Adjectival modification in Truku Seediq

2019 ◽  
Vol 20 (4) ◽  
pp. 602-633
Author(s):  
Claire Saillard
Keyword(s):  
Word Order ◽  
Language Contact ◽  
Semantic Analysis ◽  
Syntactic Structure ◽  
Noun Phrases ◽  
Elicitation Method ◽  
Basic Word ◽  
Syntactic Constraint ◽  
The Right ◽  
Nominal Position

Abstract This paper investigates the position of adjectives in noun phrases in Truku Seediq, proposing that the two documented positions correspond to different semantics as well as a difference in syntax. While post-nominal adjectives, corresponding to basic word-order in Truku Seediq, may be either restrictive or descriptive, pre-nominal adjectives, seen as an innovation, are semantically restrictive. This paper also argues for a difference in syntactic structure for both kinds of adjectives, restrictive adjectives heading their own projection while descriptive adjectives are bare adjectives standing in a closer relationship to the modified noun. This paper further identifies a syntactic constraint for pre-nominal adjectival placement that applies regardless of restrictivity of the modifier, namely the presence of a possessive clitic to the right of the modified noun. Data collection is achieved through both a traditional elicitation method and an experimental task-based method. Data are further digitalized in order to ensure systematic searchability. The data thus collected are apt to support semantic analysis as well as an investigation of age-group-related variation. It is claimed that language contact with Mandarin Chinese may be one of the triggering factors for the development of a pre-nominal position for modifying adjectives in Truku Seediq.

Discontinuous noun phrases in Ngkolmpu

2020 ◽  
Vol 44 (3) ◽  
pp. 700-721
Author(s):  
Matthew J. Carroll
Keyword(s):  
Word Order ◽  
Textual Analysis ◽  
Noun Phrases ◽  
New Guinea ◽  
General Information ◽  
The Other ◽  
Specific Language ◽  
The Right

Abstract It has been claimed that Ngkolmpu (Yam, Papuan) displays discontinuous noun phrases (Donohue 2011). However, careful textual analysis of a corpus of naturalistic language reveals that, in practice, this is highly restricted. The data shows two relatively rare constructions which give rise to limited discontinuous structures. The first is an afterthought construction involving a full co-referential nominal constituent adjacent to the clause. This co-referential constituent is both syntactically and phonetically distinct from the main utterance. The other involves a topic marking demonstrative encliticised to verbs at the right edge of the clause interacting with general information-structural conditions on word order. This is the only true discontinuity found in the corpus and is restricted to demonstratives only. This paper clarifies a claim in the literature about the empirical facts of a specific language, Ngkolmpu, and adds a nuanced discussion of nominal discontinuity in a language of New Guinea.

Word-order variation in a contact setting: A corpus-based investigation of Russian spoken in Daghestan

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-25
Author(s):  
Chiara Naccarato ◽  
Anastasia Panova ◽  
Natalia Stoynova
Keyword(s):  
Word Order ◽  
Language Contact ◽  
Noun Phrases ◽  
Simple Pattern ◽  
Word Order Variation ◽  
Order Variation ◽  
L1 Influence ◽  
Formal Features

Abstract This paper deals with word-order variation in a situation of language contact. We present a corpus-based investigation of word order in the variety of Russian spoken in Daghestan, focusing specifically on noun phrases with a genitive modifier. In Daghestanian Russian, the nonstandard word order GEN+N (prepositive or left genitive) often occurs. At first glance, this phenomenon might be easily explained in terms of syntactic calquing from the speakers’ left-branching L1s. However, the order GEN+N does not occur with the same frequency in all types of genitive noun phrases but is affected by several lexicosemantic and formal features of both the head and the genitive modifier. Therefore, we are not dealing with simple pattern borrowing. Rather, L1 influence strengthens certain universal tendencies that are not motivated by contact. The comparison with monolinguals’ Russian, in which prepositive genitives sporadically occur too, supports this hypothesis.

scholarly journals WORD ORDER IN THE LOWER CHULYM DIALECT OF CHULYM-TURKIC: A DIACHRONIC ASPECT

2020 ◽  
pp. 41-59
Author(s):  
Валерия Михайловна Лемская
Keyword(s):  
Word Order ◽  
Syntactic Structure ◽  
Early Period ◽  
Minority Language ◽  
Simple Sentence ◽  
Basic Word ◽  
Time Period ◽  
Order Change ◽  
The One ◽  
Word Order Change

