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Remarks on Modern Standard Arabic Construct State and Quantification University of Wisconsin Milwaukee UWM Digital Commons Theses and Dissertations December 2020 Remarks on Modern Standard Arabic Construct State and Quantification Mohammed Abuhaib University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Follow this and additional works at: https://dc.uwm.edu/etd Part of the Linguistics Commons Recommended Citation Abuhaib, Mohammed, "Remarks on Modern Standard Arabic Construct State and Quantification" (2020). Theses and Dissertations. 2443. https://dc.uwm.edu/etd/2443 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by UWM Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of UWM Digital Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. REMARKS ON MODERN STANDARD ARABIC CONSTRUCT STATE AND QUANTIFICATION by Mohammed Abuhaib A Dissertation Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Linguistics at The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee December 2020 ABSTRACT REMARKS ON MODERN STANDARD ARABIC CONSTRUCT STATE AND QUANTIFICATION by Mohammed Abuhaib The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, 2020 Under the Supervision of Professor Nicholas Fleisher This thesis investigates the interpretations of genitive and quantificational forms that Mod- ern Standard Arabic (MSA) unifies under a complex DP, namely Construct State (CS). Despite the linguistic differences between these phenomena, the PF form of this structure neutralizes all indicated types and their sub-types into a head-complement form (possessum-possessor or quanti- fier-domain restriction), where the whole structure’s definiteness is recovered from the comple- ment that is distinguished for this value overtly. However, the internal syntactic and semantic components such as the source of relations and definiteness value of the whole structure that con- tribute to the CS its various interpretations are always concealed at PF. This neutralization makes it hard to view the differences between CS types as well as the causes of their various semantic ambiguities. This project analyzes Nominal and Quantificational CSs of MSA to uncover their hidden syntactic and semantic factors that distinguish their semantic contributions. To approach these two forms, this thesis consists of four main discussion chapters. Two of these chapters (2&3) are devoted to approach genitive nominals, and their syntac- tic and semantic aspects. Chapter (2) looks at (in)definiteness: marking, agreement (inheritance), and its interpretation on either component at LF. In this chapter, I argue that the Nominal-CS D head inherits its covert definiteness featural specifications from its complement whose definiteness is distinguished overtly. This inheritance takes place at the syntactic level via the operation of ii syntactic agreement (following Pesetsky and Torrego, 2007 framework) which feeds the semantic interpretations of this form, regardless of some exceptional cases for this inheritance. Chapter (3) investigates the semantic ambiguities of a nominal CS. One type of the ambiguities categorizes a CS as possessive vs. modificational CS based on the relation between the head and the complement. Following Borer (2009), these interpretations are caused by the referentiality of the complement, which is associated with its syntactic category: a referential DP for the possessive type and non- referential NP for modificational type. Another ambiguity is caused by the relation between the nominals in the distinguished types contributed by Relator Phrase (RP) projection (cf. Den Dikken, 2006 and Ouhalla, 2011). The head of this projection denotes a free variable over contextual rela- tions (possessiveness, agent, control, or other pragmatic relations) or its relation can be contributed lexically by the head noun when it is relational semantically. However, the lexical relation may or may not feed the RP projection depending on the context. Regarding the quantificational side of the investigation, it focuses on quantificational de- terminers and their domain restriction (DR) nouns that form the quantificational construct state (QCS), in addition to some notes about scope taking ambiguities. Chapter (4) approaches the quan- tifiers kul: “every/each or all” dʒami:ʔ “all” muʕðˤam “most” baʕdˤ “some” and their DR nouns in CS. All the former quantifiers are restricted by definite plural DPs without partitive preposition, except for the distributive interpretation of kul:. For the latter, it has to be restricted by an indefinite bare noun. Regarding these issues, this chapter argues that quantifiers of Arabic are not syntactic determiners since they are distinguished for (in)definiteness overtly in non-CS structure or covertly in QCS. The account that is drawn for the quantifiers with definite DR proposes that they are partitive quantifiers whose partitive relation is established by a null PartP (partitive phrase) (cf. iii Fehri, 2018). PartP allows them to quantify over parts of the individual sum denoted by their def- inite plural DR noun. On the other hand, the inherited definiteness on the quantifiers is semanti- cally vacuous since the domain of quantification is restricted by the definiteness of DR noun. For the distributive interpretation of the universal kul: “every/each”, its DR is a bare NP whose number contributes the (non)atomic granularity for distributivity rather than categorizing it as indefinite since this language lacks the indefinite determiner. The following chapter shifts the discussion toward some notes on scope taking to examine the possibility of the covert inverse scope and inverse linking readings at LF in SVO and VSO word orders. For the inverse scope at clause-level, the findings of this chapter analysis suggest that the scope is fluid with respect to VSO order, while the SVO order shows some exceptions. The subject of SVO occurs in the left periphery as a topic or focus (Soltan, 2007; Albuhayri, 2019) where QR does not exceed (cf. May, 1977, 1985; Heim and Kratzer, 1998). Merely, a clitic left dislocated topic can freeze the scope by reserving wide scope interpretation, while a focused sub- ject can show scope ambiguity due to its ability to reconstruct because it is a moved element to the left periphery. Regarding scope linking within DP, MSA allows this type of QR movement at LF, but, still the left periphery boundary is respected. iv © Copyright by Mohammed Abuhaib, 2020 All Rights Reserved v To my parents, my lovely wife, my wonderful kids: Aljuhara & Meshary, and my supportive brothers and sisters vi TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT ................................................................................................................................... ii LIST OF TABLES ....................................................................................................................... ix LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ...................................................................................................... x ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ........................................................................................................ xi CHAPTER (1): IntroduCtion ....................................................................................................... 1 Introduction ............................................................................................................................ 1 CS Data .................................................................................................................................. 1 Problems and Claims ............................................................................................................. 5 Previous Works and Significance ........................................................................................ 10 Research Questions .............................................................................................................. 12 Framework and Theoretical Assumptions ........................................................................... 13 1.6.1 Semantics ...................................................................................................................... 13 1.6.2 Syntax ........................................................................................................................... 14 Outline of the Thesis ............................................................................................................ 16 CHAPTER (2): ConstruCt State (In)definiteness ..................................................................... 18 Introduction .......................................................................................................................... 18 Syntactic (In)definitenss ...................................................................................................... 19 2.2.1 Simple (In)definite Nouns ............................................................................................ 19 2.2.2 CS Syntactic (In)definiteness ....................................................................................... 22 Semantic (In)definiteness ..................................................................................................... 47 2.3.1 Definiteness .................................................................................................................. 47 2.3.2 Indefiniteness ................................................................................................................ 49 2.3.3 (In)definite CS .............................................................................................................
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