scholarly journals L’accord du participe passé dans les langues romanes

Revue Romane ◽  
2009 ◽  
Vol 44 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-24 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christel Le Bellec
Keyword(s):  
Direct Object ◽  
Romance Languages ◽  
Past Participle ◽  
Pragmatic Function ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Pragmatic Factor

This study aims at describing past participle agreement rules in the Romance languages. These are mainly considered as being an arbitrary set of rules; however, this study is based on the hypothesis that this kind of agreement has primarily a pragmatic function. Indeed, based on the hypothesis that past participle agreement is an example of verb-argument agreement, such as the subject-verb one, we will demonstrate that this agreement is triggered by a subject or a direct object with topic function. The pragmatic factor will be then integrated with those traditionally recognised in the literature, namely nuclear syntactic functions and the auxiliary selected. Finally, we will show why such a variation exists in the Romance languages.

Inflected Infinitives Revisited: Genericity and Single Event

1998 ◽  
Vol 43 (1) ◽  
pp. 5-36 ◽  
Author(s):  
Manuela Ambar
Keyword(s):  
Subject Position ◽  
Romance Languages ◽  
Past Participle ◽  
Single Event ◽  
Temporal Interpretation ◽  
Temporal Features ◽  
Minimalist Approach ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Infinitival Complements

AbstractThis article argues for a minimalist approach to the variation between Romance languages with respect to the generic interpretation associated with infinitival complements of epistemic verbs. It is proposed that epistemic verbs have inherent temporal features and that they assign a tense feature to their complement. These features are checked under a Spec-head relation through two temporal projections, related either to the object position or the subject position. The variation observed between Portuguese and French, Italian and Spanish with respect to the event interpretation of infinitives is formulated in terms of the strong/weak status of the [+specific] feature of Tense. The difference in the temporal interpretation of the inflected infinitives with respect to the presence or absence of thehave+ past participle sequence is derived from the hypothesis that the tense of the participle raises to the TP projection that c-commands it when it is morphologically invisible, the indicative present being visible in Portuguese, but not in the other languages.

Salience and shift in salience as means of creating discourse coherence

Pragmatics ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Katja Hannß
Keyword(s):  
Discourse Coherence ◽  
Pragmatic Function ◽  
The Subject

Abstract The Chipaya language, an endangered isolate of the Bolivian highlands, has a set of three enclitics, =l, =m and =ʐ, which are coreferential with the subject of a clause but are not necessarily attached to it and are not obligatory. In this paper, I investigate the pragmatic function of these forms. The salience-marking enclitics (henceforth SMEs) occur at paratactic and hypotactic discourse transitions, where they indicate a shift in salience, thereby contributing to creating discourse coherence. Discourse transitions without a shift in salience are not accompanied by the enclitics. Those enclitics that occur at paratactic transitions have scope over at least the segment whose beginning and/or end they occur in, whereas SMEs at hypotactic transitions have scope over the clause they appear in. Use of the SMEs is genre-specific.

scholarly journals Schaalvergroting in het syntactische alternantieonderzoek : Een nieuwe analyse van het presentatieve er met automatisch gegenereerde predictoren

2020 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
pp. 101-123
Author(s):  
Dirk Speelman ◽  
Stefan Grondelaers ◽  
Benedikt Szmrecsanyi ◽  
Kris Heylen
Keyword(s):  
The Other ◽  
Manual Annotation ◽  
Distributional Analysis ◽  
Syntactic Variation ◽  
Semantic Class ◽  
Semantic Classes ◽  
Reference Corpus ◽  
Lexical Collocations ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Pragmatic Factor

