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OBJECTIVES

OBJECTIVES

The expression of Evidentiality and Modality in English and other European Languages: Cross-linguistic perspectives. (EUROEVIDMOD)

 

The project aims to establish a unified account and create a database of evidential and modal markers in English in comparison to Spanish and other languages in Spain (Basque, Catalan, and Galician), and some other European languages (Dutch, French, German, modern Greek, Italian, Lithuanian, Polish).

 

The main objectives of the project are the following:

  • Creation of a database of grammatical and lexical evidential and modal markers for each of the languages studied. Once completed, the database will be accessible to other researchers in the field.

  • Organization of a conference on evidentiality and modality in European languages: EMEL’14, 6-8th October 2014

  • Theoretical and applied studies on a number of issues that have remained largely unresolved in the fields of evidentiality and modality:

    • The definition of the domains of modality and evidentiality: the status of these conceptual domains and of the linguistic means serving for their expression, and the criteria for differentiation of evidential and modal meanings.

    • The delimitation of the subdomains of evidentiality and epistemic modality.

    • The semantics and pragmatics of evidential and modal markers: distinction between core semantic meanings and pragmatically implied meaning components.

    • Variation of evidential and modal markers in different discourse types and genres.

  • Publication of a collective volume that will include theoretical studies, aiming to provide answers to the issues posed above, and cross-linguistic studies on the various languages studied in this project.