Proceedings Published by the LSA (Linguistic Society of America)
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The theory of argument formation: between kinds and properties
Get PDFAbstract Chierchia (1998) developed a cross-linguistic extension to Carlsons seminal work on bare nouns (BNs), producing the most influential theory of argument formation to date, henceforth the Kinds Approach (KA). The core achievements of the KA included the derivation of the generalized narrow scope behavior of BNs and of the existence of generalized classifier languages. There are cracks in the picture, though. The narrow scope behavior of BNs is more fine-grained than is generally assumed and the KA lacks the flexibility to deal with it (Le Bruyn & Swart 2022). The appeal of the KAs derivation of the existence of generalized classifier languages heavily relied on all nouns in these languages being mass-like, an assumption that has since been abandoned (Chierchia 2010; Jiang 2020). These developments call for a reassessment of the KA and one of its closest competitors: Krifka 2003. Krifka assumes nouns never start life as kinds but as predicates, leading us to qualify his approach as a Properties Approach (PA).We adopt a translation corpus approach and assess the explanatory potential of the KA and the PA by comparing the distribution of BNs and related expressions in (in)definite contexts across six typologically different languages. Our results show that the PA has a distinct advantage over the KA and identify pseudo-incorporation and the way it varies across languages as a primary focus for future research
Cyclic movement and chain resolution in Swahili relative clauses
Get PDFSwahili relative clauses have three different constructions, characterized by different linear positions of a relative marker. The relative marker follows C, T and the verbal complex in each case. While some previous analyses propose construction-specific operations such as T to C or V to C movement in amba-less relatives, this study shows that the distribution of the relative marker can in fact be derived from a set of independently motivated assumptions without substantial ad-hoc proposals. I argue that the relative marker is an operator that undergoes cyclic A\u27 movement to Spec,CP, and its various linear position results from Landau (2006)’s chain resolution algorithm conditioned by a disyllabic minimality requirement of words in Swahili (Park 1997; Scott 2015)
Tonal identification in whispered speech
Get PDFThis project aims to examine whether, and how, non-F0 cues facilitate the identification of lexical tones. A perception experiment is designed to explicitly test the impact of duration cues for Mandarin lexical tones when F0 is absent. We take a novel approach in which the secondary cue of interest is held constant, effectively controlling the type of information listeners receive. Future studies can potentially extend this methodology to examine other relevant cues, such as temporal envelope and intensity. The contribution of this paper is twofold: first, to propose an explanation for the inconsistent conclusions drawn in the literature on tonal identification in whispered speech; second, to devise a more well-controlled study shedding light on the nature of tonal perception
Tone, viewpoint aspect, and imperative mood
Get PDFWe examine the interaction between viewpoint aspect and imperative mood in an under-described and endangered Edoid language of West Africa. In Emai, tone functions both lexically and grammatically. Verbs in citation form, including bisyllabic items, are toneless. In declarative mood Emai distinguishes perfective from imperfective, with perfective assigning high tone to a verb and imperfective assigning low. Imperative mood takes perfective aspect, most clearly evident when an auxiliary or preverb precedes the verb or when the imperative is negated. In simpler imperatives, verb tone is low high. The low tone is conditioned by the juxtaposition of a subject phrase that shows a second person pronoun with high tone and a verb phrase whose initial syllable is high. Across phrasal constitutents, consecutive high tones, as they would have appeared in simpler imperatives, are prohibited. It is the verb phrase initial high syllable that lowers.