В статье анализируется динамика изменения порядка слов в ныне исчезнувшем малочисленном бесписьменном нижнечулымском диалекте чулымско-тюркского языка. Рассматриваются тексты, собранные в XIX–XXI вв., в т. ч. из полевых записей автора. Для обеспечения принципа репрезентативности отобранного материала и в условиях скудости собранных на разных этапах нижнечулымских текстов, анализ был проведен на выборке в 20 предложений с глагольным сказуемым для каждого временного отрезка (всего 80 предложений). В ходе исследования делается вывод, что тенденция к сохранению типичного тюркского базового порядка слов в простом предложении с глагольным скзазуемым (SOV) характерна для текстов, собранных в XIX и XXI вв. (в т. ч. в переводных текстах раннего периода). Наметившаяся с середины XX в. тенденция к изменению базового порядка слов в сторону характерного для русского языка (SVO) несколько сохраняется в XXI в., однако подавляющее большинство моделей простого предложения текстов этого периода являются разновидностями типичного тюркского базового порядка слов SOV. Это иллюстрирует тезис о том, что даже в условиях языковых контактов, активного двуязычия и сильного влияния языка большинства миноритарный язык (в данном случае — нижнечулымский диалект) вполне может сохранять свою синтаксическую структуру. The article analyzes the dynamics of word order change in the now extinct moribund non-written Lower Chulym dialect of the Chulym-Turkic language. The article deals with texts collected in the 19–21 centuries, including those recorded by the author. To ensure the representativeness principle for the selected material and in terms of the Lower Chulym text scarcity at different stages, the analysis was carried out on a sample of 20 sentences with a verb predicate for each time period (80 sentences in total). The study concludes that the tendency to preserve the typical Turkic basic word order in a simple sentence with a verb predicate (SOV) is characteristic of texts collected in the 19th and 21st centuries (including translated texts of the early period). The tendency from the middle of the 20th century to change the basic word order towards the one characteristic for Russian (SVO) persisted in the 21st century to a certain extent, however, the overwhelming majority of the simple sentence models in the texts of this period are varieties of the typical Turkic basic word order, SOV. This illustrates the point that even in the conditions of linguistic contacts, active bilingualism and strong influence of the major language, the minority language (in this case, the Lower Chulym dialect) may well retain its syntactic structure.

Errors in Translation: A Comparative Study of Noun Phrase in English and Malay Abstracts

2018 ◽  
Vol 9 (5) ◽  
pp. 17
Author(s):  
Ainul Azmin Md Zamin ◽  
Raihana Abu Hasan
Keyword(s):  
Noun Phrase ◽  
Word Order ◽  
Semantic Analysis ◽  
Noun Phrases ◽  
Structure Change ◽  
Postgraduate Students ◽  
Language Competency ◽  
Meaningful Group ◽  
Translation Errors ◽  
English Noun

Abstract as a summary of a dissertation harbours important information where it serves to attract readers to consider reading the entire passage or to abandon it. This study seeks to investigate the backward translation of abstracts made by 10 randomly selected postgraduate students. This research serves as a guideline for students in composing their abstracts as it aims to compare the differences in noun phrase structure written in Malay as translated from English. It also analyses the types of errors when English noun phrases are translated to Malay. Preliminary findings from this pilot study found that translation errors committed were mainly inaccurate word order, inaccurate translation, added translation, dropped translation and also structure change. For this study, an exploratory mode of semantic analysis is applied by looking at noun phrases, the meaningful group of words that form a major part of any sentence, with the noun as the head of the group. Syntax is inevitably interwoven in the analysis as the structure and grammatical aspects of the translations are also analysed. They are examined by comparing English texts to its corresponding translation in the Malay language. Particularly relevant in this study is the need to emphasize on the semantics and syntax skills of the students before a good transaltion work can be produced. Language practitioners can also tap on translation activities to improve the learners’ language competency.

scholarly journals A unified approach to the study of language contact: Cross-language priming and change in adjective/noun order

2021 ◽  
pp. 136700692110339
Author(s):  
Evangelia Adamou ◽  
Quentin Feltgen ◽  
Cristian Padure
Keyword(s):  
Word Order ◽  
Language Contact ◽  
Noun Phrases ◽  
Unified Approach ◽  
Speech Corpus ◽  
Contact Linguistics ◽  
Frequent Use ◽  
Bilingual Speaker ◽  
Cross Language