Abstract In this paper, we revisit earlier analyses of the distribution of er ‘there’ in adjunct-initial sentences to demonstrate the merits of computational upscaling in syntactic variation research. Contrary to previous studies, in which major semantic and pragmatic predictors (viz. adjunct type, adjunct concreteness, and verb specificity) had to be coded manually, the present study operationalizes these predictors on the basis of distributional analysis: instead of hand-coding for specific semantic classes, we determine the semantic class of the adjunct, verb, and subject automatically by clustering the lexemes in those slots on the basis of their ‘semantic passport’ (as established on the basis of their distributional behaviour in a reference corpus). These clusters are subsequently interpreted as proxies for semantic classes. In addition, the pragmatic factor ‘subject predictability’ is operationalized automatically on the basis of collocational attraction measures, as well as distributional similarity between the other slots and the subject. We demonstrate that the distribution of er can be modelled equally successfully with the automated approach as in manual annotation-based studies. Crucially, the new method replicates our earlier findings that the Netherlandic data are easier to model than the Belgian data, and that lexical collocations play a bigger role in the Netherlandic than in the Belgian data. On a methodological level, the proposed automatization opens up a window of opportunities. Most important is its scalability: it allows for a larger gamut of alternations that can be investigated in one study, and for much larger datasets to represent each alternation.

Indirect object in Manchu-Tungus languages: structural and semantic aspect (in the Orok language)

2020 ◽  
pp. 243-260
Author(s):  
L. V. Ozolinya ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Direct Object ◽  
Accusative Case ◽  
Indirect Object ◽  
Functional Aspects ◽  
Transitive Verbs ◽  
Object Composition ◽  
The Subject ◽  
First Time ◽  
Semantic Aspect ◽  
Trivalent Verbs

For the first time, the paper provides the analysis of the Oroc language object as a syntactic unit combining the semantic and functional aspects of transitive or non-transitive verbs. In the Manchu-Tungus languages, the object is found to be expressed in the morphological forms of the case: direct – in the accusative case and the possessive forms of the designative case, indirect – in the forms of oblique cases. Constructions with indirect objects, the positions of which are filled with case forms of nouns, designate the objects on which the action is aimed, objects from which the action is sent or evaded, objects-addresses, objectsinstruments, etc. Both transitive or non-transitive verbs can take the position of the predicate. The necessary (direct object) and permissible (indirect object) composition of objects in the verb is determined by its valences: bivalent verbs open subjective (subject) and objective (direct object) valences; trivalent verbs reveal subjective, subjective-objective (part of the subject or indirect subject) and objective (indirect object) valences.

scholarly journals French subject island? Empirical studies of dont and de qui

2020 ◽  
Vol 30 (3) ◽  
pp. 275-300 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anne Abeillé ◽  
Elodie Winckel
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Relative Clauses ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
First Century ◽  
Romance Languages ◽  
Frequent Use ◽  
Recent Innovation ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Corpus Data ◽  
Relative Pronouns

AbstractDont has been claimed to be an exception to the ‘subject island’ constraint (Tellier, 1991; Sportiche and Bellier, 1989; Heck, 2009) and to contrast with true relative pronouns such as de qui. We provide corpus data from a literary corpus (Frantext), which show that relativizing out of the subject is possible with dont and de qui in French relative clauses, and is even the most frequent use of both relative clauses. We show that it is not a recent innovation by comparing subcorpora from the beginning of the twentieth century and from the beginning of the twenty-first century. We also show, with an acceptability judgement task, that extraction out of the subject with de qui is well accepted. Why has this possibility been overlooked? We suggest that it may be because de qui relatives in general are less frequent than dont relatives (about 60 times less in our corpus). Turning to de qui interrogatives, we show that extraction out of the subject is not attested, and propose an explanation of the contrast with relative clauses. We conclude that in this respect, French does not seem to differ from other Romance languages.

Neuter gender in a sexless language

2012 ◽  
Vol 29 ◽  
pp. 41-54
Author(s):  
Merijn de Dreu ◽  
Leston Buell
Keyword(s):  
Romance Languages ◽  
Class System ◽  
Bantu Language ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Noun Class ◽  
Germanic Languages ◽  
Grammatical Functions ◽  
The Way

In some Germanic languages, neuter gender is used both as a lexical gender and for certain grammatical functions, while in Romance languages, neuter gender is only employed for grammatical functions. Zulu, a Bantu language, has a much more elaborate noun class system than those languages, but one not rooted in sex or animacy as in Germanic or Romance. However, it is shown that Zulu noun class 17 is used for the same range of grammatical functions as neuter gender in Indo-European. Specifically, Indo-European neuter gender and Zulu class 17 are used when the referent has no specific noun class properties, for expletive subjects, and as the subject of nominal predication, even when the referent is human. Aside from its use in some languages as a gender for nouns, then, neuter gender can be understood as a cluster of grammatical functions, independently of the way the lexicon is organized.

