English Syntax I

This paper focuses on the description of several controversial properties of Negative Inversion (NI) in Standard English. The first topic is the fact that, according to some scholars, subject-auxiliary (subj-aux) inversion when there is preposed negative element is sometimes optional. Scholars agree that subject-auxiliary inversion is compulsory whenever the fronted negative element is an adjunct, but they differ when taking complements into account. Some state that subject-auxiliary (subj-aux) inversion is optional when the fronted negative element is a complement. However, others consider subject-auxiliary inversion to be compulsory all the time. In this paper I show that it is true that subject-auxiliary inversion is optional when the fronted negative element is a complement, as all the speakers asked accept non-inversion, and only half of them accept inversion in such environment. The next topic is whether NI behaves as a Root Phenomenon (RT) or not. Some scholars have stated that NI is in fact a RT, however, by analysing and comparing the environments where RTs and NI can appear, I get to the conclusion that, unlike Topicalization or Focalization (which are also considered RTs), NI does not follow all the requirements to be considered a RT. The last topic is the classification of Only Inversion as a subtype of NI, which I believe not to be accurate, as there are many differences between both phenomena, as the optionality of inversion and their monotonicity. I have approached all these topics from an empirical point of view, comparing what has been previously said in the literature with native English speakers’ grammaticality judgements gathered by an online survey, with the aim of getting clearer results. Keywords: Negative Inversion, Negative Preposing, Negative Constituent Preposing, Negative Adverbials, Interrogative Inversion, Subject-auxiliary inversion, Wh- questions, Focus Preposing, Topicalization, Only Inversion, Only Preposing, Only fronting, Root Phenomena

Machine Learning Theory and Practice as a Source of Insight into Universal Grammar

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The Syntax of Elliptical Constructions in Jordanian Arabic

ABSTRACT THE SYNTAX OF ELLIPTICAL CONSTRUCTIONS IN JORDANIAN ARABIC by Juman Al Bukhari The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, 2016 Under the Supervision of Professor Nicholas Fleisher The syntax of Arabic elliptical constructions is unsettled, as there are few studies that have been done in the Arabic descriptive literature, as well as in Jordanian Arabic (henceforth, JA) specifically. Therefore, this paper will investigate some elliptical constructions in JA in particular to figure out the analysis of these constructions. In order to pursue this research, it is crucial to determine how JA elliptical data behave inasmuch as some examples are diagnosed as gapping constructions, while others are sluicing constructions. The research questions are: “What are the properties of JA elliptical constructions including gapping and (pseudo)-sluicing?”, “what is the syntax of these constructions in JA?”, “how do the facts of JA structure contribute to the literature of ellipsis?”, “does JA violate or salvage the Preposition Stranding Generalization?”, and “ how does the availability of wh-clefting in JA salvages PSG?

Poverty of the stimulus? A rational approach

The Poverty of the Stimulus (PoS) argument holds that children do not receive enough evidence to infer the exis-tence of core aspects of language, such as the dependence of linguistic rules on hierarchical phrase structure. We reevaluate one version of this argument with a Bayesian model of grammar induction, and show that a rational learner without any initial language-speci¯c biases could learn this dependency given typical child-directed input. This choice enables the learner to master aspects of syn-tax, such as the auxiliary fronting rule in interrogative formation, even without having heard directly relevant data (e.g., interrogatives containing an auxiliary in a relative clause in the subject NP).Amy Perfors, Joshua B. Tenenbaum and Terry Regie