Explorations in Nominal Inflection

Explorations in Nominal Inflection PDF

Author: Gereon Müller

Publisher: Walter de Gruyter

Published: 2008-08-22

Total Pages: 412

ISBN-13: 3110197502

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Explorations in Nominal Inflection is a collection of new articles that focus on nominal inflection markers in different languages. The studies are concerned with the morphological inventories of markers, their syntactic distribution, and, importantly, the interaction between the two. As a result, the contributions shed new light on the morphology/syntax interface, and on the role of morpho-syntactic features in mediating between the two components. Issues that feature prominently throughout are inflection class, case, gender, number, animacy, syncretism, iconicity, agreement, the status of paradigms, the nature of morpho-syntactic features, and the structure of nominal projections. Recurrent analytical tools involve the concepts of competition (optimality, specificity), underspecification, and economy, in various theoretical frameworks. James P. Blevins: Inflection Classes and Economy Bernd Wiese: Categories and Paradigms. On Underspecification in Russian Declension

Yearbook of Morphology 2004

Yearbook of Morphology 2004 PDF

Author: Geert E. Booij

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

Published: 2006-07-11

Total Pages: 322

ISBN-13: 1402029004

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A revival of interest in morphology has occurred during recent years. The Yearbook of Morphology, published since 1988, has proven to be an eminent support for this upswing of morphological research, since it contains articles on topics which are central in the current theoretical debates which are frequently referred to. In the Yearbook of Morphology 2004 a number of papers is devoted to the topic ‘morphology and linguistic typology’. These papers were presented at the Fourth Mediterranean Morphology Meeting in Catania, in September 2003. Within the context of this denominator, a number of issues are discussed wich bear upon universals and typology. These issues include: universals and diachrony, sign language, syncretism, periphrasis, etc.

A Phi-Syntax for Nominal Concord

A Phi-Syntax for Nominal Concord PDF

Author: Marco Benincasa

Publisher: Narr Francke Attempto Verlag

Published: 2018-03-26

Total Pages: 409

ISBN-13: 382339133X

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The book focusses on the grammatical feature definiteness in German, visible in the inflection of adjectives (ein schön-es Kind vs. das schön-e Kind). It argues for an analysis of this effect that draws a connection to the visible categories of number and gender on nouns and related words rather than an abstract property. This conclusion rests on the conflation of the established grammatical categories into a single one, number-gender, which explains a vast body of grammatical phenomena in German and principles of language in general.

Demonstratives and Definite Articles as Nominal Auxiliaries

Demonstratives and Definite Articles as Nominal Auxiliaries PDF

Author: Dorian Roehrs

Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing

Published: 2009

Total Pages: 212

ISBN-13: 9027255237

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Written in the cartographic tradition, this monograph is concerned with the inner structure and derivation of noun phrases. It proposes that demonstratives and definite articles are similar to auxiliaries in the clause. Referencing mostly Germanic languages, the book argues that determiners are base generated below adjectives and subsequently move to the left periphery in a successive-cyclic fashion. Demonstrating that determiners are complex elements, it is proposed that languages vary with regard to when and what part of the determiner they move. This provides a novel account of the variation in the Scandinavian noun phrase. With various copies left behind by moving the determiner, the restrictive and non-restrictive readings of adjectives and relative clauses are suggested to follow from the interpretation of these different copies. The system is extended to the strong and weak adjective inflections in German. Proposing that determiners are auxiliaries in the nominal domain explains these apparently unrelated data in a uniform way.

Developments in English Historical Morpho-Syntax

Developments in English Historical Morpho-Syntax PDF

Author: Claudia Claridge

Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing Company

Published: 2019-06-15

Total Pages: 320

ISBN-13: 9027262470

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Spanning the time from Old English to modern American English, this volume provides fresh perspectives on core issues and theories in the morphosyntactic history of English nominal, verbal and adverbial constructions. The contributions discuss the loss, rise and restructuring of morphonological marking, periphrastic verbal constructions, auxiliary variation and evolution, as well as changing word order options. Favouring corpus-linguistic, frequency-based and statistical approaches, the studies are firmly empirically grounded. The book is aimed at scholars interested in the history of the English language and in language variation and change.

Variation in Datives

Variation in Datives PDF

Author: Beatriz Fernandez

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2013

Total Pages: 345

ISBN-13: 0199937362

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Variation in Datives collects new research on the nature of syntactic micro-variation in datives. The papers in this volume examine different aspects of internal variation in dative marking, such as agreement and case alternations, distribution of adpositional structures and dative case-marking, the different structural positions of dative arguments and their semantic contribution, and patterns of syncretism in the clitic and/or agreement system. Interest in these topics has grown significantly in the past 20 years. Variation in Datives makes a significant contribution to our understanding of language variation, as it adds the micro-comparative perspective to the general discussion and includes 10 new articles on a wide range of European languages, including Greek, Basque, Icelandic, and Serbo-Croatian. Variation in Datives will appeal to scholars and advanced students of syntax, linguistic variation, and especially syntactic micro-variation.

Inflectional Identity

Inflectional Identity PDF

Author: Asaf Bachrach

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2008-01-24

Total Pages: 382

ISBN-13: 0199219257

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This book throws new light on the syntax, morphology, and phonology interfaces by focussing on the key current question of which elements in a paradigm can stand in a relation of partial or total phonological identity.

Gender and Noun Classification

Gender and Noun Classification PDF

Author: Éric Mathieu

Publisher: Oxford Studies in Theoretical

Published: 2018-11-15

Total Pages: 331

ISBN-13: 0198828101

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This volume explores the many ways by which natural languages categorize nouns into genders or classes. A noun may belong to a given class because of its logical or symbolic similarities with other nouns, because it shares a similar morphological form with other nouns, or simply through an arbitrary convention. The aim of this book is to establish which functional or lexical categories are responsible for this type of classification, especially along the nominal syntactic spine. The book's contributors draw on data from a wide range of languages, including Amharic, French, Gitksan, Haro, Lithuanian, Japanese, Mi'kmaw, Persian, and Shona. Chapters examine where in the nominal structure gender is able to function as a classifying device, and how in the absence of gender, other functional elements in the nominal spine come to fill that gap. Other chapters focus on how gender participates in grammatical concord and agreement phenomena. The volume also discusses semantic agreement: hybrid agreement sometimes arises due to a distinction that grammars encode between natural gender on the one hand and grammatical gender on the other. The findings in the volume have significant implications for syntactic theory and theories of interpretation, and contribute to a greater understanding of the interplay between inflection and derivation. The volume will be of interest to theoretical linguists and typologists from advanced undergraduate level upwards.

Scales and Hierarchies

Scales and Hierarchies PDF

Author: Ina Bornkessel-Schlesewsky

Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG

Published: 2014-12-12

Total Pages: 323

ISBN-13: 3110395002

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The volume advances our understanding of the role of scales and hierarchies across the linguistic sciences. Although scales and hierarchies are widely assumed to play a role in the modelling of linguistic phenomena, their status remains controversial, and it is these controversies that the present volume tackles head-on.