Conjonctions de subordination et adverbes conjonctifs «  focalisateurs  »

2004 ◽  
Vol 26 (2) ◽  
pp. 311-328
Author(s):  
Mireille Piot
Keyword(s):  
Semantic Relations ◽  
Romance Languages ◽  
Verb Phrase ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Common ◽  
Syntactic Properties

SummaryIn this paper, we present a unified hypothesis about «focusing» conjunctional adverbs and subordinating conjunctions in French. A similar hypothesis is to be taken to hold at all romance languages as we argue after Piot (2003) mentioned above. At first, differences are to be observed between this case (with “focus”) and another case in which the same conjunctional items are purely conjunctions (coordinating or subordinating, but without “focus”). Then, we point out which are the common semantic and syntactic properties of the global “focus” operation related to all these items (parallelism between sentences and nominal phrases correlated by these conjunctional items, inclusion or union semantic relations between nominal phrases in some respects ensembles theory relations alike: the addition of syntactic-semantic specific items shares this inclusion or union relation). In particular, this study highlights, as a result, the role of the subject nature of the conjoined first sentence and the syntactic-semantic nature of the verb-phrase in the second sentence. Another study (to appear) will present the results about distinctions in this operation according to the particular significance of each different item.

Trois Emplois du Verbe cuta (donner) en Coréen

1988 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 281-302
Author(s):  
Pak Hyong-Ik
Keyword(s):  
Direct Object ◽  
Special Relationship ◽  
Lexical Choice ◽  
Indirect Object ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Syntactic Properties

In this paper, I distinguish three different uses of the verb cuta: dative verb, support verb, and causative operator verb. The syntactic properties of a sentence containing the verb cuta vary with the lexical choice of the direct object. The subject of the sentence in which cuta is a support verb is seman-tically the subject of the direct object. This special relationship subject -direct object doesn't exist in the sentence with a causative operator verb cuta in which the indirect object is semantically the subject of the direct object. Furthermore, the distribution of the subject in the sentence with a dative verb cuta is different from that in the sentence with a causative operator verb cuta. The causative operator verb cuta takes the subject of the type "unrestricted noun". I present the principal syntactic properties of the verb cuta in the columns of the table. The sign "+" indicates that the verb has the corresponding property: the sign "-" that the verb does not have this property.

scholarly journals Features of signs of the crime object provided by article 166 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation

2019 ◽  
Vol 2019 (2) ◽  
pp. 192-198
Author(s):  
Алена Харламова ◽  
Alena Kharlamova ◽  
Юлия Белик ◽  
Yuliya Belik
Keyword(s):  
Supreme Court ◽  
Russian Federation ◽  
Social Relations ◽  
Criminal Law ◽  
Criminal Code ◽  
Direct Object ◽  
The Supreme Court ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Russian Federation ◽  
The Right

The article is devoted to the problematic theoretical and practical issues of the content of the signs of the object of the crimes under Art. 166 of the Criminal Code. The authors determined the main direct object, revealed the essence of the right of ownership, use and disposal. Marked social relations that can act as an optional direct object. Particular attention is paid in the article to the subject of the crime. Attempts have been made to establish criteria that are crucial for the recognition of any vehicle as the subject of theft. The content of the terms “automobile” and “other vehicle” is disclosed. The analysis of the conformity of the literal interpretation of the criminal law to the interpretation of the law enforcer is carried out. It is summarized that the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation narrows the meaning of the term “other vehicle”, including in it only vehicles for the management of which, in accordance with the legislation of the Russian Federation, is granted a special right. The authors provide a list of such vehicles and formulate a conclusion on the advisability of specifying them as the subject of a crime. The narration of the article is accompanied by examples of decisions of courts of various instances in cases of crimes under Art. 166 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation

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