This article presents obligatory control constructions in San Martín Peras Mixtec, a language in which PRO must be exponed with an overt pronoun. I propose a morphological analysis of this phenomenon in which this language lacks a null allomorph for bound minimal pronouns (Kratzer 2009, Safir 2014, Landau 2015, 2018), posited to underlie silent PRO in other languages. This suggests that null exponence ought not be ontologically tethered to PRO’s distribution or interpretation, but can rather be reduced to the routine functions of language-specific contextual allomorphy.
{"title":"Obligatorily Overt PRO in San Martín Peras Mixtec","authors":"Jason Ostrove","doi":"10.1162/ling_a_00518","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1162/ling_a_00518","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 This article presents obligatory control constructions in San Martín Peras Mixtec, a language in which PRO must be exponed with an overt pronoun. I propose a morphological analysis of this phenomenon in which this language lacks a null allomorph for bound minimal pronouns (Kratzer 2009, Safir 2014, Landau 2015, 2018), posited to underlie silent PRO in other languages. This suggests that null exponence ought not be ontologically tethered to PRO’s distribution or interpretation, but can rather be reduced to the routine functions of language-specific contextual allomorphy.","PeriodicalId":48044,"journal":{"name":"Linguistic Inquiry","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2023-08-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44814610","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
We introduce a novel locality violation and its repair in Southeastern Sierra Zapotec: an object pronoun cannot cliticize when the subject is a lexical DP. We develop an account in which pronouns and lexical DPs interact with the same probe because they share featural content. In particular, we suggest that the Person domain extends to include non-pronominal DPs, so that all nominals are specified for a feature we call [δ] (to resonate with DP), while all and only personal pronouns are specified for [π]. This account aims to unify the locality violation with the Weak Person Case Constraint (PCC), as well as parallel constraints based on animacy, and requires a departure from Chomsky’s (2000, 2001) classical system of featural co-variation (Agree). A functional head must be able to overprobe: that is, interact with more than one goal, even if its requirements appear to be met. We introduce a probe activation model for Agree in which, after applying once, the operation can apply again, subject to certain restrictions. We compare probe activation to two other systems recently proposed to account for overprobing: Deal’s (2015, to appear) “insatiable probes” and Coon and Keine’s (2021) “feature gluttony.” Neither can account for the locality pattern in Zapotec.
{"title":"The Featural Life of Nominals","authors":"I. Sichel, M. Toosarvandani","doi":"10.1162/ling_a_00517","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1162/ling_a_00517","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 We introduce a novel locality violation and its repair in Southeastern Sierra Zapotec: an object pronoun cannot cliticize when the subject is a lexical DP. We develop an account in which pronouns and lexical DPs interact with the same probe because they share featural content. In particular, we suggest that the Person domain extends to include non-pronominal DPs, so that all nominals are specified for a feature we call [δ] (to resonate with DP), while all and only personal pronouns are specified for [π]. This account aims to unify the locality violation with the Weak Person Case Constraint (PCC), as well as parallel constraints based on animacy, and requires a departure from Chomsky’s (2000, 2001) classical system of featural co-variation (Agree). A functional head must be able to overprobe: that is, interact with more than one goal, even if its requirements appear to be met. We introduce a probe activation model for Agree in which, after applying once, the operation can apply again, subject to certain restrictions. We compare probe activation to two other systems recently proposed to account for overprobing: Deal’s (2015, to appear) “insatiable probes” and Coon and Keine’s (2021) “feature gluttony.” Neither can account for the locality pattern in Zapotec.","PeriodicalId":48044,"journal":{"name":"Linguistic Inquiry","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2023-08-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47854141","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This squib documents a novel empirical generalization from selection in Semitic: lexically selected PPs can vary by (verbal) template. This discovery is problematic for current analyses which take (lexically) selected arguments to either be introduced by the root (Harley 2014a) or by the categorizing head (Merchant 2019), both of which are lower than the functional heads realized as Semitic templates. Templates can induce alternations in argument structure (e.g. causativization) and diathesis (e.g. passivization)—characteristics typically associated with v/Voice. A preliminary solution is sketched whereby PPs can be jointly selected by the root, categorizing head, and template-defining head.
