scholarly journals Topic and focus in Old French V1 and V2 structures

2018 ◽  
Vol 63 (2) ◽  
pp. 264-287 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marie Labelle ◽  
Paul Hirschbühler
Keyword(s):  
Information Structure ◽  
Old French ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Left Periphery ◽  
Verb Second

AbstractThe hypothesis that Old French was not a verb-second (V2) language, but rather a Topic-initial language, is evaluated in a corpus of verb initial (V1) and V2 matrix clauses extracted from a corpus of 12th- and 13th-century texts. It is shown that the initial constituent of V2 clauses is not always a Topic; it may be part of the informational Focus, or it could be an element that is neither Topic nor Focus. In addition, in V1 and V2 sentences with subject inversion, the postverbal subject may be an informational Topic, contrary to the hypothesis that subjects must move to the preverbal position to avoid being interpreted as part of the informational Focus. Therefore, from an Information-Structure point of view, Old French is similar to a standard V2 language like German. However, certain differences between 12th- and 13th-century texts could suggest that the use of the left periphery evolved during the period considered.

Rethinking Medieval Romance Verb Second

2020 ◽  
pp. 348-367
Author(s):  
Sam Wolfe
Keyword(s):  
Thirteenth Century ◽  
Old French ◽  
Romance Languages ◽  
Left Periphery ◽  
Compelling Evidence ◽  
Verb Second ◽  
Medieval Romance ◽  
Corpus Data

This chapter offers a reappraisal of the place of Medieval Romance languages within the V2 typology based on novel corpus data. A review of the available primary and secondary evidence provides compelling evidence that the Medieval Romance languages considered (French, Occitan, Sicilian, Venetian, and Spanish) were V2 languages, with V-to-C movement and XP-merger in the left periphery. The second half of the chapter focuses in detail on Old Sicilian and Old French, arguing that although both show certain commonalities, the height of the V2 bottleneck is distinct with thirteenth-century French showing a stricter V2 syntax than Old Sicilian. This is linked to the former’s status as a high V2 language with a locus for V2 on Force, as opposed to Fin where the constraint is operative in Sicilian.

scholarly journals Diagnosing embedded V2 in Old English and Old French

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christine Meklenborg Salvesen ◽  
George Walkden
Keyword(s):  
Old English ◽  
Word Order ◽  
Old French ◽  
Left Periphery ◽  
Verb Second ◽  
The Matrix ◽  
Matrix Verb ◽  
Finite Verb

Old English (OE) and Old French (OF) both display verb-second (V2) word order in main declarative clauses. Different models may account for V2: (a) the finite verb must move to a head in the CP field; (b) it must remain in the IP field; or (c) it moves to the left periphery only when the preceding XP is not a subject. While the IP-model should allow free embedded V2, the two others would either exclude completely or strongly limit the possibilty of having embedded V2. We select embedded that-clauses and analyse the word order with respect to the matrix verb: embedded V2 is possible in both OE and OF, although the availability of this structure is restricted. OE has very few occurrences of embedded V2, whereas OF seems to permit this construction more freely. We link this difference to the site of first Merge of complementizers in the two languages.

An Information Structure scenario for V2 loss in Medieval French

Diachronica ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pierre Larrivée
Keyword(s):  
Word Order ◽  
Information Structure ◽  
Initial Position ◽  
Left Periphery ◽  
Verb Second ◽  
Gradual Loss ◽  
Order Change ◽  
Informational Cues ◽  
Word Order Change ◽  
Informational Value

Abstract This paper discusses word order change in Medieval French. Verb-second (V2) configurations are generally understood as having an initial XP and the verb in the left periphery. How has this configuration been lost in French? Under an Information Structure scenario, the XP is in initial position because of its characterized (discourse-old) informational value, which motivates the left-peripheral position of the verb. The decline of the characterized informational value of the XP thus accounts for the gradual loss of V2. The informational behaviour of XPs was examined in unambiguous V2 configurations with an overt post-verbal subject in Medieval French. This detailed quantitative study of a calibrated corpus shows that XPs with a characterized informational value were predominant with productive V2 configurations, that they gradually declined as productive V2 was lost, and that they increasingly failed to attract the verb to the left periphery. These observations can be accounted for if V2 in Medieval French was driven by informational values and if it disappeared along with the informational cues provided by the XPs.

Introduction to Part I

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Svetlana Petrova
Keyword(s):  
Basic Property ◽  
Information Structure ◽  
State Of The Art ◽  
Left Periphery ◽  
Verb Second ◽  
West Germanic ◽  
In The Beginning ◽  
Diachronic Development ◽  
Role Of Information

This chapter provides an overview of the diachronic development of the left periphery in German. It introduces the OV/V2 asymmetry as a basic property of continental West Germanic syntax, as well as the components of the verb-second rule. On this basis, it surveys the rise of verb-second, elaborating on state-of-the-art in the beginning of the attestation, on the relation between V2 and the emergence of complementizers in Germanic, as well as on the role of Germanic sentence particles in the left periphery of the clause. In addition, orders challenging the validity V2 in German—such as verb-first, verb-third, and verb-final orders—are discussed. The chapter also discusses the role of information structure in movement to the left periphery, as well as the emergence of a special class of adverbial connectives, which develop from low adverbs and acquire a special status with respect to the left periphery.

