Representation theory (RT) is a
theoretical linguistic framework in the
generative tradition, created and developed by
Edwin S. Williams – chiefly in an eponymous
monograph of 2003. Williams compares it with other frameworks such as
Noam Chomsky's
minimalist program,
and argues that his proposal has significant descriptive and conceptual advantages over them. The substance of the proposal is that linguistic derivation is the result of mappings and mismappings between an open set of 'representations', which in one dimension correspond to increasingly larger
locality domains and in the other pair '
syntactic' (sentential and sub-sentential) and '
semantic
Semantics is the study of linguistic Meaning (philosophy), meaning. It examines what meaning is, how words get their meaning, and how the meaning of a complex expression depends on its parts. Part of this process involves the distinction betwee ...
' (as well as
pragmatic) levels.
Cross-linguistic variation is then accounted for by the prioritisation of 'faithfulness' to some representations over others.
See also
*
Discourse representation theory
References
External links
Edwin S. Williamsat
Princeton University
Princeton University is a private university, private Ivy League research university in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial ...
Generative linguistics
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