The Nanosyntax of Case • Pavel Caha
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This is the accepted manuscript of the article, which has been published in Kittilä S., Västi K., Ylikoski J. (eds.) Case, Animacy and Semantic Roles. Typological Studies in Language, 99. Amsterdam: John Benjamins, 2011. ISBN 978-90-272-0680-0. https://doi.org/10.1075/tsl.99 Is there a future for the Finnish comitative? Arguments against the putative synonymy of the comitative case -ine and the postposition kanssa Maija Sirola-Belliard University of Tampere 1. Introduction The core meaning of the comitative is Accompaniment, although cross- linguistically the same form can also be used for encoding Instrument or Possession, for example. The comitative is prototypically used to combine two nominal phrases which represent two human participants in a situation where one is accompanying the other. This relationship is not symmetrical: one of the participants in the situation is the main actor, so called accompanee, while the other, the companion, is more marginal and can be involved in the action only indirectly, i.e. through the accompanee. (Stolz et al. 2006: 5; 2009: 602f.) Across languages, Accompaniment can be expressed by adpositions, case affixes and serial constructions, among other means (Stolz et al. 2009: 602f.). In Finnish, the principal means are an inflectional case and several postpositions governing the genitive case. The comitative case marker is -ine, which, when 1 attached to a noun, is obligatorily followed by a possessive suffix that refers (in most cases) to the accompanee. The case marker is formally a plural since the plural marker -i- has been grammaticalized as a part of the affix. -
Root and Semi-Phrasal Compounds: a Syntactic Approach Dimitrios Ntelitheos & Katya Pertsova*
2019. Proc Ling Soc Amer 4. 30:1-14. https://doi.org/10.3765/plsa.v4i1.4530 Root and semi-phrasal compounds: A syntactic approach Dimitrios Ntelitheos & Katya Pertsova* Abstract. We present a syntactic account of the derivation of two types of attributive nominal compounds in Spanish, Russian and Greek. These include right-headed “root” compounds, which exhibit more “word”-like properties and single stress domains, and left-headed “semi-phrasal” compounds with more phrasal properties and independent stress domains for the two compound members. We propose that both compound structures are formed on a small clause predicate phrase, with their different properties derived from the merger of the predicate member of the small clause as a root or as a larger nominal unit with additional functional projections. The proposed structures provide an explanation of observed lexical integrity effects, as well as specific predictions of patterns of compound formation crosslinguistically. Keywords. morpho-syntax; compounds; Distributed Morphology; lexical integrity; predicate inversion; small clauses 1. Introduction. A hotly debated issue is to what extent morphological principles are independ- ent from the syntactic ones. There is no agreement on how and why differences between “words,” “phrases,” and other units proposed to exist in-between these two categories arise. Syn- tactic approaches to word-formation such as Distributed Morphology (Halle & Marantz 1993, Marantz 1997 and related work), antisymmetry (Kayne 1994, Koopman and Szabolcsi 2000) and more recently nanosyntax (Starke 2009) derive morphosyntactic properties of different units from the derivational path of their formation. For instance, Marantz (2001) proposes a difference between units created via combinations of functional heads with roots vs. -
Are There Case S in Fifteenth-Century Dutch? a 'Case Study' of an Utrecht
397 Are there case s in fi fteenth-century Dutch? A ‘case study’ of an Utrecht manuscript (1464) Joost Robbe Aarhus University Abstract This article examines the case system in a fi fteenth-century Utrecht manuscript. It demonstrates that there is a functional case system in the manuscript. However, it also identifi es a relatively small number of mistakes – grammatical errors as well as hypercorrections – in how this case system is used in the manuscript. It argues that these mistakes indicate that the case system had lost its support in the underlying spoken dialect. The mistakes concern both the use of case forms in the nominative and the accusative, and the use of gender markers in the genitive and the dative. By examining the mistakes in the use of cases (accusative and nominative), it is possible to determine the conditions for syncretic n-deletion in the underlying spoken dialect; and, by examining the mistakes in the use of gender markers (in the genitive and dative), it is possible to determine an expansion of masculine fl exion in the genitive and dative in the underlying spoken dialect. 1. Introduction One of the most signifi cant changes that has taken place in the history of Dutch (and most of its relatives, such as English and Danish) is the loss of case distinctions. Like all Germanic languages, Dutch began with a system of four relatively distinct cases (nominative, genitive, dative and accusative). The use of these cases was very similar to other Germanic Sten Vikner, Henrik Jørgensen & Elly van Gelderen (eds.): Let us have articles betwixt us – Papers in Historical and Comparative Linguistics in Honour of Johanna L. -
