N-to-D movement within compounds and phrases.: Referential compounding, -s- possessives and title expressions in Dutch.

Noun–noun concatenations can differ along two parameters. They can be compounds, i.e., single words, or constructs, i.e., constituents, and they can have modificational non-heads or referential non-heads. Of the four logical possibilities, one was argued not to exist: compounds of which the non-head is referential were considered to be principally excluded. In this article, I argue that Dutch has compounds with a referential non-head. They resemble the Dutch s-possessive in that their non-heads involve movement to a referential layer. However, unlike the possessive structures, the compounding structure contains head incorporation which results in word-hood. The article further discusses title expressions, such as Prince Charles, which are argued to be referential construct states. Together with the syntactic structure of titles plus proper names, the referential compounds further contribute evidence to the idea that a ban on N-to-D movement for certain uniquely referring roots, such as sun and Bronx, is extra-syntactic

Creating Awareness of Pluricentricity at University Language Departments: A Case Study of Dutch

Dutch is a pluricentric language: It is an official language in six countries spread over two continents. Its national varieties became recognized as officially accepted, equal varieties of the standard language in the 21st century. These recognized varieties are Belgian Dutch, Dutch Dutch, and Surinamese Dutch. We show that despite the official equal status of these varieties, Dutch Dutch remains the dominant variety and the relatively recent official pluricentric status of Dutch is not generally known to all language users. We discuss that this is still noticeable in textbooks used for advanced learners of Dutch at schools in the German federal state of Lower Saxony for example, but also in Dutch language teaching in general. It is thus of importance to create (even more) awareness amongst future teachers. For this reason, we propose a matrix to evaluate and implement awareness of the pluricentricity of Dutch at university language departments. We illustrate and discuss the application of this matrix in the Department of Dutch Studies at the University of Oldenburg, Germany

A split approach to the selection of allomorphs: Vowel length alternating allomorphy in Dutch

In this article it is argued that the selection of allomorphs is distributed over two modules, viz. Vocabulary Insertion and Phonology. This is done on the basis of a case study of vowel length alternating allomorphs in Dutch. The data show a split pattern: some empirical domains can be fully captured by phonological principles. For these cases, the phonologically most optimal allomorph will be selected. In other empirical domains, phonological principles still account for many of the attested data. Yet, one attests lexicalised exceptions as well, which are clearly phonologically non-optimal. The data echo opposing views in the literature: some proposals attempt to reduce allomorph selection to phonology, others focus on the fact that many examples are simply not phonologically optimal and suggest that allomorph selection should not be done by Phonology. I argue that the opposing nature of these two types of data is actually indicative of the way the selection of allomorphs is organised. More specifically, both Vocabulary Insertion and Phonology can determine the selection of allomorphs. Vocabulary Insertion is responsible for stored information, Phonology is responsible for phonologically optimising patterns

