scholarly journals Accusative case assignment to the verbal internal argument in the Albanian language and the corresponding case assigning model

2021 ◽  
Vol 6 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joana Taci ◽  
Mirela Saraci
Keyword(s):  
Noun Phrase ◽  
Word Order ◽  
Special Focus ◽  
Case Assignment ◽  
Distinctive Features ◽  
Accusative Case ◽  
Case System ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Free Word ◽  
European Family

The following paper aims at shedding some light on Albanian language case system with special focus on the assignment of accusative case. As a member of the vast Indo-European family Albanian language is characterized by an inflected case system and as so a free word order. Traditionally, we are taught and we still teach to the coming generations that accusative case is assigned mostly by the verb to that sentence noun phrase syntactically representing the direct object and semantically introducing the Theme or the Patient.   Moreover in Albanian accusative is also assigned by another morphological category bearing the distinctive features [+noun;+verb], namely the preposition. Furthermore, as a researcher in the field of generative syntax I have a stake at analyzing certain exceptional cases of accusative case assignment to the subject NP of the Albanian subjunctive clause. In conclusion, I was really tempted to adopt Chomsky’s reconciling proposal in accusative case assignment under the specifier-head structural and schematic relation. 

scholarly journals The Derivation of Wh-Questions in Najrani Arabic

2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (5) ◽  
pp. 181
Author(s):  
Saud A. Mushait
Keyword(s):  
Word Order ◽  
Nominative Case ◽  
Case Assignment ◽  
Accusative Case ◽  
Phase Approach ◽  
Wh Questions ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Edge Feature

The study explores the derivation of wh-questions in Najrani Arabic and attempts to answer the following questions: (i) Can wh-questions in Najrani Arabic be derived in VSO or SVO or both?, and (ii) How can Najrani Arabic wh-questions be accounted for within Chomsky’s (2001,2005, 2013,2015 ) Phase approach? The objective of the study is to present a unified analysis of the derivation of wh-questions in Najrani Arabic and show the interaction between Najrani Arabic data and Chomsky’s Phase framework. It has been shown that Najrani Arabic allows the derivation of wh-questions from the argument and non-argument positions in VSO word order. Given this, we assume that VSO is the unmarked order for the derivation of wh-questions in Najrani Arabic. In VSO, the subject DP does not raise to Spec-TP because the head T does not have the EPP feature: the latter attracts movement of the former. The verb raises to the head T of TP, while the subject DP remains in-situ in Spec-vP. Moreover, in Najrani Arabic intransitive structures, the phase vP does not have a specifier because it does not have an external thematic argument whereas in transitive constructions the vP has. Concerning case assignment, the phase vP merges with an abstract tense af (fix) on the head T, which agrees with and assigns invisible nominative case to the subject wh-word man ‘who’. We assume that the phase head C is the probe and has the Edge feature which attracts the raising of the subject wh-phrase to Spec-CP. Besides, we argue that the light transitive head v has an Edged feature which attracts the raising of the object wh-phrase aish ‘what’ to be the second (outer) specifier of vP. Being the phase head, the v probes for a local goal and finds the object wh-phrase aish; the v agrees with and assigns accusative case to the object wh-phrase aish. As the TP merges with a null interrogative head C, the phase head C has an Edge feature that attracts the raising of the object wh-word aish to Spec-CP for feature valuation. Following this, the null copies of the moved entities left after movement receive a null spellout in the phonological level and, hence, cannot be accessed for any further operation.

Pragmatics for Latin

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. M. Devine ◽  
Laurence D. Stephens
Keyword(s):  
Noun Phrase ◽  
Word Order ◽  
Information Structure ◽  
Descriptive Analysis ◽  
Informational Content ◽  
Compositional Process ◽  
Association With Focus ◽  
Narrow Scope ◽  
Order Language ◽  
Free Word

Latin is often described as a free word order language, but in general each word order encodes a particular information structure: in that sense, each word order has a different meaning. This book provides a descriptive analysis of Latin information structure based on detailed philological evidence and elaborates a syntax-pragmatics interface that formalizes the informational content of the various different word orders. The book covers a wide ranges of issues including broad scope focus, narrow scope focus, double focus, topicalization, tails, focus alternates, association with focus, scrambling, informational structure inside the noun phrase and hyperbaton (discontinuous constituency). Using a slightly adjusted version of the structured meanings theory, the book shows how the pragmatic meanings matching the different word orders arise naturally and spontaneously out of the compositional process as an integral part of a single semantic derivation covering denotational and informational meaning at one and the same time.