Possessive Constructions in Modern Low Saxon
POSSESSIVE CONSTRUCTIONS IN MODERN LOW SAXON a thesis submitted to the department of linguistics of stanford university in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of master of arts Jan Strunk June 2004 °c Copyright by Jan Strunk 2004 All Rights Reserved ii I certify that I have read this thesis and that, in my opinion, it is fully adequate in scope and quality as a thesis for the degree of Master of Arts. Joan Bresnan (Principal Adviser) I certify that I have read this thesis and that, in my opinion, it is fully adequate in scope and quality as a thesis for the degree of Master of Arts. Tom Wasow I certify that I have read this thesis and that, in my opinion, it is fully adequate in scope and quality as a thesis for the degree of Master of Arts. Dan Jurafsky iii iv Abstract This thesis is a study of nominal possessive constructions in modern Low Saxon, a West Germanic language which is closely related to Dutch, Frisian, and German. After identifying the possessive constructions in current use in modern Low Saxon, I give a formal syntactic analysis of the four most common possessive constructions within the framework of Lexical Functional Grammar in the ¯rst part of this thesis. The four constructions that I will analyze in detail include a pronominal possessive construction with a possessive pronoun used as a determiner of the head noun, another prenominal construction that resembles the English s-possessive, a linker construction in which a possessive pronoun occurs as a possessive marker in between a prenominal possessor phrase and the head noun, and a postnominal construction that involves the preposition van/von/vun and is largely parallel to the English of -possessive. -
Systematic Homonymy and the Structure of Morphological Categories: Some Lessons from Paradigm Geometry
Jason Johnston (1997) Systematic Homonymy and the Structure of Morphological Categories: Some Lessons from Paradigm Geometry. PhD thesis, University of Sydney Note to the PDF Edition This PDF version of my dissertation is as close as I have been able to make it to the copies deposited with the Faculty of Arts and the Department of Linguistics at the University of Sydney. However this version is not in any sense an image capture of those copies, which remain the only ‘official’ ones. The differences between this document and the printed copies are very minor and revolve entirely around the use of Greek and IPA fonts. Essentially, one instance of the Greek font has been rewritten in transliteration (the quotation on page 41), and the change to an IPA font lacking a subscripted dot has entailed some modification of words containing that diacritic. Either these have been rewritten without diacritics (the words ‘Panini’ and ‘Astadhyayi’ throughout), or proper IPA retroflex glyphs have been substituted where appropriate (in all other cases). Additionally, the substitute IPA font has slightly different metrics from the one used originally, which has caused some enlargement of tables containing IPA characters or (more commonly) diacritics, and therefore occasionally some repagination. In all cases this is compensated for within a few pages at most. There are other small differences in the appearance of some tables, diagrams, and accented characters. This document contains a ‘live’ table of contents (‘bookmarks’ in Adobe Acrobat terminology). In addition, endnote references and bibliographic citations, though not specifically so marked, are hyperlinked to their corresponding text or entry, as the case may be. -
Pronouns in Nanosyntax a Typological Study of the Containment Structure of Pronominals
Pronouns in Nanosyntax A typological study of the containment structure of pronominals *Name* *Student number* rMA Linguistics Universiteit van Amsterdam 24-06-2015 Acknowledgements This paper is the result of my Research Project Linguistics, the final part of my Research Master Linguistics at the University of Amsterdam. In following this rMA, I had the opportunity to study the fields that I am interested in the most: linguistic theory and typology. These two fields are fused in this research project, that was sometimes challenging but more often fun to work on. I would like to thank all my teachers and fellow students, in particular my co-students at the rMA, for the educational and fun experience this rMA has been. In particular, I want to express my gratitude to two of my teachers: Eva van Lier and Jan Don. I would like to thank Eva van Lier, for introducing me to the field of typology and for being an inspirational teacher. Besides that, I am grateful for her comments on earlier versions of this paper which made me evaluate my own work critically. I am most grateful to Jan Don, for making me realise that linguistics is the most interesting field of study, for his valuable lessons about linguistics and academic research, and for his faith in my capacities. Above all, I want to thank him for being the most inspirational, encouraging and helpful supervisor of this thesis project that a student could wish for. i Abbreviations 1 1st person 2 2nd person 3 3rd person ABS absolutive ACC accusative ALIEN alienable possession C common gender -
