A public screening of “The Linguists” will take place at the Franke Institute on Friday, May 9, at 2:30pm. The film will be followed by a discussion with David Harrison. All are welcome!
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Please mark your calendars for a syntax LingLunch talk by Luis Vicente (PhD Leiden, currently postdoc at UCSC) on Wed April 23 from 11am-12pm in the Lounge.
“Deriving word order variation in Basque through prosody”
Basque scholars agree that the word order of the language is constrained by discourse (topic/focus) factors. Traditionally, this intuition has been implemented in terms of movement to designated topic/focus projections (Ortiz de Urbina 1989 et seq.). However, such analyses are based on the assumption that the verbal complex is a syntactic head that can undergo head movement to the relevant projections. There exists evidence, though, that the subparts of verbal complexes do not actually form a constituent at all, which poses a rather serious problem for this kind of analyses.
The alternative I pursue here is based on the assumption that the verbal complex is immobile, and word order variation is a consequence of what moves or doesn’t move around it. This approach results in a unified analysis of all word order types while keeping intact the insights gained by previous treatments of the problem. However, it raises the problem of how to motivate the different types of movements that are necessary. I propose that the trigger is prosodic: modifying Richards’ (2006) theory, I hypothesize that the C node defines the domain of stress assignment. More specifically, I propose that Basque specifies that pitch accent must be separated from C by as few XP boundaries as possible. With this much in place, word order variation can be derived as the need for certain constituents to appear or not appear in the focus position, depending on their discourse status.
There will be a special colloquium next Friday from Enoch Aboh of the University of Amsterdam and MIT. The title of the talk is “A Typology of Adpositions” and you can find the abstract here:
The talk will be held at the normal colloquium time in the normal colloquium location (3:30 in the CSL)
The Department of Near Eastern languages and Civilizations
The Rise of Hittite Literacy:
H. Craig Melchert
Professor of Linguistics
University of California, Los Angeles
Thursday, March 13, 2008
12:00 noon
The LaSalle Banks Room – Oriental Institute
Modularity in Morphology: The Case of Basque Finite Auxiliaries
Karlos Arregi
University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
Thur, Feb 21 2008 3:30-5:00pm, Cobb 201
Many modern theories of morphology are highly modular: morphological phenomena with different properties are accounted for by separate modules of grammar. In this talk, I argue for a particular view of the modularity of morphology based on examination of Basque finite auxiliaries, which have a complex system of clitics that cross-reference ergative, absolutive and dative arguments in the sentence. I argue that a principled analysis of several generalizations regarding these clitics must involve a theory of word-formation with separate modules that have their own well-formedness principles and repair operations. Special attention will be given to verbal forms where these requirements of the separate modules conflict with each other. It will be shown that these conflicts are resolved in a manner that is best accounted for by a theory where the modules involved in word formation are derivationally ordered.
On the parametric variation of case and agreement: implications for (non)-configurationality
Vita Markman
Simon Fraser University
Henry Hinds [5734 S. Ellis Ave.] Room 101.
Tues Feb 19, 2008 3:30-5:00pm
In this talk I will argue that case and agreement features are subject to parametric variation and explore the consequences of this claim with a particular attention to word order. Departing from the view that case and agreement are present in the syntax of every language, but may not be overtly realized (Rouveret and Vergnaud 1980; Chomsky 1981, 1995, 2000, 2001; Harley 1995; Bittner and Hale 1996; Sigurdsson 2003), I will argue that languages can choose to have case features, agreement features, some combination of the two or none at all. The main focus of the talk will be on languages that have agreement features but no case. Specifically, I will demonstrate that languages without case features, but with agreement features will be non-configurational. These include Mohawk, Kinande, and Chichewa. In contrast, languages with case features may allow but not require NP dislocation in the presence of agreement. These are all of the Indo-European languages, Japanese, and Nahuatl.
In addition to addressing the effects of the parametric variation in case and agreement on word order, I will also address a number of other syntactic phenomena that pose a problem for the ‘universal’ approach to case and agreement and are better understood if these features are taken to vary parametrically.
