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UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA SANTA CRUZ A THEORY OF NOMINAL CONCORD A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY in LINGUISTICS by Mark Norris June 2014 The Dissertation of Mark Norris is approved: Professor Jorge Hankamer, Chair Professor Sandra Chung Professor James McCloskey Dean Tyrus Miller Vice Provost and Dean of Graduate Studies Copyright © by Mark Norris 2014 Table of Contents List of Figures vi List of Tables vii Abstract viii Dedication x Acknowledgments xi 1 Introduction 3 1.1 Themainpuzzle.................................. 3 1.2 EmpiricalBackground ... ...... ..... ...... ...... ... 5 1.2.1 Grammaticalsketch ........................... 6 1.2.2 Nominalmorphology........................... 8 1.2.3 Nominal morphophonology . 12 1.2.4 Datasources ............................... 14 1.2.5 ThecaseforEstonian...... ..... ...... ...... .... 16 1.3 Theoretical Background . 16 1.3.1 Some important syntactic assumptions . ..... 17 1.3.2 Some important morphological assumptions . ...... 20 1.4 Organization.................................... 21 2 Estonian Nominal Morphosyntax 23 2.1 Introduction.................................... 23 2.2 TheDPlayerinEstonian .. ...... ..... ...... ...... ... 25 2.2.1 Estonian does not exhibit properties of articleless languages . 28 2.2.2 Overt material in D0 inEstonian..................... 44 2.2.3 Evidence for D0 from demonstratives . 50 2.2.4 Implications for the Small Nominal Hypothesis . ....... 54 2.3 Cardinal numerals in Estonian . 60 2.3.1 The numeral’s “complement” . 60 2.3.2 Previous analyses of numeral-noun constructions . ......... 64 iii 2.4 Two structures for NNCs in Estonian . ..... 75 2.4.1 The size of the NP+ ............................ 76 2.4.2 The higher number feature in Estonian . 79 2.4.3 Higher adjectives and possessors . 81 2.4.4 Plural numerals in Estonian are specifiers . ...... 85 2.5 Conclusions and Further Directions . ...... 92 3 Nominal Concord in Estonian 94 3.1 Introduction: What is concord? . ..... 94 3.2 Previous approaches to concord . 99 3.2.1 Comparing concord and subject-verb agreement . 100 3.2.2 Agree and kinds of agreement . 103 3.2.3 Adjectival concord and Agree . 104 3.2.4 Possessors and intervention . 120 3.2.5 Previous Approaches: Summary . 122 3.3 Refining the characterization of concord . ........ 123 3.3.1 Norris 2012 on Icelandic concord: Feature Collection and Copying . 124 3.3.2 Complex concord in Numeral-Noun Constructions in Estonian . 128 3.3.3 Summary: Locality in numeral-noun construction concord . 131 3.4 The syntactic side of concord . 132 3.4.1 A theoretical argument for feature spreading . ....... 133 3.4.2 φ-features spread from bottom to top . 135 3.4.3 Case features spread from top to bottom . 148 3.5 The morphological side of concord . 151 3.5.1 Agr0 nodeinsertion............................ 152 3.5.2 FeatureCopying ............................. 157 3.6 Conclusion .................................... 159 4 An Unmarked Case in Estonian Nominals 165 4.1 Introduction.................................... 165 4.2 The syntax of the pseudopartitive . 168 4.2.1 Pseudopartitives in a theoretical context . ........ 170 4.2.2 N1isanormalnoun ........................... 171 4.2.3 TheN2PhraseisatleastaDP . 177 4.3 Case-marking in Estonian pseudopartitives . .......... 180 4.3.1 The many lives of partitive case . 182 4.3.2 Accusative in Estonian grammar . 184 4.3.3 Some Estonian cases are postpositions . 190 4.3.4 Interim summary and implications . 197 4.4 Case hierarchies and their sources . 199 4.4.1 Hierarchical effects driven by morphology . ....... 204 4.4.2 Caha: case hierarchy encoded in syntactic representations . 209 4.4.3 Interim summary: nominative and accusative are special ........ 211 iv 4.5 The Phase-Based Spell-Out approach to timing . ........ 212 4.5.1 Preliminariesoncase. 213 4.5.2 The Phase-Based Spell-Out analysis . 214 4.5.3 Extending the analysis to numerals . 218 4.5.4 Extending the analysis once more: Stacking NNCs and pseudopartitives 219 4.6 Partitive as an unmarked case inside nominals . ......... 223 4.6.1 Unmarked Partitive: the matching pattern . 225 4.6.2 Unmarked Partitive: the partitive pattern . ........ 226 4.6.3 Extending the analysis to M-stacks . 228 4.6.4 Summary: towards deriving the case hierarchy . 231 4.7 Microvariation between Finnish and Estonian . ......... 232 4.8 Conclusions.................................... 235 5 Conclusion 238 5.1 Summaryofresults ................................ 238 5.2 In search of verbal concord . 240 5.2.1 Verbal concord with verbal features . 241 5.2.2 Verbal concord with φ-features...................... 242 5.2.3 In search of verbal concord: summary . 245 5.3 Nextsteps..................................... 