The Ongoing Eclipse of Possessive Suffixes in North Saami
Te ongoing eclipse of possessive sufxes in North Saami A case study in reduction of morphological complexity Laura A. Janda & Lene Antonsen UiT Te Arctic University of Norway North Saami is replacing the use of possessive sufxes on nouns with a morphologically simpler analytic construction. Our data (>2K examples culled from >.5M words) track this change through three generations, covering parameters of semantics, syntax and geography. Intense contact pressure on this minority language probably promotes morphological simplifcation, yielding an advantage for the innovative construction. Te innovative construction is additionally advantaged because it has a wider syntactic and semantic range and is indispensable, whereas its competitor can always be replaced. Te one environment where the possessive sufx is most strongly retained even in the youngest generation is in the Nominative singular case, and here we fnd evidence that the possessive sufx is being reinterpreted as a Vocative case marker. Keywords: North Saami; possessive sufx; morphological simplifcation; vocative; language contact; minority language 1. Te linguistic landscape of North Saami1 North Saami is a Uralic language spoken by approximately 20,000 people spread across a large area in northern parts of Norway, Sweden and Finland. North Saami is in a unique situation as the only minority language in Europe under intense pressure from majority languages from two diferent language families, namely Finnish (Uralic) in the east and Norwegian and Swedish (Indo-European 1. Tis research was supported in part by grant 22506 from the Norwegian Research Council. Te authors would also like to thank their employer, UiT Te Arctic University of Norway, for support of their research. -
Introduction to Case, Animacy and Semantic Roles: ALAOTSIKKO
1 Introduction to Case, animacy and semantic roles Please cite this paper as: Kittilä, Seppo, Katja Västi and Jussi Ylikoski. (2011) Introduction to case, animacy and semantic roles. In: Kittilä, Seppo, Katja Västi & Jussi Ylikoski (Eds.), Case, Animacy and Semantic Roles, 1-26. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Seppo Kittilä Katja Västi Jussi Ylikoski University of Helsinki University of Oulu University of Helsinki University of Helsinki 1. Introduction Case, animacy and semantic roles and different combinations thereof have been the topic of numerous studies in linguistics (see e.g. Næss 2003; Kittilä 2008; de Hoop & de Swart 2008 among numerous others). The current volume adds to this list. The focus of the chapters in this volume lies on the effects that animacy has on the use and interpretation of cases and semantic roles. Each of the three concepts discussed in this volume can also be seen as somewhat problematic and not always easy to define. First, as noted by Butt (2006: 1), we still have not reached a full consensus on what case is and how it differs, for example, from 2 the closely related concept of adpositions. Second, animacy, as the label is used in linguistics, does not fully correspond to a layperson’s concept of animacy, which is probably rather biology-based (see e.g. Yamamoto 1999 for a discussion of the concept of animacy). The label can therefore, if desired, be seen as a misnomer. Lastly, semantic roles can be considered one of the most notorious labels in linguistics, as has been recently discussed by Newmeyer (2010). There is still no full consensus on how the concept of semantic roles is best defined and what would be the correct or necessary number of semantic roles necessary for a full description of languages. -
Some Observations on the Hebrew Desiderative Construction – a Dependency-Based Account in Terms of Catenae1
Thomas Groß Some Observations on the Hebrew Desiderative Construction – A Dependency-Based Account in Terms of Catenae1 Abstract The Modern Hebrew (MH) desiderative construction must obey four conditions: 1. A subordinate clause headed by the clitic še= ‘that’ must be present. 2. The verb in the subordinate clause must be marked with future tense. 3. The grammatical properties genus, number, and person tend to be specified, i.e. if the future tense affix is underspecified, material tends to appear that aids specification, if contextual recovery is unavailable. 4. The units of form that make up the constructional meaning of the desiderative must qualify as a catena. A catena is a dependency-based unit of form, the parts of which are immediately continuous in the vertical dimension. The description of the individual parts of the desiderative must address trans-, pre-, and suffixes, and cliticization. Catena-based morphology is representational, monostratal, dependency-, construction-, and piece-based. 1. Purpose, means and claims The main purpose of this paper is to analyze the Hebrew desiderative construction. This construction is linguistically interesting and challenging for a number of reasons. 1. It is a periphrastic construction, with fairly transparent compositionality. 2. It is transclausal, i.e. some parts of the construction reside in the main clause, and others in the subordinated clause. The complementizer is also part of the construction. 3. The construction consists of more than one word, but it does not qualify as a constituent. Rather the construction cuts into words. 4. Two theoretically 1 I want to thank Outi Bat-El (Tel Aviv University) and three anonymous reviewers for their help and advice. -
