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States, Changes of State, and the Monotonicity Hypothesis

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States, Changes of State, and the Monotonicity Hypothesis STATES, CHANGES OF STATE, AND THE MONOTONICITY HYPOTHESIS A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO THE DEPARTMENT OF LINGUISTICS AND THE COMMITTEE ON GRADUATE STUDIES OF STANFORD UNIVERSITY IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY Andrew Koontz-Garboden January 2007 c Copyright by Andrew Koontz-Garboden 2007 All Rights Reserved ii I certify that I have read this dissertation and that, in my opinion, it is fully adequate in scope and quality as a dissertation for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. (Beth Levin) Principal Advisor I certify that I have read this dissertation and that, in my opinion, it is fully adequate in scope and quality as a dissertation for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. (Cleo Condoravdi) I certify that I have read this dissertation and that, in my opinion, it is fully adequate in scope and quality as a dissertation for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. (Paul Kiparsky) I certify that I have read this dissertation and that, in my opinion, it is fully adequate in scope and quality as a dissertation for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. (Peter Sells) Approved for the University Committee on Graduate Studies. iii iv Abstract This dissertation examines the Monotonicity Hypothesis (MH), the widely assumed, but rarely discussed idea that while word formation operations can add decompositional operators to a word’s lexical semantic representation, they cannot remove them. Adopt- ing modified versions of Dowty’s (1979) decompositional representations of states (e.g., red) and changes into states (e.g., redden), I observe that the MH makes two strong fal- sifiable predictions in this domain. First, words naming states should never be derived from words naming changes of state, as this would involve the deletion of a BECOME operator. Data from a number of languages are examined and shown to bear out the prediction, with one apparent exception. Ulwa, an endangered Misumalpan language, appears to have words naming states derived from change of state denoting roots. De- tailed examination of Ulwa verbal and adjectival semantics and morphosyntax based on extensive primary fieldwork shows that this is an illusion. Given the widely held view that the semantic representation of inchoative verbs lacks the CAUSE operator present in the representation of causative verbs, a second strong prediction is that inchoatives should never be derived from causatives. This is apparently falsified by anticausativiza- tion, in which an inchoative verb is derived from a causative verb, e.g., Spanish romper ‘cause to become broken’ versus romper se ‘become broken’. Building on Chierchia (2004), I argue instead for a reflexivization analysis of anticausativization, showing that it captures a wide range of facts of the phenomenon not accounted for by alternative approaches, most notably facts showing that derived inchoatives retain the CAUSE op- erator of the causatives from which they are derived. This analysis is consistent with the MH, since it entails no deletion of decompositional operators. Finally, I lay out sev- eral areas for future research. Formally, the relationship of the MH to the Principle of v Compositionality remains to be clarified. Empirically, the MH makes many falsifiable predictions beyond the domain of states and changes of state, which suggest areas for promising future crosslinguistic investigation. Research of both kinds will shed further light on the MH and more broadly on the semantic nature of word formation operations. vi Glossing conventions accusative case the morpheme appearing on Ulwa words naming property concept states audative (in Ulwa) auxiliary causative copula –– –da– verb class marker (in Ulwa) definite article different subject switch reference marking ergative case future tense imperative inchoative indefinite article infinitive interrogative marker irrealis modality marker of irreverence negative nominative case - non-nominative case (in Ulwa) –pa– verb class marker (in Ulwa) . past participle vii past tense . plural exclusive (of first person plural in Ulwa) . plural inclusive (of first person plural in Ulwa) plural present tense perfective aspect perfect aspect progressive aspect presentational marker (in Tongan) quotative marker the Ulwa marker raupi, described in Chapter 4 reciprocal reflexive resultative marker (in Eastern Armenian) - the sentential ka marker in Ulwa, described in Chapter 4 singular same subject switch reference marking –ta– verb class marker (in Ulwa) topic marker –wa– verb class marker (in Ulwa) 1,2,3 1st,2nd,3rdpersonagreement < > Gloss inside angle brackets indicates glossed morpheme is an infix viii Acknowledgements Writing these acknowledgements has been a humbling experience; I have been extraor- dinarily well-supported, personally and professionally, over the last many years . My advisor, Beth Levin, has set the highest of standards for the kindofwork I aim to do: research that is empirically well-grounded, crosslinguistically