Draft of Aspects of Yaghnobi Grammar « The Yaghnobi

7. NUMBERED EXAMPLES, RULES, AND FORMULAS
a. Type each numbered item on a separate indented line with the number in parentheses; indent after the number; use lowercase letters to group sets of related items:

(2)  a.  Down the hill rolled the baby carriage.
      b.  Out of the house strolled my mother’s best friend.

b. In the text, refer to numbered items as 2, 2a, 2a,b, 2(a- c).

The Problem

One of the problems I run into when writing long papers, is keeping the numbered examples synchronized with my references to them in the text of the paper. If I add an example, remove an example, or change their order, then I have to go through the whole paper and update the references.

Fortunately, Microsoft Word has a solution to that problem. If you insert a paragraph number (using the “numbered” button, right next to the bullet button) then you can insert cross-references in the text that can be automatically updated. You insert the references by clicking on ‘Insert’, ‘Reference’, ‘Cross-reference’ and then selecting the item you want to cross reference from a list box. But, there’s a potential problem. The format of the cross-reference will be the same as the format of the paragraph (example) number. If the example number has paranthesis around it, so will the cross-refernce. Here’s an example:

The suffix -tit is used to form third person plural pronouns and plural demonstrative pronouns as shown in (2).

(2)  iʃ  -tit     man -ik       or
       this -3PL   I    -3S.Poss  are
       ‘These are mine.’

This is fine, unless you’re using LSA format. In LSA format, the reference in the text should not have parenthesis around it.

The Solution

I searched everywhere for a way to control the formating of the cross-reference in Word, but there is no way to automatically remove the parenthesis. You can delete them by hand, but as soon as you update the cross-reference, the parenthesis reappear. So, my solution was to write a macro that goes through the entire document and removes parenthesis around cross-references. It won’t remove any other parenthesis. This solution has been working quite well for me. Here is the VBA macro:

Sub DeleteParensInXRef()
   Dim doc As Document
Dim fld As Field
Set doc = ActiveDocument   

For Each fld In doc.Fields
fld.Select
If fld.Type = wdFieldRef Then
fld.Result.Text = Replace(fld.Result.Text, "(", "")
fld.Result.Text = Replace(fld.Result.Text, ")", "")
      End If
   Next     

Set fld = Nothing
   Set doc = Nothing
End Sub

To add this macro to your document do the following:

1. Select the text containing the macro in this post.
2. In the ‘Tools’ menu click on ‘Macros, Visual Basic Editor’.
3. In the project pane, right click on the project with the name of your doucment and select ‘Insert’, ‘Module’
4. Double-click on the newly created module (probably named ‘Module 1′) and then right click in the editor pane and select ‘paste’.
5. Click on the tool-bar button with the floppy disk icon to save the macro with your document.
6. Close the Visual Basic editor.

To run the macro while editing your document you can click on the menu item ‘Tools’, ‘Macro’, ‘Macros…’ and then double click on ‘DeleteParensInXRef’.

November 10, 2007 Update: Once you have removed the parenthesis and are ready to print your document, you will first need to lock the cross-reference fields. If you don’t lock the fields, they will be updated when you print, and all the parenthesis will reappear. You can lock all the fields in your document by pressing CTRL-F11. You can unlock them by pressing CTRL-SHIFT-F11.

If you have any questions about how to use this macro, or suggestions for improving it, feel free to leave a comment!

Related Links

• Tech Republic, 2007, Remove Field Codes from Word Documents with this Handy Macro. I modified the VBA macro in this article to create the macro for stripping parenthesis from cross-references.
• Microsoft Office Developer Center, 2007, Word Developer Reference: wdFieldTypeEnumeration. This is where I found the name of the cross-reference field type.
• Allen Wyatt, Word Tips: Controlling the Format of Cross-References. This article didn’t solve my problem, but it solves a similar one and provides a nice VBA macro to do it.
• Travis G. Bradley, 2004, Using Microsoft Word for Writing Papers in Linguistics. Bradley presents a manual (no macro required) solution to cross-referencing data citations, but his solution is a bit awkward (requires a lot of keystroks) and leaves parenthesis around the cross-reference in the text, so the result does not exactly conform to LSA style.
• Key XL: Microsoft Word 2003 Keyboard Shortcuts.

The e-journal Language Documentation & Conservation (LD&C) was launched last month by the University of Hawai‘i Press to journal endangered language issues.

One puzzling theoretical question about Persian complex predicates is how they are represented in the mental lexicon. Since the meaning of a complex predicate is not entirely predictable based on the individual semantics of the preverb, or non-verbal element (NV) and the verb (V), it is hypothesized that NV and V must be stored in the mental lexicon as a single construct with a single meaning. But this hypothesis is complicated by the fact that in some clauses, the NV and V can be separated by other morphemes.

In this paper, I will present a hypothesis based on Construction Grammar that will: (a) account for the productivity of the Persian complex predicate constructs; (b) describe the way instances of this construction are stored in the mental lexicon; and (c) explain how they are unified with other constructions in a clause-including clauses in which the NV and V become separated.

Click this link to read more:Tajik Persian Complex Predicates.

This book will be on my list of books to read after I finish my MA Thesis.

The table of contents lists the following articles:

• What counts as evidence in linguistics? An introduction, by Martina Penke and Anette Rosenbach
• Typological evidence and Universal Grammar, by Frederick J. Newmeyer
• Remarks on the relation between language typology and Universal Grammar: Commentary on Newmeyer, by Mark Baltin
• Does linguistic explanation presuppose linguistic description?, by Martin Haspelmath
• Remarks on description and explanation in grammar: Commentary on Haspelmath, by Judith Aissen and Joan Bresnan
• Author’s response, by Martin Haspelmath
• From UG to Universals: Linguistic adaptation through iterated learning, by Simon Kirby, Kenny Smith and Henry Brighton
• Form, meaning and speakers in the evolution of language: Commentary on Kirby, Smith and Brighton, by William Croft
• Author’s response, by Simon Kirby, Kenny Smith and Henry Brighton
• Why assume UG?, by Dieter Wunderlich
• What kind of evidence could refute the UG hypothesis? Commentary on Wunderlich, by Michael Tomasello
• Author’s response: Is there any evidence that refutes the UG hypothesis?, by Dieter Wunderlich
• A question of relevance: Some remarks on standard languages, by Helmut Weiß
• The Relevance of Variation: Remarks on Weiß’s Standard-Dialect-Problem, by Horst J. Simon
• Author’s response, by Helmut Weiß
• Universals, innateness and explanation in second language acquisition, by Fred R. Eckman
• ‘Internal’ versus ‘external’ universals: Commentary on Eckman, by Lydia White
• Author’s response: ‘External’ universals and explanation in SLA, by Fred R. Eckman
• What counts as evidence in historical linguistics?, by Olga Fischer
• Abstraction and performance: Commentary on Fischer, by David W. Lightfoot
• Author’s response, by Olga Fischer

An informative journalistic description of the social and political developments in Tajikistan, Afghanistan, and Uzbekistan during the 20th century.

The book gives accounts of the turbulent, and unfortunately often violent, recent events in the region such as:

unrest and revolution in Bukhara in the second decade of the 20th century, the Tajik civil war and its resolution in the 1990s, and ongoing displacement of Tajiks due to war, forced migration, and other hardships.

Read the review at: Land Beyond the River, by Monica Whitlock « Birds’ Books