Aims and objectives/purpose/research questions: The connection between language contact and the bilingual speaker goes back to foundational authors in the field of contact linguistics. Yet there is very little work that combines these two levels in a single study. In this paper, we propose a unified approach to language contact by testing the role of cross-language priming (CLP) on contact-induced change at the level of complex noun phrases (NPs). Design/methodology/approach: We conducted three studies with different types of data. In Study 1, we analyse the Romani Morpho-Syntax database to identify word order preferences in Romani dialects from different countries. In Study 2, we examine a corpus of interviews in Romani from Romania. In Study 3, we conduct an experiment to test short-term priming in adjective (ADJ)/noun (N) order from Romanian to Romani and within Romani. Data and analysis: In Study 1, we examine the word order in approximately 3000 NPs from 119 Romani speakers. In Study 2, we analyse a speech corpus of 9400 words from four elderly Romani–Romanian bilinguals. In Study 3, 90 Romani–Romanian bilinguals participated in a priming experiment. We used multinomial mixed-effects logistic regression, Bayesian models and Random Forests to analyse the experimental results. Findings/conclusions: Study 1 shows that Romani speakers from Romania stand out for their frequent use of postnominal ADJs. Study 2 confirms these uses in free speech. Study 3 reveals significant CLP effects, whereby speakers favour the use of determiner (DET)–N–ADJ order in Romani immediately following a noun with a suffixed determiner (NDET)–ADJ sentence read in Romanian. Originality: Our study is the first to demonstrate CLP effects in ADJ/N order. Significance/implications: We illustrate a unified approach to language contact by introducing theoretical and methodological advances from the field of bilingualism into the study of contact-induced change.

Syntactic distinctions in child language

1990 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 343-355 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul Bloom
Keyword(s):  
Word Order ◽  
Semantic Information ◽  
Child Language ◽  
Proper Names ◽  
Noun Phrases ◽  
Spontaneous Speech ◽  
English Word ◽  
Syntactic Constraint ◽  
Linguistic Categories ◽  
Syntactic Theories

ABSTRACTThis paper presents a study of young children's understanding of a constraint on English word order, which is that pronouns and proper names cannot be modified by prenominai adjectives. For adults, this is a syntactic constraint: adjectives can only precede nouns, and pronouns and proper names are lexical Noun Phrases (NPs). In two analyses, the spontaneous speech of 14 one- and two-year-old children was studied. These analyses show that even in children's very first word combinations, they almost never say things like big Fred or big he. Some non-syntactic theories of this phenomenon are discussed and found to have serious descriptive problems, supporting the claim that children understand knowledge of word order through rules that order abstract linguistic categories. A theory is proposed as to how children could use semantic information to draw the noun/NP distinction and to acquire this restriction on English word order.

Mismatching nominals and the small clause hypothesis

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-46
Author(s):  
PAUL ROGER BASSONG
Keyword(s):  
Word Order ◽  
Syntactic Structure ◽  
Noun Phrases ◽  
Comprehensive Analysis ◽  
Small Clause ◽  
Theoretical Contribution ◽  
Bantu Language ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Split Topicalization ◽  
Feature Checking

I propose a comprehensive analysis of what has been commonly referred in the literature to as split, discontinuous noun phrases or split topicalization. Based on data from Basaá, a Narrow Bantu language spoken in Cameroon, I partly capitalize on previous authors such as Mathieu (2004), Mathieu & Sitaridou (2005) and Ott (2015a), who propose that this morphosyntactic phenomenon involves two syntactically unrelated constituents which are only linked semantically in a predication relation in a small clause (Moro 1997, 2000; Den Dikken 1998). According to these analyses, split noun phrases are obtained as a result of predicate inversion across the subject of the small clause. Contrary to/but not against these views, I suggest that what raises in the same context in Basaá is rather the subject of the small clause as a consequence of feature-checking under closest c-command (Chomsky 2000, 2001), and for the purpose of labelling and asymmetrizing an originally symmetric syntactic structure on the surface (Ott 2015a and related work). The fact that the target of movement is the subject and not the predicate of the small clause follows from agreement and ellipsis factors. Given that the subject of predication is a full DP while the predicate is a reduced DP with a null head modifier, the surface word order is attributed to the fact that noun/noun phrase ellipsis is possible if the elided noun is given in the discourse and is recoverable from the morphology of the stranded modifier. This paper offers a theoretical contribution from an understudied language to our understanding of this puzzling nominal construction.

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.

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