Unagreement is an illusion

This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from Springer via http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11049-015-9311-yThis paper proposes an analysis of unagreement, a phenomenon involving an apparent mismatch between a definite third person plural subject and first or second person plural subject agreement observed in various null subject languages (e.g. Spanish, Modern Greek and Bulgarian), but notoriously absent in others (e.g. Italian, European Portuguese). A cross-linguistic correlation between unagreement and the structure of adnominal pronoun constructions suggests that the availability of unagreement depends on whether person and definiteness are hosted by separate heads (in languages like Greek) or bundled on a single head (i.e. pronominal determiners in languages like Italian). Null spell-out of the head hosting person features high in the extended nominal projection of the subject leads to unagreement. The lack of unagreement in languages with pronominal determiners results from the interaction of their syntactic structure with the properties of the vocabulary items realising the head encoding both person and definiteness. The analysis provides a principled explanation for the cross-linguistic distribution of unagreement and suggests a unified framework for deriving unagreement, adnominal pronoun constructions, personal pronouns and pro

The morpho-syntax of phrasal proper names in German

This paper studies the morpho-syntax of proper names like 'die Deutsche Bank' ‘the German Bank’ in German. Semantically, these types of proper names, called phrasal proper names here, refer to entities but have descriptive meaning. Lexically, they are frozen and morpho-syntactically, they are frozen or transparent depending on the phenomenon. To capture these hybrid properties, it is proposed that regular vocabulary items are taken from the lexicon, that these individual elements receive each a referential marker (i.e., an index), and that they are stored as a set in the lexicon. Second, these indexed elements build a regular structure during the syntactic derivation projecting the marker to the entire structure. As is clear from proper names in Italian, certain syntactic operations are sensitive to these markers. As a consequence, these operations cannot single out the individual parts (but only the entire structure). Regular vocabulary items and an ordinary derivation explain the transparent properties; the addition of referential markers accounts for the referentiality and the frozen characteristics. The optional presence of non-restrictive modifiers shows that these nominal structures can be quite complex. Given this discussion, it seems unlikely that the referentiality of phrasal proper names is located in the DP-level

Demonstratives and Definite Articles as Nominal Auxiliaries

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.Demonstratives and Definite Articles as Nominal Auxiliaries -- Editorial page -- Title page -- LCC data -- Dedication -- Table of contents -- Preface -- Chapter1. Introduction -- 1. Introduction -- 2. Basic proposal -- 3. Assumptions and their motivation -- 3.1 The structure of the DP -- 3.2 Concord and movement inside the DP -- 4. Overview of the chapters -- 4.1 Chapter 2 -- 4.2 Chapter 3 -- 4.3 Chapter 4 -- Chapter 2. The syntactic distribution of determiners -- 1. Introduction -- 2. Word order possibilities of demonstratives and articles in Early Scandinavian -- 2.1 Proto-Scandinavian -- 2.2 Common Scandinavian -- 2.3 Old Norse -- 2.4 Schematic summary -- 3. Formalizing the development of the suffixed article -- 3.1 Demonstratives are phrases -- 3.2 Three options to derive the order N-Dem -- 3.3 Reanalysis from demonstrative to article -- 3.4 Some immediate consequences -- 4. Unifying the different determiner systems -- 4.1 Demonstratives in different positions -- 4.2 "Split" demonstratives -- 5. "Split" articles in the Scandinavian languages -- 5.1 The basic data -- 5.2 The semantic and syntactic relations of the two determiners -- 5.2.1 Semantic differences overtly reflected -- 5.2.2 The syntactic relation -- 5.2.3 "Split" determiners -- 5.3 Induced agreement domains -- 5.3.1 Assumptions -- 5.3.1.1 The suffixal determiner -- 5.3.1.2 The free-standing determiner -- 5.3.2 Modified DP -- 5.3.3 Unmodified DP -- 5.3.4 "Violations" of the double definiteness effect -- 5.4 Summary -- 6. An alternative proposal: Julien (2002 [2005]) -- 7. Conclusion -- Chapter 3. The syntax and semantics of non-/restrictive modifiers -- 1. Introduction -- 2. The syntax and semantics of restrictive modifiers -- 2.1 Derivation of the restrictive reading -- 2.2 Syntactic consequences: Scandinavian relative clauses3. The syntax and semantics of non-restrictive modifiers -- 3.1 Derivation of the non-restrictive reading -- 3.2 Syntactic consequences: more on Scandinavian relative clauses -- 4. Extension to Romance adjectives -- 5. Some further issues -- 5.1 Summary of the syntax of modifiers -- 5.2 Some differences and idiosyncracies -- 5.3 Some restrictions on the "free" interpretation of the determiner -- 6. Conclusion -- Chapter 4. The strong and weak alternation in German -- 1. Introduction -- 2. The strong and weak inflections: The traditional endings -- 3. The problem: Determiners with different endings -- 3.1 The definite article -- 3.2 The indefinite article -- 4. The proposal: Weak and strong null endings more generally -- 5. Null endings as no endings: The new inflections -- 6. Distribution of inflections: The traditional picture -- 7. The new picture -- 8. The strong and weak alternation as a reflex of Impoverishment -- 9. Basic derivations -- 9.1 The stereotypical cases -- 9.2 The genitive masculine and neuter -- 10. Special cases -- 10.1 Split-NPs -- 10.2 Indefinite pronoun constructions -- 10.3 Lexically ambiguous elements -- 10.3.1 Determiner-like pronouns -- 10.3.2 Determiner-like adjectives -- 10.3.3 Determiner-like intensifiers -- 10.3.3.1 Alle -- 10.3.3.2 Ein -- 10.4 Summary and feature realization -- 11. Conclusion -- Chapter 5. Conclusion -- References -- Language Index -- Subject index -- The series Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics TodayWritten 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.Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources.Electronic reproduction. Ann Arbor, Michigan : ProQuest Ebook Central, YYYY. Available via World Wide Web. Access may be limited to ProQuest Ebook Central affiliated libraries

