The launching of the JOT provides a welcome opportunity to resume the Eiffel column that ran for many years in JOOP from 1998 (edited first by Rock Howard from whom I took over in 1998). It will run pretty much like its predecessor, with a mix of contributions by guest columnists and by me, and a mix of topics — from language matters to methodological issues of object-oriented software construc...

Sign languages (SL) require a fundamental rethinking of many basic assumptions about human language processing because instead of using linear speech, sign languages coarticulate facial expressions, shoulder and hand movements, eye gaze and usage of a three-dimensional space. SL researchers have therefore advocated SL-specific approaches that do not start from the biases of models that were ori...

Construction Grammar has reached a stage of maturity where many researchers are looking for an explicit formal grounding of their work. Recently, there have been exciting developments to cater for this demand, most notably in Sign-Based Construction Grammar (SBCG) and Fluid Construction Grammar (FCG). Unfortunately, like playing a music instrument, the formalisms used by SBCG and FCG take time ...

Spartina anglica (hereafter Spartina) is an invasive perennial marsh grass shifting hydrodynamic regime and sediment characteristics in invaded area, thereby reducing macrobenthic diversity. There have been only a few studies focusing on the patch structure of according to size its effects macrofauna. A field experiment was conducted identify patches where they introduced no later than 5 years ...

BACKGROUND Empirical observations on how businesses respond after a major catastrophe are rare, especially for a catastrophe as great as Hurricane Katrina, which hit New Orleans, Louisiana on August 29, 2005. We analyzed repeated telephone surveys of New Orleans businesses conducted in December 2005, June 2006, and October 2007 to understand factors that influenced decisions to re-open amid pos...

Natural physical conditions and the politics of flood management provide the historical context for structural flood control that underlies modern flood hazards in the Sacramento Valley. The valley is a broad, low plain with backswamp basins that were frequently inundated prior to Anglo-American settlement, continuing until the modern flood-control system was established. Early attempts to emul...