Matrix Operators in Georgian Indexical Shift

This paper examines indexical shift in Georgian (South Caucasian), which has been noted but understudied in the literature. I argue that its matrix-level shift provides evidence in favour of the shifty operator theory (Anand and Nevins, 2004; Shklovsky and Sudo, 2014; Deal, 2020, i.a.). In these approaches, an embedded indexical is interpreted against a non-utterance context whose parameters are determined by an operator. Crucially, this operator is distinct from the verb that introduces it, which logically allows for the operator to merge freely in the structure. This prediction is evidenced by shifted indexicals in Georgian matrix clauses

A plea for syntax and a return to first principles: monstrous agreement in Tamil

The paper focuses on an interesting form of (person) indexical shift in the Dravidian language Tamil which surfaces as 1SG agreement marking in a clause embedded under a speech predicate. I show that this agreement is an instance of indexical shift and label it "monstrous agreement". However, I demonstrate that its full range of empirical properties cannot be adequately explained by the major analyses of indexical shift in the literature. The bulk of these, I argue, in addition to being predominantly semantic in spirit, and thus ill-equipped to deal with a morphosyntactic phenomenon like agreement, also involve two core misconceptions regarding indexicality vs. logophoricity on the one hand and speech vs. attitude predicates on the other. I propose that these core assumptions be strongly re-evaluated from first principles and that syntactic and typological clues on the subject be paid more heed. I propose a new analysis of the Tamil paradigms which derives indexical shift within an enriched grammatical model involving contextual features instantiated in a structurally articulated cartographic left periphery

How Do Children Deal with Shifted Indexicals?

The topic of indexical shift has, like so many other domains in linguistics, blossomed into a domain showing extensive and unusual variation across languages. One initial goal in this project was to bring an acquisition perspective to the evolving theories early in the process. Initially we began with views derived from Hollebrandse (2000) where the idea was advanced that there is an PoV operator that jointly controls several types of indexicals such as personal pronouns, demonstratives, time and space adverbials

Armenian Speech Reports: Blurring the Quotative Line

Modern Eastern Armenian has two complementizers, vor and te. When used to introduce speech reports, those complementizers differ as to the discourse status of the speech event they introduce; most notably, te possesses an evidential meaning that vor lacks. Using the model of discourse update suggested in Portner (2006), I provide an analysis of te that explains its evidential properties. I also provide evidence that MEA thwarts the traditional dichotomy assumed in the literature between direct and indirect speech by allowing a form of loose quotation

The Quotative Complementizer Says “I’m too Baroque for that”

We build a composite picture of the quotative complementizer (QC) in Dravidian by examining its role in various left-peripheral phenomena – agreement shift, embedded questions; and its particular manifestation in various constructions like noun complement clauses, manner adverbials, rationale clauses, with naming verbs, small clauses, and non-finite embedding, among others. The QC we conclude is instantiated at the very edge of the clause it subordinates, outside the usual left periphery, comes with its own entourage of projections, and is the light verb say which does not extend its projection. It adjoins to the matrix spine at various heights (at the vP level it gets a theta-role, and thus argument properties) when it does extend its projection, and like a verb selects clauses of various sizes (CP, TP, small clause). We take the Telugu QC ani as illustrative, being more transparent in form to function mapping, but draw from the the QC properties of Malayalam, Kannada, Bangla, and Meiteilon too

Semantic monsters

This chapter provides a general overview of the issues surrounding so-called semantic monsters. In section 1, I outline the basics of Kaplan’s framework and spell out how and why the topic of “monsters” arises within that framework. In Section 2, I distinguish four notions of a monster that are discussed in the literature, and show why, although they can pull apart in different frameworks or with different assumptions, they all coincide within Kaplan’s framework. In Section 3, I discuss one notion that has spun off into the linguistics literature, namely “indexical shift”. In Section 4, I emphasize the connection between monsters and the compositionality of asserted content in Kaplan’s original discussion. Section 5 discusses monsters and the more general idea of re-interpretation or meaning-shift. Section 6 closes with a brief survey of where monsters may dwell, and pointers to avenues for future research