{"title":"Verbal Templates Can Influence L-Selection in Semitic","authors":"Matthew R Hewett","doi":"10.1162/ling_a_00516","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1162/ling_a_00516","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 This squib documents a novel empirical generalization from selection in Semitic: lexically selected PPs can vary by (verbal) template. This discovery is problematic for current analyses which take (lexically) selected arguments to either be introduced by the root (Harley 2014a) or by the categorizing head (Merchant 2019), both of which are lower than the functional heads realized as Semitic templates. Templates can induce alternations in argument structure (e.g. causativization) and diathesis (e.g. passivization)—characteristics typically associated with v/Voice. A preliminary solution is sketched whereby PPs can be jointly selected by the root, categorizing head, and template-defining head.","PeriodicalId":48044,"journal":{"name":"Linguistic Inquiry","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2023-07-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44780439","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
In Icelandic, part of the complex reciprocal hvor annar matches in case with the reciprocal’s antecedent. In structures where the reciprocal is embedded in a PP, the P intervenes between the two parts. A recent analysis of these data suggests that part of the reciprocal overtly moves to the base position of the antecedent by an operation termed e-raising. We show that such an analysis makes a number of wrong predictions about the constituencies of such structures and also about the behavior of reciprocals in coordinations. We show that this is also the case for other languages that show case-agreeing reciprocals. We instead argue that matching in case between antecedent and reciprocal can occur with the reciprocal staying in situ. Instances with PPs do involve movement but only to the edge of PP and not further. This analysis is in line with a number of recent approaches that advocate for a morphosyntactic feature matching relation between antecedent and locally bound anaphors.
{"title":"E-Raising Reconsidered: Constituency, Coordination and Case-Matching Reciprocals","authors":"T. Messick, G. R. Harðarson","doi":"10.1162/ling_a_00515","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1162/ling_a_00515","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 In Icelandic, part of the complex reciprocal hvor annar matches in case with the reciprocal’s antecedent. In structures where the reciprocal is embedded in a PP, the P intervenes between the two parts. A recent analysis of these data suggests that part of the reciprocal overtly moves to the base position of the antecedent by an operation termed e-raising. We show that such an analysis makes a number of wrong predictions about the constituencies of such structures and also about the behavior of reciprocals in coordinations. We show that this is also the case for other languages that show case-agreeing reciprocals. We instead argue that matching in case between antecedent and reciprocal can occur with the reciprocal staying in situ. Instances with PPs do involve movement but only to the edge of PP and not further. This analysis is in line with a number of recent approaches that advocate for a morphosyntactic feature matching relation between antecedent and locally bound anaphors.","PeriodicalId":48044,"journal":{"name":"Linguistic Inquiry","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2023-07-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46223670","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
In Nonderived Environment Blocking (NDEB), a phonological process applies across morpheme boundaries or morpheme-internally when fed by another phonological process but is otherwise blocked. I present a theory of NDEB that attributes blocking to an interaction between morpheme structure constraints (which constrain possible URs in the lexicon) and the usual phonological mapping from URs to surface forms. The theory has some unusual aspects that make it conceptually suspicious, but I will argue that it receives empirical support. Using several case studies, I discuss three puzzles for theories of NDEB previously proposed in the literature, including the Strict Cycle Condition (Mascaró, 1976), Kiparsky’s (1993) theory of underspecification, Sequential Faithfulness (Burzio, 2000), Coloured Containment (van Oostendorp, 2007), and Optimal Interleaving with Candidate Chains (Wolf, 2008). I show that none of those theories can deal with all three puzzles and that the proposed theory with morpheme structure constraints succeeds. This result supports a dual-component architecture of phonology (as in SPE) over architectures that eliminate language-specific morpheme structure constraints (i.e., the principle of Richness of the Base in Optimality Theory).