Sizing up countability

SIZING UP COUNTABILITY: TOWARDS A MORE FINE-GRAINED MASS-COUNT DISTINCTION MARIJKE DE BELDER CRISSP/CATHOLIC UNIVERSITY OF BRUSSELS/FACULTÉS UNIVERSITAIRES SAINT-LOUIS 1. Summary Borer (2005) argues that the presence of the functional projection DivP, which divides stuff into units, yields count readings in the NP and that its absence yields mass readings. I claim, however, that countability requires not only DivP (which creates units) but also SizeP (which assigns size). The head of SizeP can be overtly realized as a diminutive morpheme. 2. The problem: Dutch mass nouns and plural marking Borer (2005) proposes that the default reading for all nouns is mass. She argues that functional projections can be added to the NP to add semantic features to the noun. Borer thus assumes a functional projection DivP which serves to divide the mass stuff into countable units. Its presence causes count readings, its absence results in mass readings. Classifiers and plural marking are instantiations of the head of this DivP. There are two problems for this approach. Firstly, Dutch mass nouns can be pluralized, yielding kind readings (1-2). (1) verschillende soepen (2) witte chocolades different soup.pl white chocolate.pl ‘different kinds of soup’ ‘kinds of white chocolates’ It is unclear under Borer’s approach how the addition of plural morphology to a mass noun results in a kind reading. The second problem is related to diminutives. In Dutch, diminutives also seem to have the ability to divide stuff into units, as they can turn mass readings into count readings. (3-4) (3) een soepje (4) een chocolaatje a soup.dim a chocolate.dim ‘a portion of soup’ ‘a piece of chocolate’ One would therefore expect the diminutive to be another instantiation of the head of DivP. This would imply that Plural and the diminutive occupy the same position and hence that they should be in complementary distribution (cf. Borer 2005, Ch.4, Fn.6). However, this expectation is not borne out (5-6). (5) soepjes (6) chocolaatjes soup.dim.pl chocolate.dim.pl ‘portions of soup’ ‘pieces of chocolate’ 3. The proposal: two functional projections I take the above data to show that the diminutive and the plural morpheme occupy two different head positions (cf. also Wiltschko 2007). That means, however, that not one, but two projections play a role in creating count readings. Concretely, I propose (i) that the diminutive and the plural occupy different heads and (ii) that DivP alone fails to distinguish between mass and count. More specifically, I analyze the diminutive as an instantiation of a second head, Size° and I add a second parameter to differentiate mass from count readings, viz. [±Size]. I follow Borer in assuming that the presence or absence of certain functional projections above the NP (in this case DivP and SizeP) determines the semantic features of that noun phrase. The presence of DivP can be detected by adding numerals and plural marking to a noun, while the possibility of adding a size-denoting adjective is an indication of the presence of SizeP (cf. Truswell 2004 on size-denoting adjectives) The latter test indicates that mass nouns do not have size, whereas count nouns do (7-9). (7) *kleine melk (8) een kleine tafel (9) een kleine kans little milk a small table a small chance ‘a small table’ ‘a small chance’ The example in (9) illustrates that not only concrete, but also abstract countable nouns can combine with size-denoting adjectives. This shows that size is indeed a grammatical notion and not a purely conceptual one. In Dutch, the head of SizeP is phonetically null in the unmarked case and it is realized as the diminutive in the marked case (i.e. small size). Semantically, Size° is a measure function, i.e. a function that projects a noun onto a scale ranging from small to large (cf. Bartsch&Vennemann 1973, Kennedy 1999). 4. The mass/count-distinction as the interaction between two parameters The interaction between the two parameters [±Div] and [±Size] yields the following four structures : (10) a) [DP [NP]] b) [DP [DivP [NP]]] c) [DP [DivP [SizeP [NP]]]] d) [DP [SizeP [NP]]] a) [DP [NP]] yields canonical mass readings (11). The noun is interpreted as having no size, and plural marking is impossible. From the fact that mass nouns have no size, it follows that they do not combine with size-denoting adjectives (12). (11) soep (12) *kleine soep soup small soup ‘soup’ [mass] b) [DP [DivP [NP]]] yields a kind reading of mass nouns (cf. 1-2). The noun is a countable concept, and it consequently allows for numerals and plural marking (13), but it is incompatible with a size-denoting adjective (14). (13) drie soepen (14) *kleine soepen three soup.pl small soup.pl ‘three kinds of soup’ c) [DP [DivP [SizeP [NP]]]] yields countable nouns, which can combine with numerals and plural marking. Furthermore, since they also have size, they can be combined with size-denoting adjectives (15). (15) drie kleine honden three small dog.pl ‘three small dogs’ d) The fourth logical possibility would be [DP [SizeP [NP]]]. I claim that this does not exist, as everything that has size is also a unit and therefore countable by definition. This becomes most clear when mass nouns are combined with diminutives; as soon as size is added they automatically acquire the possibility of plural marking (16). (16) drie kleine soepjes three small soup.dim.pl ‘three small portions of soup’ Further research Time permitting, I will explore the interaction between the SizeP proposed here and the little n of Wiltschko (2007) which hosts shape-assigning classifiers. References Bartsch, Renate and Theo Vennemann (1973) Semantic structures: a study in the relation between semantics and syntax. Athenäum-Skripten Linguistik, 9. Frankfurt am Main: Athenäum. Borer, Hagit (2005) In name only. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Kennedy, Chris (1999) Projecting the adjective. New York: Garland Press. Truswell, Robert (2004) Attributive adjectives and the nominals they modify. M.Phil thesis. University of Oxford. Wiltschko, Martina (2007) Why should diminutives count? ms. UBCstatus: publishe

Silence and the Construct State in Dutch Date Expressions

In this paper, I examine two types of date expressions in Dutch. The first one contains an ordinal, the second one a cardinal. I have argued that the first construction contains both a silent preposition and a silent noun DAG ‘day’. As for the second construction, I have provided evidence for the fact that it also contains a silent noun DAG and that it instantiates a construct state. From a slightly broader perspective, then, these analyses provide additional support for the existence of a silent preposition in Dutch and for the existence of a silent noun DAG ‘day’.status: publishe

N-to-D Movement within Compounds and Phrases:Referential Compounding, -s Possessives, and Title Expressions in Dutch

Noun–noun concatenations can differ along two parameters. They can be compounds, i.e., single words, or constructs, i.e., constituents, and they can have modificational non-heads or referential non-heads. Of the four logical possibilities, one was argued not to exist: compounds of which the non-head is referential were considered to be principally excluded. In this article, I argue that Dutch has compounds with a referential non-head. They resemble the Dutch s-possessive in that their non-heads involve movement to a referential layer. However, unlike the possessive structures, the compounding structure contains head incorporation which results in word-hood. The article further discusses title expressions, such as Prince Charles, which are argued to be referential construct states. Together with the syntactic structure of titles plus proper names, the referential compounds further contribute evidence to the idea that a ban on N-to-D movement for certain uniquely referring roots, such as sun and Bronx, is extra-syntactic

Distributed Morphology: An oratio pro domo

In this paper we aim to explain and illustrate the theory of Distributed Morphology for non-specialists. The goal is to take away any misunderstandings and to provide some illustrations of the workings of the theory, mainly on the basis of data from Dutch. Distributed Morphology is a theory of morphology that embraces the so-called Separation Hypothesis: derivation – the forming of a new word by some abstract operation – is separated from affixation – the realization or spell-out of the abstract operation by the addition of some phonologically specified element. The means used by DM to implement the Separation Hypothesis is by late (after syntax) insertion of affixes. Furthermore, Distributed Morphology claims that there is no separate component of the grammar where word-formation takes place. The operations that form new words are the same operations that may create syntactic phrases. Starting from these fundamental claims, we go into some detail of the way Distributed Morphology accounts for different morphological patterns. The paper also points at some cognate, but alternative, approaches to word-formation and inflection. In particular, we briefly address Borer’s so-called exo-skeletal model, and the nanosyntactic approach