This book examines the present-day distribution and diachronic evolution of a set of infinitival structures in Spanish, Portuguese and Romanian, making use of extensive corpus data and investigating how pragmatic factors and usage patterns interact with syntax. After a contrastive account of the patterns of clausal subordination in Latin and Romance, the rise of prepositional infinitives is traced through the documented history of the three languages, revealing astonishing parallels in their development. The analysis of the data shows how cognitive principles such as reanalysis and entrenchment combine with parameters such as relevance and usage frequency to cause syntactic change. Beyond providing a genuine explanation for the observed processes in the Romance languages, this study offers new evidence for the existence of language-independent, cross-linguistically applicable principles and mechanisms in language change.

THREE DAYS IN DAMASCUS is a memoir about a three year fight for a chance at love with an Iraqi refugee the author met in Syria. While traveling to Jordan, Lebanon and Syria to interview Iraqi refugees and hear some of their stories, Kim never expected to fall in love with one of them. But that is exactly what happened. This is the story of one American woman and one Iraqi man set against the backdrop of the Iraqi refugee crisis. Through actual Iraqi refugee interviews, a whirlwind middle-eastern love story and the consequently doomed, intercontinental relationship told through texts and emails with civil war, revolution and an arranged marriage as the backdrop, we learn of culture and devastation, desperation and redemption, while still never losing hope. While there are roughly 65 million refugees worldwide, approximately five million Iraqis have been displaced from their homes since the U.S led invasion of their country, most of them fleeing to Jordan, Lebanon and Syria. Since Syria is currently in the midst of a violent civil war, the Iraqis there are left in an extremely dangerous position- stuck between a rock and a hard place with nowhere to go. This timely memoir examines the lives of dozens of these Iraqi refugees trying desperately to survive in a world blind to their plight and one Iraqi in particular: Omar. Told through a strong narrative and a surprisingly comedic lens, the reader travels with the author through this unknown, sandy terrain breaking assumptions, stereotypes and expectations - in a journey that ultimately ends in the most traditional assumption one could imagine: a Middle Eastern man agreeing to an arranged marriage. And after three years of trying to "save" Omar and salvage a life for/with him, she discovers maybe he wasn't the one who needed saving.