Verb Second in Medieval Romance

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sam Wolfe
Keyword(s):  
Old French ◽  
Romance Languages ◽  
Verb Second ◽  
Medieval Period ◽  
Verb Movement ◽  
Medieval Romance ◽  
Second Languages ◽  
Clausal Structure ◽  
Qualitative And Quantitative ◽  
Null Argument

This book provides the first book-length study of the controversial subject of Verb Second and related properties in a range of Medieval Romance languages. Both qualitative and quantitative data are examined and analysed from Old French, Occitan, Sicilian, Venetian, Spanish, and Sardinian to assess whether the languages were indeed Verb Second languages. The book argues that unlike most modern Romance varieties, V-to-C movement is a point of continuity across all the medieval varieties, but that there are rich patterns of synchronic and diachronic variation in the medieval period which have not been noted before. These include differences in the syntax–pragmatics mapping, the locus of verb movement, the behaviour of clitic pronouns, the syntax of subject positions, matrix/embedded asymmetries, and the null argument properties of the languages in question. The book outlines a detailed formal cartographic analysis both of both the synchronic patterns attested and of the diachronic evolution of Romance clausal structure.

Clause Structure and Word Order in the History of German

2018 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Word Order ◽  
Left Periphery ◽  
Structural Factors ◽  
Clause Structure ◽  
Verb Second ◽  
Verb Forms ◽  
History Of ◽  
New Research ◽  
The Right ◽  
Theoretical Analyses

Over roughly the last decade, there has been a notable rise in new research on historical German syntax in a generative perspective. This volume presents a state-of-the-art survey of this thriving new line of research by leading scholars in the field, combining it with new insights into the syntax of historical German. It is the first comprehensive and concise generative historical syntax of German covering numerous central aspects of clause structure and word order, tracing them throughout various historical stages. Each chapter combines a solid empirical basis and valid descriptive generalizations with reference also to the more traditional topological model of the German clause with a detailed discussion of theoretical analyses couched in the generative framework. The volume is divided into three parts according to the main parts of the clause: the left periphery dealing with verbal placement and the filling of the prefield (verb second, verb first, verb third orders) as well as adverbial connectives; the middle field including discussion of pronominal syntax, order of full NPs and the history of negation; and the right periphery with chapters on basic word order (OV/VO), prosodic and information-structural factors, and the verbal complex including the development of periphrastic verb forms and the phenomena of IPP (infinitivus pro participio) and ACI (accusativus cum infinitivo). This book thus provides a convenient overview of current research on the major issues concerning historical German clause structure both for scholars interested in more traditional description and for those interested in formal accounts of diachronic syntax.

scholarly journals Deutsches auch und italienisches anche im Vergleich

2021 ◽  
Vol 111 (6) ◽  
pp. 187-208
Author(s):  
Manuela Caterina Moroni ◽  
Ermenegildo Bidese
Keyword(s):  
Information Structure ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Usage Patterns ◽  
Basic Functions ◽  
Semantic Point

The focus of our contribution is the German particle auch ‘also’ and its Italian counterpart anche. From a semantic point of view, auch and anche convey the same additive meaning in both languages: through them an element, called ‘domain of association’, is added to a list of further elements for which the auch/anche phrase applies. From a syntactical point of view, auch and anche can occupy different positions in the sentence by modifying the type and the scope of the domain of association. This results in four basic usage patterns which are similar in both languages and correspond to just as many functions of auch/anche: (i) additivity, (ii) sentence connection, (iii) focus domain, and (iv) modality. Despite these common functions, auch and anche interact with the syntax and the information structure of the sentence in German and in Italian differently. Furthermore, they are used in conversation contexts, which are distinctive in both languages. By starting from the current description of auch and anche in the literature, the first aim of our contribution is to provide evidence for the above-mentioned four basic functions despite their language-specific usage contexts. As a second aim, we want to validate our systematization through the analysis of spoken data for German and Italian, explaining why some functions are more likely to be found in the former than in the latter.

scholarly journals On the Acquisition of Word Order in WH-Questions in theTromsø Dialect

Nordlyd ◽  
10.7557/12.48 ◽  
2004 ◽  
Vol 31 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Marit Richardsen Westergaard
Keyword(s):  
Word Order ◽  
Information Structure ◽  
Verb Second ◽  
Verb Movement ◽  
Syntactic Form ◽  
Wh Questions

This article reports on a study of three children acquiring a dialect of Norwegian which allows two different word orders in certain types of WH-questions, verb second (V2) and and verb third (V3). The latter is only allowed after monosyllabic WH-words, while the former, which is the result of verb movement, is the word order found in all other main clauses in the language. It is shown that both V2 and V3 are acquired extremely early by the children in the study (before the age of two), and that subtle distinctions between the two orders with respect to information structure are attested from the beginning. However, it is argued that V3 word order, which should be ìsimplerî than the V2 structure as it does not involve verb movement, is nevertheless acquired slightly later in its full syntactic form. This is taken as an indication that the V3 structure is syntactically more complex, and possibly also more marked.

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