Copulas: universals in the categorization of the lexicon

This Cross-linguistic Study Addresses The Existing Bias Against The Study Of The Copula, Taking Issue With Both Accepted Definitions And Descriptions. The Author Presents An Analysis Of Grammatical Descriptions Of Over 160 Languages Drawn From The Language Families Of The World. 1. Copulas In Current Research -- 1.1. The Copula Paradox -- 1.2. Definition Of 'copula' -- 1.3. The Parts-of-speech Issue -- 1.4. A Possible Theoretical Approach To Copularization -- 2. Copulas In Cross-linguistic Perspective -- 2.1. Scope Of The Investigation -- 2.2. Copula Dropping -- 2.3. The Global Sample -- 2.4. A Universal Hierarchy Of Copularization -- 2.5. The Copularization Scale And Contemporary Research On Lexical Categorization -- 3. Copularization And Lexical Semantics -- 3.1. Copularization And Time-stability: A Pilot Study -- 3.2. Copularization And Lexical Semantics: Method Of Investigation -- 3.3. Lexical Minimal Pairs And Semantic Features -- 3.4. Statistics -- 4. The Multi-factor Model Of Copularization -- 4.1. The Limited Predictive Power Of Semantics -- 4.2. Migration Of Copulas In The Lexicon -- 4.3. Combining The Parameters -- 4.4. The Cognitive Basis: Prototypes -- 4.5. A Scalar Model Of The Lexicon -- 4.6. Discourse Frequency -- 5. Synopsis -- 5.1. Copularization And Markedness -- 5.2. Towards A New Approach To The Parts-of-speech Issue -- App. A. Genetic Affiliation Of The Languages Quoted -- App. B. Pilot Study/semantic Classification -- App. C. Pilot Study/statistics -- App. D. Questionnaire -- App. E. The Semantic Structure Of The Lexical Samples -- App. F. Copula Use And Semantic Similarity Space. Regina Pustet. Includes Bibliographical References (p. [248]-258) And Index.