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Embedded imperatives: Empirical evidence from Colloquial German
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 January 2026
Extract
We offer experimental data from Colloquial German that involve imperative morphology in speech reports and in the scope of WH-elements. We confirm two independent restrictions on these phenomena, whose statistical significance provides evidence for the existence of embedded imperatives in Colloquial German in general.
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- Copyright © 2013 Linguistic Society of America
Footnotes
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We would like to thank Eva Csipak, Matt Goldrick, Anke Holler, William Snyder, and Thomas Weskott for sharing their expertise on experimental design, evaluation, and presentation. For comments on previous versions we would like to thank the audiences of colloquia and workshops at the University of Connecticut, Kyoto University, and Göttingen University, as well as the editorial team of Language, in particular, Lisa Matthewson and Gregory Carlson, and two anonymous referees. Any remaining errors and shortcomings are certainly ours. This research was funded by the German Research Foundation, the German Initiative of Excellence, and the University of Connecticut. Institutional support was provided by Göttingen University, Frankfurt University, and Northwestern University.
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