Objects in the German prefield

2020 ◽  
pp. 15-39
Author(s):  
Markus Bader
Keyword(s):  
Word Order ◽  
Language Production ◽  
Initial Position ◽  
Experimental Investigations ◽  
Demonstrative Pronoun ◽  
New Findings ◽  
The Subject ◽  
New Speakers ◽  
Referential Form ◽  
Free Word

From the perspective of language production, this chapter discusses the question of whether to move the subject or the object to the clause-initial position in a German Verb Second clause. A review of experimental investigations of language production shows that speakers of German tend to order arguments in such a way that the most accessible argument comes first, with accessibility defined in terms like animacy (‘animate before inanimate’) and discourse status (e.g. ‘given before new’). Speakers of German thus obey the same ordering principles that have been found to be at work in English and other languages. Despite the relative free word order of German, speakers rarely produce sentences with object-before-subject word order in experimental investigations. Instead, they behave like speakers of English and mostly use passivization in order to bring the underlying object argument in front of the underlying subject argument when the object is more accessible than the subject. Corpus data, however, show that object-initial clauses are not so infrequent after all. The second part of the chapter, therefore, discusses new findings concerning the discourse conditions that favour the production of object-initial clauses. These findings indicate, among other things, that the clausal position of an object is affected not only by its referent’s discourse status but also by its referential form. Objects occur in clause-initial position most frequently when referring to a given referent in the form of a demonstrative pronoun or NP.

scholarly journals ORDERING OF MODIFIERS IN THE MULTI-NOUN PHRASE OF SL AND TL

2020 ◽  
Vol 1 (9(77)) ◽  
pp. 160-163
Author(s):  
Valery Mykhaylenko
Keyword(s):  
Noun Phrase ◽  
Word Order ◽  
Noun Phrases ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Semantic Model ◽  
Linguistic Analyses ◽  
Free Word

In this paper there is an overview of ordering in English multi-noun phrases (MNP) or poly-adjectival nominal phrases (PNP) and the model of semantic ordering is revealed:[Det] + MODIFIERS (+ size [Adj] + shape [Adj] + age[Adj] – colour [Adj + nationality [Adj] + HEADWORD [Noun]. The transformation patterns of rendering English MNPs into Ukrainian ones are recognized and we developed a relevant analysis of MNPs. This project concerns the ordering among modifiers in poly-adjectival nominal phrases (PNP) coined by Bache (1978) to refer to any noun phrase which contains more than one modifier(see also Georgi, 2010). We considered the concept of ordering the constituents in the multi-NP (MNP) in the process of translating from English into Ukrainian. Sproat and Shih (1988) provide one of the most comprehensive cross-linguistic analyses of adjective ordering restrictions, and suggest that the semantic-based ordering theories proposed for English are largely universal across languages. This rearrangement of ordering is triggered by the Ukrainian synthetic grammar structure which permits free word order in the phrase and a sentence, and a change of the communicative focus by the translator. A modifier is defined as words or phrases which premodify the head word of the phrase and can postmodify it as well. From 150 pages of the novel “Angels ad Demons” by Dan Brown and its Ukrainian translation by Aнжелa Кам’янець only 35 multi-noun phrases have been retrieved as an object of our study which we have classified into 4 groups according to the type of transformation (equivalent, permutation, addition, and omission). There is one of the main arguments for the rearrangment motivation of noun headwords and modifiers is the opposition of the author’s and translator’s intentional meaning. In addition we put forward a hypothesis – the both transformations are motivated by the semanticsof modifiers. The Semantic Model of ordering adjectives in the English multi- noun phrase must be verified in various discourse registers to define common and distinctivefeatures of this phenomenon.

Case assignment and image schemas

2004 ◽  
Vol 28 (2) ◽  
pp. 285-319 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tore Nesset
Keyword(s):  
Noun Phrase ◽  
Cognitive Linguistics ◽  
Case Assignment ◽  
Distinctive Features ◽  
Prepositional Phrases ◽  
Image Schemas ◽  
Image Schema ◽  
Locative Case

The notion of image schema has received a great deal of attention in cognitive linguistics. In this paper, image schemas are applied to an analysis of case assignment in Russian temporal adverbials. My focus will be on prepositional phrases headed by v ‘in’ followed by a noun phrase in the accusative or the second locative case. This approach, it is argued, facilitates the formulation of simple generalizations. While the paper focuses on data from a single language, the proposed analysis has wider ramifications for the study of case, since it is argued that that image schema-based analyses have quite general advantages over those couched in terms of distinctive features.