PART I: HOMEWORK 1: GRAMMAR from the Book. 2: EXERCISES
1 Winter Semester 2015/2016 Handout 2 PART I: HOMEWORK 1: GRAMMAR from the book. To be prepared for the Lesson 2 you are expected: to read the following material from the book Unit 1: Pronunciation and accent in Latin, p. 1-2; Grammatical categories, p. 3-5; 2: EXERCISES 1. Read aloud: • vertebra, ante, palpebra, medulla, vēna, trachēa, venēnum (2) • sine, pilula, vitrum, inter, spīna, rīma, vīnum, salīva (3) • post, anodus, oleum, prostata, bōlus, prō, prōcessus, dolorōsus (4) • apud, gutta, glandula, uterus, ūrīna, rūptūra, nātūra (5) • aegrōtus, praemātūrus, lagoena, foetor, aër, dyspnoē, diploē, proerythroblastos, coenzymum (6) • felleus, balneum, āreola, aorta, interosseae, pleura, pӯogenēs, euryōpia (9) • celulla, cibus, caecum, cystis, costa, cutis, fasciculus, clāvicula, frāctūra (11) • coccӯgeus, occipitālis, ōscilococcinum, accessōrius, saccus, saccī, vaccīna (12) • caecum, caecī, bucca, buccae, verrūca, verrūcae, thōrācica, thōrācicae, saccus, saccī, coenzymum (13) • digitus, tībia, destillāta, hernia, tunica, audītus (15) • fūnctiō, articulātiō, vitium, īnsufficientia, sānātiō, ōstium, testium, mixtiō, combustiō (16) • aqua, liquor, quadrātus, lingua, sanguis, unguentum, unguis, unguium, inguinālis (17) • resistentia, incīsūra, spongiōsus, basis, crisis, nasālis, pulsus, morsus, mēnsis, plasma (18) • comissūra, prōcessus, scissus, accessōrius, ossa, ossium, hypoglōssus, tussis, pertussis (19) 2. Read aloud the nominative and genitive forms of the nouns. Write down the number of the declension; follow the example: ex: caput, -
The Concept of Intentional Action in the Grammar of Kathmandu Newari
THE CONCEPT OF INTENTIONAL ACTION IN THE GRAMMAR OF KATHMANDU NEWARI by DAVID J. HARGREAVES A DISSERTATION Presented to the Department of Linguistics and the Graduate School of the University of Oregon in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy August 1991 ii APPROVED: Dr. Scott DeLancey iii An Abstract of the Dissertation of David J. Hargreaves for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of Linguistics to be taken August 1991 Title: THE CONCEPT OF INTENTIONAL ACTION IN THE GRAMMAR OF KATHMANDU NEWARI Approved: Dr. Scott DeLancey This study describes the relationship between the concept of intentional action and the grammatical organization of the clause in Kathmandu Newari, a Tibeto-Burman language spoken primarily in the Kathmandu valley of Nepal. In particular, the study focuses on the conceptual structure of "intentional action" along with the lexical, morphological, and syntactic reflexes of this notion in situated speech. The construal of intentional action consists of two distinct notions: one involving the concept of self-initiated force and the other involving mental representation or awareness. The distribution of finite inflectional forms for verbs results from the interaction of these two notions with a set of evidential/discourse principles which constrain the attribution of intentional action to certain discourse roles in situated interaction. iv VITA NAME OF AUTHOR: David J. Hargreaves PLACE OF BIRTH: Detroit, Michigan DATE OF BIRTH: March 10, 1955 GRADUATE AND UNDERGRADUATE -
Course Reader
Language and Space Marcus Kracht Department of Linguistics, UCLA 3125 Campbell Hall PO Box 951543 Los Angeles, CA 90095–1543 [email protected] March 15, 2007 2 Introduction Foreword My own interest in space and language was sparked off by the regularities I ob- served in the case systems of Finnish and Hungarian. Though the facts are often obvious and have been pointed out many times in the literature, I was surprised to find that most literature is concerned only with the morphological aspects of space, and that there seemed to be very little on semantics. The more I looked into the matter the more I discovered how fascinating the area is; I also learned that there is a lot of material on space and language, but it tends to be somewhat lesser known. There is a noticeable trend to take the linguistics of space more serious also from a theoretical point of view. The present book does not attempt to provide a typological survey, nor is it uniquely theoretical in character. I have tried to create a synthesis between lin- guistically oriented investigation (involving syntax, morphology and historical de- velopment) and formal ones (which include the mathematical structure of space and other spatial concepts). Inevitably, some parts of the book will be hard going for a linguist and they might therefore disapprove of my overly formal stance. Yet, I hope that such readers will benefit nevertheless from this work even if they skip such sections. On the other hand, when formal accounts of meanings can be given I think they should be given.