246 5.3.1 Where to look for interesting data . 246 5.3.2 Optionalconcord ............................. 247 5.4 Finalremarks ................................... 249 v List of Figures 1.1 The Finno-Ugric languages, slightly abbreviated (adapted from Abondolo 1998) 5 1.2 TheinvertedY-Model.... ...... ..... ...... ...... ... 17 1.3 Agree between A and B resulting in feature sharing . ......... 20 3.1 Overlapping feature domains in Estonian concord . .......... 131 vi List of Tables 1.1 Traditional Estonian declension paradigm for lind ‘bird’ ............ 9 1.2 Some example stem distributions in Estonian . ........ 12 1.3 Formation of the semantic cases in Estonian . ........ 13 1.4 Formation of the short-form partitive plural in Estonian............. 14 2.1 Estonian declension paradigm for inimene ‘person’ . 25 2.2 Languages with and without articles (Boškovic2008)..............´ 29 2.3 Some properties of possessors in Estonian and Serbo-Croatian . 43 2.4 Declension paradigms for mis ‘what’ and miski ‘something’ . 48 3.1 Elements showing concord in Estonian . ...... 95 3.2 A comparison of subject-verb agreement and concord . .......... 103 3.3 Partial case paradigms for ordinal numerals in Estonian ............. 130 3.4 Some possible arrangements of categories showing concord........... 153 3.5 Feature expression by CEs in Estonian concord . ........ 155 3.6 An impossible pattern of feature expression in Estonian concord . 155 3.7 The distribution of features in Nez Perce concord . .......... 156 3.8 The syntax and morphology of concord . 160 4.1 Case patterns for the pseudopartitive tükk leiba ‘piece of bread’ . 181 4.2 Morphological case of transitive objects in Estonian . ............. 185 4.3 Finnish structural cases (Kiparsky 2001) . ......... 185 4.4 Abbreviated case paradigm for Skolt Saami ˇcuäcc ‘rotten snag’ (Feist 2010:140) 186 4.5 Case patterns in Estonian pseudopartitives, to be revised again . 189 4.6 Case morphology in Estonian . 192 4.7 Postpositions and case markers in Estonian . ........ 195 4.8 Case patterns in Estonian pseudopartitives, final version............. 198 vii Abstract A theory of nominal concord by Mark Norris This dissertation develops a novel theory of the kind of agreement that has come to be known as (nominal) concord, traditionally described as obtaining between a noun and its modifiers, e.g., adjectives and determiners. The empirical focus is the concord system in Estonian, and thus a second goal of the dissertation is to describe and analyze various morphosyntactic puzzles within Estonian DPs. The core phenomena investigated are: (i) the functional structure of nominals in Estonian, including the category D and the syntax of cardinal numerals; (ii) number concord in Estonian and concord more generally; and (iii) case concord in simple DPs as well as case concord in pseudopartitives and DPs with numerals, which apparently show an alternation between case assignment and case concord. The dissertation argues for a view of morphological case wherein some cases are assigned in particular environments when no other case is available and for a view of nominal concord as an agreement phenomenon that is formally distinct from subject-verb agreement. Despite the fact that Estonian lacks definite and indefinite articles—the most common members of category D—there is evidence that Estonian nominals contain a normal amount of functional structure, including DP. I argue that we achieve a clearer understanding of the Estonian possessor system if Estonian has DP, and I show that the category D is not only for articles, but also indefinite pronouns and the wh-determiner corresponding to ‘which’. I then argue that cardinal numerals in Estonian can occupy either a specifier position or a position as a head in the nominal extended projection. I show how this helps explain differences in number-marking and case-marking that arise in DPs with numerals. I then turn to an analysis of nominal concord in case and number in Estonian. I argue that treating nominal concord as a DP-internal correlate of subject-verb agreement does not lead us to a better understanding of its behavior. Furthermore, I show that nominal concord exhibits some behavior that is puzzling under an Agree-based analysis: (i) adjectives show concord despite the fact that they are not in a position to c-command the source of the features, and (ii) though possessors may intervene structurally and linearly between a putative probe and goal, viii they do not disrupt or affect concord in any way. The novel analysis of concord that I propose does not treat it as a direct relationship between two syntactic nodes, but as the relationship between an extended projection and the elements that comprise it. The properties just listed in (i) and