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(as opposed to young children generally) and its ambiguity (talk by babies as
well as to babies). It was replaced by motherese, and also by more general
notions such as caregiver or caretaker speech, before the present term came to
be widely used.
choice function A term used in semantics for a function which maps each
set in its domain onto a member of that set. Choice functions play an important
role in certain semantic analyses of specific indefinites.
chmeur (n.) A term used in relational grammar, derived from the French
word meaning unemployed, to refer to a nominal item which has its role in a
clause taken over (or usurped) by another nominal; abbreviated as cho. For
example, in a passive sentence, the underlying subject is seen as having its
subject function usurped by the direct object from the active sentence; as a
result, the subject of the active sentence becomes demoted into a chmeur. By
seeing such structures in terms of rules which alter relations (rather than in
terms of a transformation of one phrase-marker into another), it is hoped
that a more universal formulation of such rules will be obtained.