{"title":"Morpheme Structure Constraints Solve Three Puzzles for Theories of Blocking in Nonderived Environments","authors":"E. Rasin","doi":"10.1162/ling_a_00514","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1162/ling_a_00514","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 In Nonderived Environment Blocking (NDEB), a phonological process applies across morpheme boundaries or morpheme-internally when fed by another phonological process but is otherwise blocked. I present a theory of NDEB that attributes blocking to an interaction between morpheme structure constraints (which constrain possible URs in the lexicon) and the usual phonological mapping from URs to surface forms. The theory has some unusual aspects that make it conceptually suspicious, but I will argue that it receives empirical support. Using several case studies, I discuss three puzzles for theories of NDEB previously proposed in the literature, including the Strict Cycle Condition (Mascaró, 1976), Kiparsky’s (1993) theory of underspecification, Sequential Faithfulness (Burzio, 2000), Coloured Containment (van Oostendorp, 2007), and Optimal Interleaving with Candidate Chains (Wolf, 2008). I show that none of those theories can deal with all three puzzles and that the proposed theory with morpheme structure constraints succeeds. This result supports a dual-component architecture of phonology (as in SPE) over architectures that eliminate language-specific morpheme structure constraints (i.e., the principle of Richness of the Base in Optimality Theory).","PeriodicalId":48044,"journal":{"name":"Linguistic Inquiry","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2023-07-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44224258","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This article is concerned with the role of syntax in the licensing of sluicing in English. It amends and provides new support for a proposal made by Rudin (2019) in which syntax plays a crucial but circumscribed role: crucial in that antecedents are required; circumscribed in that matching with an antecedent holds only with respect to a proper subpart of the elided clause—its argumental core.
{"title":"The Domain of Formal Matching in Sluicing","authors":"P. Anand, Daniel Hardt, James McCloskey","doi":"10.1162/ling_a_00495","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1162/ling_a_00495","url":null,"abstract":"This article is concerned with the role of syntax in the licensing of sluicing in English. It amends and provides new support for a proposal made by Rudin (2019) in which syntax plays a crucial but circumscribed role: crucial in that antecedents are required; circumscribed in that matching with an antecedent holds only with respect to a proper subpart of the elided clause—its argumental core.","PeriodicalId":48044,"journal":{"name":"Linguistic Inquiry","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2023-07-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41847872","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Within the typology of embedded pronouns, there are languages that allow for non-first person pronouns to apparently control first person agreement morphology when in certain embedded contexts. This type of agreement displays some degree of optionality: it is also possible for the pronoun to control the expected agreement morphology given the pronoun’s own overt morphological features. This paper provides new data from the Dravidian language Telugu that shows when the embedded pronoun controls agreement on two separate targets, agreement may be uniform across the two targets or the two targets can mismatch in one direction, but crucially not the other. I show how we may account for this paradigm using the assumptions that the pronouns in question are similar to so-called hybrid nouns and that agreement features are restricted in principled ways.
{"title":"3/4 of a Monster: On Mixed Shifty Agreement in Telugu","authors":"T. Messick","doi":"10.1162/ling_a_00512","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1162/ling_a_00512","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 Within the typology of embedded pronouns, there are languages that allow for non-first person pronouns to apparently control first person agreement morphology when in certain embedded contexts. This type of agreement displays some degree of optionality: it is also possible for the pronoun to control the expected agreement morphology given the pronoun’s own overt morphological features. This paper provides new data from the Dravidian language Telugu that shows when the embedded pronoun controls agreement on two separate targets, agreement may be uniform across the two targets or the two targets can mismatch in one direction, but crucially not the other. I show how we may account for this paradigm using the assumptions that the pronouns in question are similar to so-called hybrid nouns and that agreement features are restricted in principled ways.","PeriodicalId":48044,"journal":{"name":"Linguistic Inquiry","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2023-06-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49559765","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Many languages have words that can be interpreted either as question words or as existentials. We call such words quexistentials. It has been claimed in the literature (e.g., Haida 2007) that, across languages, quexistentials are (a) always focused on their interrogative interpretation and (b) never focused on their existential interpretation. We refer to this as the quexistential-focus biconditional. The article makes two contributions. The first is that we offer a possible explanation for one direction of the biconditional: the fact that quexistentials are generally contrastively focused on their interrogative use. We argue that this should be seen as a particular instance of an even more general fact—namely, that interrogative words (quexistential or not) are always contrastively focused—and propose an account for this fact. The second contribution of the article concerns the other direction of the biconditional. We present evidence that, at least at face value, suggests that focus on a quexistential does not necessarily preclude an existential interpretation. Specifically, we show that it is possible for Dutch wat to be interpreted existentially even when it is focused. We attempt to explain this phenomenon.