The subject agreement–accusative case connection in Turkish

2010 ◽  
Vol 10 ◽  
pp. 117-160
Author(s):  
Cem Keskin
Keyword(s):  
Single Source ◽  
Basic Premise ◽  
Case Assignment ◽  
Accusative Case ◽  
The World ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Subject Agreement ◽  
Structural Case ◽  
Structural Object ◽  
The Relationship

This article is on the relationship between case and agreement. A noun phrase is assigned the structural case that it bears through agreement with a functional head. Several recent works assume this thesis, referred to as the George and Kornfilt Thesis, as a basic premise to provide an account of structural case assignment. The central thesis of the article is that there is at least one more dependency that needs to be assumed in case phenomena, namely that, in some languages of the world, structural object case, or more particularly accusative case, is dependent on subject agreement—the Subject Agreement–Accusative Case Conjecture. The article proposes the Jump-start Hypothesis in order to explain this dependency. According to this hypothesis, in a finite construction, case assignment to each argument is activated by a single source of agreement. The argumentation relies on data from Turkish nominalizations and restructuring infinitives.

Psycholinguistic Evidence for the VP-Internal Subject Position in Japanese

2010 ◽  
Vol 41 (4) ◽  
pp. 663-680 ◽  
Author(s):  
Masatoshi Koizumi ◽  
Katsuo Tamaoka
Keyword(s):  
Word Order ◽  
Subject Position ◽  
Sufficient Information ◽  
Theoretical Hypothesis ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Free Word

The question of whether the subject stays in its thematic position within the VP or moves to Spec, TP is difficult to answer with respect to free word order languages such as Japanese because the surface constituent orders in these languages do not necessarily provide sufficient information to determine syntactic positions. In this article, we present psycholinguistic evidence for the theoretical hypothesis that, in Japanese, the subject must move to Spec, TP in sentences with the subject-objectverb word order, but may stay within the VP in sentences with the object-subject-verb word order.

On the syntax of ergativity ın Kurdish

2014 ◽  
Vol 50 (3) ◽  
pp. 231-271
Author(s):  
Yadgar Karimi
Keyword(s):  
External Argument ◽  
Transitive Verb ◽  
Case Assignment ◽  
Accusative Case ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Subject

Abstract This paper is an attempt to develop an analysis of ergativity syntax, focusing on the past transitive structures in Kurdish where ergativity manifests itself. Adducing evidence from a diverse array of structures that share formal characteristics with the past transitive structure in Kurdish, I will argue that ergativity emerges in transitive structures where (a) the transitive verb, subcategorizing for a complement DP, is defective in terms of accusative case assignment (i.e. unaccusative) and (b) the external argument, i.e. the subject DP, is licensed as the specifier of a high applicative head that takes vP as its complement. Thus analyzed, ergativity is construed as a natural computational corollary deriving from the interaction of independently motivated operations of the narrow syntax.

The emergence of functional case marking in initial varieties of Polish L2

2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 32-67 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jacopo Saturno ◽  
Marzena Watorek
Keyword(s):  
Word Order ◽  
Task Difficulty ◽  
Target Sentence ◽  
Inflectional Morphology ◽  
Elicited Imitation ◽  
Accusative Case ◽  
Case Marking ◽  
Comprehension Task ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Case Markings

Abstract This paper addresses the acquisition of L2 inflectional morphology after only a few hours of exposure. Eighty-nine participants with five different L1s and no experience of the L2 took part in a specially designed 14-hour L2 Polish course, during which they were tested on their developing morphosyntactic skills at various times. The present paper uses a Comprehension task and an Elicited Imitation task to probe learners’ ability to use nominative and accusative case markings to infer and express the subject and object. The study is designed to isolate variables such as the task employed to elicit L2 data, target sentence word order, time of exposure to the L2 input, and learners’ L1. The results show that while the majority of learners stick to a word order principle, some managed to identify and systematically apply the target-like use of inflectional morphology. Various intermediate strategies make it possible to identify a hierarchy of task difficulty. Both time of exposure and the learner’s L1 proved to be significant predictors of performance.

A word order paradox resolved by copy deletion at PF

2003 ◽  
Vol 3 ◽  
pp. 139-177 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sandra Stjepanović
Keyword(s):  
Word Order ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The One ◽  
Free Word ◽  
Lower Copy

In this paper I point out a word order paradox in Serbo-Croatian and propose a solution to it. I show that there are data indicating that the subject must move overtly to the highest projection in the split IP, as well as data indicating that it can remain in SpecVP overtly. I argue that the key to resolving the paradox lies in a mechanism of pronunciation of lower copies motivated by PF considerations, similar to the one proposed in Franks (1998) and Bošković (2001, 2002). The mechanism entails that PF has a preference for pronunciation of the highest copy of elements moved in syntax, but that a lower copy can be pronounced in order to avoid a PF violation. I show that in Serbo-Croatian, a PF factor that can affect copy deletion is prosody. The proposed analysis captures extremely free word order of SC as well as discourse effects of scrambling.

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