Chinese Liandong(Serial Verb) Constructions from the Perspective of Figure-Ground Relation

Empty categories,which lack phonological form and hence are not visible in the phonetic representation of the sentence,have both syntactic and semantic properties.Null subjects PRO and pro are base-generated empty categories.This thesis,based on Chomsky's theory about empty categories and research achievements made by Chinese scholars,attempts to analyze the liandong(Serial Verb) construction from Figure and Ground perspective.

Interpretation of Image in Poetry from a Perspective of Figure-ground Theory

Figure-ground theory is originated from psychology and was then introduced to cognitive linguistics.The basic principle of figure-ground theory is proximity.The figure is a theme and the background serves a foil to it.Both Chinese and English poetry use different images,some of which are figures and some are backgrounds.This paper interprets image in poetry on the basis of figure-ground theory.

Analysis of English Complex Sentences based on Figure-Ground Theory

English is a language featuring its complex sentences composed of main and subordinate clauses. The subordinate clause conveys the unfinished messages in main clause and it becomes quite complicated. English complex sentence is a fair important sentence type and also of importance in English teaching. Analyzing complex sentence based on Figure-Ground Theory, especially the Adverbial Clause, is helpful to learn English and translate it. The Figure-Ground Theory originated in psychology studies and it was introduced in cognitive linguistics to explain some language phenomena. From Figure-Ground perspective, the essay studies attributive clause,adverbial clause and nominal clause and some critical sentence types have been analyzed carefully and the major finding is Figure-Ground Theory is dynamic not static.

Cognitive Stylistic Study on Cummings's Love Lyrics——Based on Figure-Ground Theory

The style of Cummings' s poems is unique and special among the 20 th century poets. In this thesis, his love lyrics are analyzedfrom cognitive stylistics perspective and this analysis is based on the figure-ground theory. According to Talmy's classification of lan-guage events, Cummings' s love lyrics are divided into space events and time events. Then figure and ground in different poems are de-termined on the basis of features and principles of figure and ground in two kinds of events. The analysis makes it possible for readers tobuild an interest in Cummings' s love lyrics and identify the hidden emotions and contents. What's more, connotation as well as aesthet-ic values of poems can also be explored. Theory in the cognitive stylistics is applied to the appreciation of poems in this paper, whichmay help readers imagine the scene and better understand the connotation. This method provides a new perspective for poem study.Meanwhile, it offers a new pedagogical method in poem teaching in the future.

Figure-Ground Separation Using a Diffusion-Concentration Neural Network

The mechanism of diffusion and concentration of neural activity is one of the basic laws of neuronal interaction in the cerebral cortex.The evidence shows that the lateral connections between neurons in the cerebral neocortex take the following structure: the short-range lateral connections are excitatory while the long-range ones are inhibitory.This note shows that the structure of connections is able both to diffuse and to concentrate information; that is, the short-range excitatory connections

COMPUTER SIMULATIONS OF FIGURE-GROUND DISCRIMINATION IN THE VISUAL SYSTEM OF THE FLY

Figure-ground discrimination and pattern discrimination represent one of the most important problems in computer vision. Based on computational neuronal network model proposed by Reichardt et al. for figure-ground discrimination in the visual system of the fly, entire systematic computer simulations were carried out under nonstationary conditions. Results show that the model network and simulations have predictive power for behavioural experimental results. This paper proposes that motion perception and elementary pattern discrimination in human visual system may be mediated by some kind of figure-ground system with movement detectors as input layer.

Neural Network Approaches to Visual Motion Perception

This paper concerns certain difficult problems in image processing and perception: neuro-computation of visual motion information. The first part of this paper deals with the spatial physiological integration by the figure-ground discrimination neural network in the visual system of the fly. We have outlined the fundamental organization and algorithms of this neural network, and mainly concentrated on the results of computer simulations of spatial physiological integration. It has been shown that the gain control mechanism , the nonlinearity of synaptic transmission characteristic , the interaction between the two eyes , and the directional selectivity of the pool cells play decisive roles in the spatial physiological integration. In the second part, we have presented a self-organizing neural network for the perception of visual motion by using a retinotopic array of Reichardt's motion detectors and Kohonen's self-organizing maps. It .has been demonstrated by computer simulations that the network is able to learn to solve the ambiguities given by local motion detection mechanism. The resultant self-organized configuration in the output layer is resembling direction selective columns which first appear in area MT of the primate visual system. It has been explored that the spatio-temporal coherences, mapping, cooperation, competition, and Hebb rule are the basic neural principles for visual motion perception.

Teaching Syntactic Relations:A Cognitive Semiotic Perspective

This paper suggests a theoretical model for teaching syntactic relations to foreign students of English Linguistics using insights from Cognitive Grammar as developed in Langacker(e.g.1987,1991,1999) and elaborated on in Radden and Dirven(2007). The model deals with syntactic relations as participants in a prototypically structured network of events, radiating out from the experiential action chain schema(a skeletal concept of force dynamics involved in the interaction between entities)(see Langacker, 1999). This involves dealing with syntactic relations as meaning-making tools that collaborate with the verb in a regular manner manipulating the prototypical schema. The aim is to draw attention to the need to add a cognitive semiotic dimension to the teaching of sentence structure. Such a dimension exposes learners to the cognitive factors behind grammatical meaning making and may, therefore, result in a better understanding of language structure and use on the part of learners who can become English language teachers.

NEUROCOMPUTATION OF VISUAL RELATIVE MOTION INFORMATION

In this paper the neurocomputation of figure-ground relative motion information in thevisual system of the fly have been investigated in great detail by a combination of quanti-tative behavioural experiments and computational model simulations. Only torque responsesabout the vertical axis of the tethered flying flies (Musca domestica) were determined inthe behavioural experiment. The main results of behavioural experiments are: (i) The dynam-ics of the torque responses depends not only on the phase relationship between figure andbackground motion but also on the oscillation frequency of the figure and ground. (ii) Inall the phase relations tested, the time courses are a characteristic fingerprint of the partic-ular phase relationship. (iii) The variation of the amplitude of the response peaks is an espe-cially sensitive indicator for the variability of figure--ground discrimination behaviour. The main results of computer simulations are: (i) The 'computer fly', the networkmodel of both the SF-system and the LF--system with a two-dimensional array of elementarymovement detectors (EMDs) as the input layer have proved to be sufficient so far to ac-count for the main characteristics of the torque responses of the fly during stimulation withrelative motion under different conditions. (ii) The computer simulations fit the correspond-ing experimental data sufficiently well with respect to their characteristic features underdifferent stimulus conditions. (iii) The time course in computer simulation depends criticallyon the parameters n, q, T and k. The behavioural experimental results together with the computational model simulationscast a new light on an important problem: the strategies underlying the extraction of rela-tive motion information at the level of neural network.

Generalization of Figure and Ground Theory

Figure and Ground theory,stemming from psychology ,is a theory based on the principle of prominence.The theory holds that the separation principle,which is not only a basic cognitive principle of spatial organization,but also a basic cognitive prin?ciple of the conceptual content of language organization.Later,it was introduced into the language research by cognitive linguists such as Tamly,who use it to explain some grammar and language phenomena which has great inspiration for our research .This paper starts with the basic idea of figure-ground theory,namely its linguistic meaning,and then summarizes its application in the field of linguis?tics,especially in syntactic analysis.