{"title":"Quexistentials and Focus","authors":"Kees Hengeveld;Sabine Iatridou;Floris Roelofsen","doi":"10.1162/ling_a_00441","DOIUrl":"10.1162/ling_a_00441","url":null,"abstract":"Many languages have words that can be interpreted either as question words or as existentials. We call such words quexistentials. It has been claimed in the literature (e.g., Haida 2007) that, across languages, quexistentials are (a) always focused on their interrogative interpretation and (b) never focused on their existential interpretation. We refer to this as the quexistential-focus biconditional. The article makes two contributions. The first is that we offer a possible explanation for one direction of the biconditional: the fact that quexistentials are generally contrastively focused on their interrogative use. We argue that this should be seen as a particular instance of an even more general fact—namely, that interrogative words (quexistential or not) are always contrastively focused—and propose an account for this fact. The second contribution of the article concerns the other direction of the biconditional. We present evidence that, at least at face value, suggests that focus on a quexistential does not necessarily preclude an existential interpretation. Specifically, we show that it is possible for Dutch wat to be interpreted existentially even when it is focused. We attempt to explain this phenomenon.","PeriodicalId":48044,"journal":{"name":"Linguistic Inquiry","volume":"54 3","pages":"571-624"},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2023-06-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42437251","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Linguistic processes tend to respect locality constraints. In this article, we analyze the distribution of conjugation classes in Armenian verbs. We analyze a type of tense allomorphy that applies across these classes. We show that on the surface, this allomorphy is long-distance. Specifically, it is sensitive to the interaction of multiple morphemes that are neither linearly nor structurally adjacent. However, we argue that this allomorphy respects “relativized adjacency” (Toosarvandani 2016) or tier-based locality (Aksënova, Graf, and Moradi 2016). While not surface-local, the interaction in Armenian verbs is local on a tier projected from morphological features. This formal property of tier-based locality is substantively manifested as phase-based locality in Armenian (cf. Marvin 2002). In addition to being well-studied computationally, tier-based locality allows us to capture superficially nonlocal morphological processes while respecting the crosslinguistic tendency of locality. We speculate that tier-based locality is a crosslinguistic tendency in long-distance allomorphy, while phase-based locality is not necessarily so.
语言过程倾向于尊重地域限制。本文分析了亚美尼亚语动词的变位类分布。我们分析了一种适用于这些类的时态异形。我们证明了在表面上，这种异态是远距离的。具体来说，它对既不是线性也不是结构相邻的多个语素的相互作用很敏感。然而，我们认为这种同形性尊重“相对邻接性”(Toosarvandani 2016)或基于层的局部性(Aksënova, Graf, and Moradi 2016)。虽然不是表面局部的，但亚美尼亚语动词的相互作用是在形态特征投射的层次上局部的。在亚美尼亚语中，基于层的局部性的这种形式属性实质上表现为基于阶段的局部性(参见Marvin 2002)。除了在计算上得到充分的研究外，基于层的局部性使我们能够在尊重局部性的跨语言倾向的同时捕捉表面上的非局部性形态学过程。我们推测基于层的局部性是远距离异型同构的跨语言倾向，而基于相的局部性则不一定如此。
{"title":"Relativized Locality: Phases and Tiers in Long-Distance Allomorphy in Armenian","authors":"Hossep Dolatian;Peter Guekguezian","doi":"10.1162/ling_a_00456","DOIUrl":"10.1162/ling_a_00456","url":null,"abstract":"Linguistic processes tend to respect locality constraints. In this article, we analyze the distribution of conjugation classes in Armenian verbs. We analyze a type of tense allomorphy that applies across these classes. We show that on the surface, this allomorphy is long-distance. Specifically, it is sensitive to the interaction of multiple morphemes that are neither linearly nor structurally adjacent. However, we argue that this allomorphy respects “relativized adjacency” (Toosarvandani 2016) or tier-based locality (Aksënova, Graf, and Moradi 2016). While not surface-local, the interaction in Armenian verbs is local on a tier projected from morphological features. This formal property of tier-based locality is substantively manifested as phase-based locality in Armenian (cf. Marvin 2002). In addition to being well-studied computationally, tier-based locality allows us to capture superficially nonlocal morphological processes while respecting the crosslinguistic tendency of locality. We speculate that tier-based locality is a crosslinguistic tendency in long-distance allomorphy, while phase-based locality is not necessarily so.","PeriodicalId":48044,"journal":{"name":"Linguistic Inquiry","volume":"54 3","pages":"505-545"},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2023-06-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43841418","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Definiteness Effect in the PP","authors":"Katalin É. Kiss","doi":"10.1162/ling_a_00453","DOIUrl":"10.1162/ling_a_00453","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":48044,"journal":{"name":"Linguistic Inquiry","volume":"54 3","pages":"625-648"},"PeriodicalIF":1.6,"publicationDate":"2023-06-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42173873","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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