oriented, and relevant across a range of theories. In addition to being an academic role model, she has sup- ported me in innumerable ways, not only intellectually in our weekly meetings, but also by: employing me on her NSF project; funding work on Tongan; being very generous with her colossal library; supporting (in many ways) multiple grant applications to fund my work on Ulwa; and reading and commenting on long and semi-coherent (at best) missives on Ulwa grammar sent from the Nicaraguan jungle. For all of this, and much more, I am grateful. The other members of my committee have been no less instrumental in my devel- opment as a linguist and in setting good examples to follow more generally. It would be impossible to overstate the impact Paul Kiparsky has had on me intellectually. The most fascinating meetings I’ve had during my time as a graduate student have been with Paul. He’s genuinely interested (and knowledgeable) in seemingly everything and al- ways has profound and topical questions and feedback that have kept me focused both on the predictions of my analyses and on their larger consequences. Beyond the won- derfully useful feedback Peter Sells has always (very promptly!) provided, he gave me a trajectory-changing experience working with him and my graduate student colleague Judith Tonhauser on the NSF Terascale Linguistics Initiative and later on an NSF grant application. The latter of these was an eye-opening introduction to grant writing, and although it wasn’t successful, the experience ultimately gave me the needed confidence ix and know-how to undertake my own successful applications for grant money, without which my work on Ulwa would not have proceeded. I also feel extremely privileged to have had Cleo Condoravdi agree to serve on my committee. My meetings with her, al- though relatively few, have been extraordinarily productive and very enlightening. Her sharp comments have made the dissertation much better than it otherwise would have been and have no doubt saved me from (at least some) embarrassment. Finally, many other (current and former) Stanford faculty members have had a positive impact on my graduate student experience and ultimately on the dissertation, among them: David Beaver, Joan Bresnan, Eve Clark, Edward Flemming, John Rickford, Ivan Sag, Eliza- beth Traugott, Tom Wasow, Annie Zaenen, Arnold Zwicky, and Will Leben, who aside from the usual faculty duties, also generously loaned Melissa and me his garage for a year to store our stuff while we were in Nicaragua. I suspect that I’ve learned at least as much outside of class from my Stanford grad- uate student colleagues over coffee and beer as I did in class from faculty members. In particular, I have benefited from a critical mass of students interested in semantics dur- ing my time at Stanford: Tanya Nikitina, Itamar Francez, Ashwini Deo, John Beavers, Judith Tonhauser, Dmitry Levinson, Scott Grimm, Philip Hofmeister, David Oshima, Iv´an Garc´ıa Alvarez, Lis Norcliffe, Doug Ball, Laura Whitton, and Nola Stephens. And, Stanford being the place it is, I have learned just as much about linguistics more broadly and had encouragement from people whose specialization is outside of semantics: Mary Rose, Lev Blumenfeld, Alex Jaker, Florian Jaeger, and Bruno Estigarribia. I owe a big thanks especially to John Beavers and Itamar Francez, who have been sounding boards for my thoughts (linguistic and otherwise) for the last several years. In many cases, major advances have come about as results of discussion with one or both of them. I also have several fellow grad students to thank for painstakingly proofreading the final version of the dissertation: Doug Ball, Scott Grimm, and Jason Grafmiller. Thanks to the Stanford colloquium series, the Construction of Meaning Workshop, linguistics summer schools, other events, and email, I have come in contact during my graduate years with a number of linguists beyond the Stanford bubble that have pro- vided important feedback on my work that has substantively impacted my thinking. Among them are: Daniel Kaufman (who provided invaluable help with the Tagalog x data in Chapter 3), Elena Benedicto, Martin Haspelmath, Shelly Lieber, Maria Bittner, Mark Baker, D. Gary Miller, Jimmy Lin, Eric Jackson, Marcus Smith, Florian Schaefer, Artemis Alexiadou, Steve Wechsler, Melissa Bowerman, Martina Faller, Dalina Kallulli, Sergei Tatevosov, Marianne Mithun, Juergen Bohnemeyer, Ruth Rouvier, and Andrew Garrett. Also, while at Indiana University, George Candler, Rich File, members of the Department of Linguistics at IU, and especially Clancy Clements, had big impacts on me and their influence was important in my decision to pursue linguistics in more depth. I owe an enormous debt of gratitude to the community of Karawala, Nicaragua and particularly to the members of the Ulwa Language Project and their families: Clementina Sim´on, Abanel Lacayo, Francisco Santiago, Kandler Santiago, Lorinda Mart´ınez, and Alberto Santiago. They all went far beyond the call of duty in making sure that both Melissa and I remained in good health during our time in Karawala, offering food, their houses, organizational resources, camaraderie, and much more.
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