What language models can tell us about learning adjectives
Get PDFIt has been argued that language models (LMs) inform our knowledge of language acquisition. While LMs are claimed to replicate aspects of grammatical knowledge, it remains unclear how this translates to acquisition directly. We ask if a language model trained specifically on child-directed speech (CDS) is able to capture grammatical knowledge of adjectives. Ultimately, our results reveal that what the model is “learning” is how adjectives are distributed in CDS, and not the grammatical properties of different adjective classes. While highlighting the ability of LMs to learn distributional information, these findings suggest that LMs alone cannot explain how children generalize beyond their input
De-centering English with “language of the day” in undergraduate linguistics
Get PDFUndergraduate linguistics courses often prioritize data from prestige varieties of English. This limits student learning to test cases of English and centers prestige varieties in the linguistics educational experience. We developed a method for de-centering English by exposing students to many languages in “language of the day” (LotD) activities. These activities broadened student knowledge of the world’s languages and improved student achievement on core analytical skills. This paper covers our implementation of LotD across two undergraduate phonetics and phonology courses, student and instructor reception, and suggestions for adaptation across subfields and course types
The realization of agreement in the Turkish verbal domain
Get PDFDifferent realizations of the agreement morpheme in the Turkish verbal domain have been argued to signal differences in the underlying syntax. Concretely, Kornfilt (1996) has proposed that verbs with agreement markers from the z-paradigm contain a silent copula whereas those with k-paradigm agreement do not. This paper is concerned with yet another, understudied agreement paradigm – the reduced z-paradigm – and investigates how it fits into the dichotomy posited by Kornfilt. I find hat the new forms have mixed properties and do not pattern clearly with either of the two older sets of verbs. In response, I propose that the syntactic distinction between verbs that do and verbs that do not contain a copula is being levelled in diachronic development, and I develop an analysis of how contemporary grammars encode the distinct properties of the three sets of verbs
On the emergence of an aspectual NPI: comparative polysemy and the case of Diyari marla
Get PDFCross-linguistically, morphological material that expresses comparison (e.g. more) appears to be colexified with aspectual (“phasal”) adverbs that, under negation, encode the termination of some eventuality (CESSATIVEs, e.g. *(not)...anymore). Using data drawn from the Diyari language of central Australia, we propose a diachronic trajectory for the lexical item marla ‘very, truly’. This word first developed a comparative semantics and, subsequently, a cessative reading restricted to negative polar contexts. This proposal moves us towards a lexical entry that permits for the unification of comparative and aspectual readings for items which exhibit this polysemy and—on the basis of robust pragmatic principles— predicts their polarity-sensitive distribution cross-linguistically
Movement and interpretation of quantifiers in internally-headed relative clauses
Get PDFThis paper addresses the semantic typology of internally-headed relative clauses using a case study of two West African languages, Atchan (Kwa) and Bùlì (Gur). Both languages exhibit syntactically-similar relatives, involving overt movement of the head. However, quantifiers on the head are interpreted differently in the two languages. In Atchan, quantifiers on the relative-clause head take the entire relative clause as their restriction; in Bùlì, quantifiers on the head take only the head noun as their restriction. I propose that the former is interpreted via NP reconstruction and Trace Conversion, the latter via DP reconstruction. The empirical difference between these two languages motivates a revision to the typology developed by Grosu (2012), which tightly links head movement and the Atchan-like quantifier interpretation pattern. This work further supports a a modular view in which languages can adopt different strategies to interpret movement-involving structures
Semifactives in comparatives
Get PDFThis is more complicated than I realized. How are we to understand the status of realize\u27s complement in a sentence like this? What sort of relationship must this complement bear to its matrix environment, in light of realize\u27s status as a cognitive factive or semifactive predicate (Kiparsky & Kiparsky 1970; Karttunen 1971)? Comparative constructions, I suggest, do much to illuminate the nature of semifactives and the semantic–pragmatic status of their clausal complements. Specifically, I propose that semifactives support graded awareness—knowledge of something less, but not more, than the full truth with respect to some question or issue—while requiring that their complement be informationally consistent with the matrix environment, rather than presupposed true. The picture that emerges fits naturally with pragmatic approaches to presupposition generation and projection (Beaver 2010; Simons, Beaver, Roberts & Tonhauser 2017; Degen & Tonhauser 2022) and depends on sensitivity to scalar polarity and orientation (Kennedy 2001)