Sometimes Syntax is Syntax. Sometimes Syntax is Phonology
Jason Kandybowicz
Swarthmore College
Thursday, February 14, 2008, 3:30-5:00pm
Cobb 201
In recent years, the field of syntax has seen a shift toward explorations and explanations of syntactic phenomena cast in terms of the interfacing sub-systems of grammar; namely, the phonological and semantic components. This modus operandi necessitates a broader knowledge base than was previously thought necessary. It also entails that the more rigorous analyses in this vein will likely come from those who study languages holistically. Yet curiously enough, holism is far from being the battle cry in today’s interface-driven syntactic frameworks. In this talk, I advance an argument for linguistic holism on the basis of two case studies drawn from the Nupe language, a Benue Congo language spoken in south central Nigeria.
The first case study deals with the language’s restriction on extraction from perfect clauses. The second case study is similar in that it too deals with an extraction restriction. In this case, the restriction involves the prohibition of embedded subject extraction across a complementizer – the so-called Comp-trace effect. Although the phenomena investigated in both case studies have been traditionally referred to as “syntactic” in both the Nupe literature and in the generative literature more broadly, I show that the former is truly syntactic in the narrow sense, while the latter is more phonological in nature. In this respect, then, it is difficult to know in advance of analysis whether a purported syntactic phenomenon is truly syntactic after all. Thus, in light of situations like these, holistic approaches to language take on an elevated level of importance. The talk also addresses a number of theoretical issues raised by the core empirical problems of each case study, including, but not limited to, the syntax-phonology interface.
Gradient phonological generalizations in speech processing
Mirjam Ernestus
Radboud University Nijmegen &
Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics
Thursday Jan. 10, 2008
Cobb 201, 3.30-5 pm
Abstract
Several studies have shown that speakers are sensitive to the absolute and statistically gradient phonological patterns in their mental lexicon. Participants prefer words conforming to these patterns, and they are slower in producing morphologically regular word forms violating the patterns. In this talk I will discuss two series of experiments that further investigate the role of gradient patterns in speech processing. The first series suggest that generalizations based on intraparadigmatic relations, between the forms of single word, have a stronger effect than those based on interparadigmatic relations, between the same types of forms of different words. The second series of experiments shows that phonologically gradient patterns affect also speech comprehension, even when listeners are focusing on content instead of form. This shows that gradient generalizations play a role in everyday language processing.
Pauline Jacobson (Brown University) will talk about “What Ellipsis tells us about (Direct) Compositionality - and Vice Versa” on Friday, November 9th in Wieboldt 111 at the Semantics and Philosophy of Language Workshop.
Susan Goldin-Meadow (U. Chicago, Beardsley Ruml Distinguished Service Professor) will talk about “Gesture’s Role in Creating and Learning Language” at the Workshop on Language and Cognition on Friday, November 9 at 4pm in Green Hall, Room 104.
The Department of Linguistics presents
Rutgers University
Knowing How in Romance
October 18, Thursday, 3pm, Cobb 201
Workshop on Semantics and Philosophy of Language presents
Rutgers University
Sly Pete: Indicative Conditionals and Context Dependence
October 19, Friday, 11am - 1pm, Wieboldt 111
The talks that Jason Stanley was scheduled to give next week — a linguistics colloquium on Thursday and a semantics/philosophy workshop talk on Friday — have been postponed until fall quarter, as Jason will not be able to make it to Chicago next week.
On Wednesday, Richard Heck (Brown) is giving the lecture “What is Compositionality?” as part of a workshop series on 20th-century British philosophy. The talk will be at 4:30 at the Franke Institute.
This Wednesday there will be a guest lecture in Prof. Giannakidou’s Semantics 2 class, by Urtzi Etxeberria (CNRS/University of the Basque Country). Urtzi will talk about the structure of quantificational phrases, and will examine a wide array of languages from Basque to Greek to Salish. The title of the talk is: “On how some languages restrict their quantificational domains overtly.” Everyone is welcome!
The talk will take place from 1:30-2:50 in the first floor of Green Hall, B101.