Ever since Chomsky's Barriers, functional heads have been the privileged object of research in generative linguistics. But over the last two decades, two rival approaches have developed. The cartographic project, as represented by the collections in this Oxford series, considers evidence for a functional head in one language as evidence for it in universal grammar. On the other hand, minimalist accounts tend to consider structural economy as literally involving as few heads as possible. In the present volume, some of the most influential linguists who have participated in this long-lasting debate offer their recent work in short, self contained case studies. The contributions cover all the main layers of recently studied syntactic structure, including such major areas of empirical research such as grammaticalization and language change, standard and non-standard varieties, interface issues, and morphosyntax. Functional Heads attempts to map aspects of syntactic structure following the cartographic approach, and in doing so demonstrate that the differences between the cartographic approach and the minimalist approach are more apparent than substantial.

Ever since Chomsky's Barriers, functional heads have been the privileged object of research in generative linguistics. But over the last two decades, two rival approaches have developed. The cartographic project, as represented by the collections in this Oxford series, considers evidence for a functional head in one language as evidence for it in universal grammar. On the other hand, minimalist accounts tend to consider structural economy as literally involving as few heads as possible. In the present volume, some of the most influential linguists who have participated in this long-lasting debate offer their recent work in short, self contained case studies. The contributions cover all the main layers of recently studied syntactic structure, including such major areas of empirical research such as grammaticalization and language change, standard and non-standard varieties, interface issues, and morphosyntax. Functional Heads attempts to map aspects of syntactic structure following the cartographic approach, and in doing so demonstrate that the differences between the cartographic approach and the minimalist approach are more apparent than substantial.

This volume contains the contributions delivered at the efsli (European Forum of Sign Language Interpreters) Annual Conference held in Vietri sul Mare, Italy, on 16th-18th September 2011. The volume represents the interesting and novel discussions from many of the questions raised by sight translation on the one hand and by the emerging figure of the Deaf translator on the other. More than one contributor underline the need of further discussion on sight translation when one of the two languages involved is a sign language. Specific questions are raised by the visual modality of sign languages and by the fact that these languages do not have a written form. At the same time, many authors observe that the best potential translators, particularly in the case of sight translation, are Deaf translators because of their native knowledge of their respective sign languages. Being a native signer does not however suffice, as in the case of translation into any language. The need for a specific training, in sign language translation, is pointed out by almost every contributor. The experiences they report also show that the situation in the status of training and working conditions of Deaf and hearing sign language translators is different in the various countries represented in the volume. The positive experiences collated in these proceedings can therefore also count as a model for those countries that are yet to develop service provision in sign language translation, in order to achieve full access to information and education for the Deaf communities in any country. All presenters and contributors to this volume have made the 2011 edition of the efsli conference a very useful and enriching opportunity to deepen the knowledge about the specific properties of translation into sign language and the skills required to professionals working in this relatively new domain. The need for specific training, repeatedly pointed out in the papers, will hopefully inspire those who are in charge of the translation and interpreting programmes in sign languages across Europe and beyond.