions:

Steve Gross, University of South Carolina
Rick Hallett, University of South Carolina
Barbara Hancin-Bhatt, University of South Carolina
D. Eric Holt, University of South Carolina
Melanie Moll, University of South Carolina
Michael Montgomery, University of South Carolina
Gert Webelhuth, University of North Carolina

Abstract:

Title: Lithuanian Turn-Taking 'in a Word'
Author: Richard W. Hallett, Northeastern Illinois University, Ph.D. from University of South Carolina
(Click on the relevant type of file to download the whole paper: pdf )

In the last thirty years, linguistic anthropologists and ethnographers have done a great deal of analysis of various aspects of English conversations, e.g. turn-taking, repair, overlap. While these anlyses have led to keen insights into communication among speakers of English, some of the more fascinating research has come from cross-cultural/cross-linguistic comparisons of conversations in English to conversations in other languages. From such comparisons, we begin to question the notion of universality in conversations, e.g. cross-linguistic differences in accommodation (Ochs 1988). In this paper a single conversation in Lithuanian is analyzed. Specifically, the turn-taking devices employed by two native speakers of a Baltic language are presented to show the cross-linguistic convergence and divergence of this aspect of conversation.

 Abstract:

Title: Markedness in Messiah's Libretto: Explaining the Standard Set
Author: Catherine C. Mikell, University of South Carolina
(Click on the relevant type of files to download the paper:
pdf MSWord'97)

This study focuses on the relationship between the changes made to Scripture in the composition of the Messiah libretto and the popularity of certain songs resulting oratorio.  I employ Myers-Scotton's Markedness Model (1993, 1998) along with Sperber & Wilson's concept of implicatures (1986, 1995) in order to explain how certain syntactic changes affect why some songs are more popular than others. Librettist Charles Jennens and composer Frideric Handel made these changes to Scripture in order to remove focus from complex syntactic structures of individual phrases and to emphasize the complex structure of the story of Christian faith on which this oratorio is focused. Based on a set of six syntactic change categories, this analysis shows that changes related to contraction, expansion, leveling, parallelism, and alternatives occur as marked or unmarked in relation to the popularity of the song; that is, these changes occur frequently in popular songs and thus represent the norm. Ultimately, however, this analysis is inconclusive in discovering the full explanation for the songs' popularity since here is a great deal of semantic/syntactic complexity as well as a wealth of theological background which also have an undeniable influence on the 'standard set' of popular songs in Handel's Messiah.