 discourse levinsohn , stephen h . ; discourse features of ten languages of west-central africa ; pb . ; isbn : 0-88312 - 619 - 2 ; ix , 241pp . ; $ 30 . 00 . summer institute of linguistics and university of texas arlington . twelve contributers describe discourse features of ten niger - congo and chadic languages of cameroon and bordering countries , using data that includes folktales and other narratives . discussions include how coherence is maintained , participant reference , and markers of prominence and backgrounding . internet : academic . books @ sil . org discourse ; africa pragmatics rudanko , juhani . 1993 . pragmatic approaches to shakespeare . essays on othello , coriolanus and timon of athens . lanham , new york and london : the university press of america . field : pragmatics and its application to literature . the book develops methods of linguistic pragmatics that can , it is suggested , be applied to the study of dramatic dialogue in three shakespearean tragedies . as far as othello is concerned , the methods applied include topic analysis and case grammar analysis , the latter applied to soliloquies ; in the case of coriolanus there is a focus on speech act analysis , and as for timon of athens , it is proposed that politeness theory sheds light on themes of the play . it is argued that the practical application of methods of linguistic pragmatics contributes to a better understanding of the three plays as dramatic works of art and also leads to the further refinement of the methods themselves as tools of analysis . syntax the malfrfpirannssknir ( linguist research ) series : volume i : fridrik magnusson : kjarnafaersla og tad-innskot i aukasetningum i islensku ( topicalization and tad-insertion in subordinate clauses in icelandic ) . prize : usd 14 . the main theme of this work is a study on topicalization and tad-insertion in icelandic , the author giving a great many examples to support his theory . he works whitin the generative tradition , and begins the book with an introducion on generative grammar and x ' - theory . he also examines word order in icelandic and related languages and the methods of describing it . volume ii : eirikur rognvaldsson : um ordarod og faerslur i islensku ( on word order and movement in icelandic ) . prize : usd 14 . the author 's main subject is positional transformations in icelandic . he begins by giving an account of the basic structure of icelandic sentences , and then turns to movement , topicalization , extraposition , indefinite subject-shift , and indefinite np - shift . finally , he examines the role of movement and its constraints . to order the books from malfrfpirannssknir ( linguist research ) series , please write to : institute of linguistics university of iceland arnagardur v / sudurgotu 101 reykjavik iceland e-mail : malvis @ rhi . hi . is