Phrasal Proper Names in German and Norwegian

This paper discusses the morpho-syntax of phrasal proper names like Deutsche Bahn ‘German Railway’ and Norske Skog ‘Norwegian Forest’ in German and Norwegian. As regards determiner elements, there are three types of phrasal proper names in German: some proper names do not have a definite article, some do, and yet others exhibit a possessive. Depending on the syntactic context, the first two types pattern the same as regards the presence or absence of the article but contrast with the third, where the possessive is always present. It is proposed that proper names in German vary in their structure as regards the presence of the DP-level: unlike articles, possessives have a referential marker, and a DP is obligatorily projected with the latter element. Norwegian is different. While proper names in Norwegian also vary in the presence or absence of determiners, there is no flexibility—determiners are always present or always absent, independent of the syntactic context. It is proposed that unlike in German, the DP-level in Norwegian is always present. As argued by Roehrs (Glossa J Gen Linguist, 5(1):1–38, 2020, https://doi.org/10.5334/gjgl.1267), phrasal proper names involve a regular syntactic derivation. Given that elements of regular DPs are sensitive to definiteness in Norwegian, it is proposed that Norwegian proper names involve an obligatory definiteness feature. As this feature surfaces in the DP-level, the latter must be present in that language in all instances. Besides this cross-linguistic difference, we document that phrasal PN may show features of recursivity evidenced most clearly in Norwegian

Quantifying Expressions in the History of German: Syntactic Reanalysis and Morphological Change

This study describes the 1200-year history of German quantifying expressions like nîoman anderro \u3e niemand anderer ‘nobody else’, analyzing the morpho-syntactic developments within the generative framework. The quantifiers examined arose from various lexical sources/categories (nouns, adjectives, and pronouns) but all changed to adjectival quantifiers. These changes are interpreted as a novel type of upward reanalysis from head to specifier, which we associate with degrammaticalization driven by analogy. As for the quantified phrases, most appeared in the genitive in Old High German, indicating a bi-nominal structure. During the Early New High German period, most quantified nouns and adjectives changed to agreement with the quantifier. By Modern German, only quantified DPs and pronouns remain in the genitive. These changes involve downward reanalysis of the quantified elements, being integrated into the matrix nominal depending on the structural size of the quantified phrase. Overall, we conclude that diachronically quantifying expressions may have different syntactic analyses.https://egrove.olemiss.edu/libarts_book/1042/thumbnail.jp

Adjectives in German and Norwegian

In this paper, we demonstrate that adjective endings in the Germanic languages do not pattern uniformly. We illustrate this with nine syntactic contexts: possessives involving proper names and pronominals, embedded and unembedded proper names, “disagreeing” pronominal DPs, appositives, definite adjectives, vocatives, and discontinuous noun phrases. We show that German is subject to lexical and structural conditions but Scandinavian is semantic in nature. In German, the weak endings are feature-reduced forms which always have a specific local relation to a certain type of determiner, which triggers the relevant feature reduction. Adopting Distributed Morphology, this reduction in features is implemented by Impoverishment. In Scandinavian, the weak endings are an agreement reflex with a semantic feature have semantics of their own. We follow others in that adjectives are in – what is traditionally called – Spec,AgrP. We propose that the relevant semantic feature is in Agr and the adjective agrees with it. Given the language-specific conditions, the strong endings surface in the remaining contexts in both types of languages as the elsewhere case