Contrast Preservation in dialects of North Levantine Arabic

This paper uses Contrast Preservation Theory to account for two opaque processes in two dialects of Levantine Arabic spoken in Tripoli: (1) a Push Shift effect in a dialect spoken in traditional neighborhoods and (2) a constraint paradox in the standard dialect

Where Number Lies

<p>On the syntax of the DP structure</p

Movement and structure effects on Universal 20 word order frequencies: A quantitative study

In this paper, we illustrate a novel method to translate a derivational explanation of Universal 20 into vectorial representations. We exploit this vectorial representation to answer a number of theoretical questions. First, we use linear regression to automatically rank the costs of different syntactic movements within this proposal and investigate some proposals on partial and complete movement. This investigation of movement suggests that the nature of the movement is important, while the importance of harmonic specification of functional categories, i.e. whether the movement is partial or complete, is more context-dependent. We then evaluate whether the base order dem num adj n is the best predictor of the typological facts. We compare different syntactic proposals on the position of numerals in the noun phrase. We find that a merge position of numerals higher than adjectives has better results in both methods. We also show, using this method, that the independently motivated low merge position for numerals can only be semantically motivated, which results in intra-linguistic variation, and is not a parametric choice

Order in the DP! On word order and the structure of the DP

Novel observations show Cinque's (2005) phrasal movement proposal makes correct predictions on the grammaticality of word orders in Lebanese Arabic noun phrases. Adding an adjective yields grammatical orders Cinque (2005) cannot derive. We show that assuming an additional merge position – either for demonstratives or for numerals – derives the orders without losing Cinque's typological predictions, and we present evidence favoring an additional numeral position