Functional Categories and Parametric Variation

Functional Categories and Parametric Variation PDF Author: Jamal Ouhalla
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134934742
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 278

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Book Description
This book explores the idea that functional categories are the flesh and blood of grammar'. From within the context of the Principles and Parameters framework put forward by Chomsky and others, Jamal Ouhalla develops the argument that much of what we understand by the term grammar and grammatical variation involves functional categories in a crucial way. His main thesis is that most, if not all, of the information which determines the major grammatical processes and relations (movement, agreement, case, etc.) and consequently parametric (or crosslinguistic) variation is associated with functional categories. By identifying parameters with a limited set of lexical properties associated with a well-defined group of functional categories, the book offers a new and highly constrained version of the theory of Lexical Parametrization. Dr Ouhalla begins by identifying a set of lexical properties which distinguish functional categories from substantives, arguing that each of them represents a parameter in its own right. He then goes on to argue on the basis of evidence drawn from a broad range of languages that functional categories, most of which are bound morphemes, behave in important respects like independent syntactic categories, and therefore should be assigned a full categorial status on a par with substantives. The remainder of the book contains detailed discussions of how this conclusion, together with the theory of Lexical Parametrization developed, account naturally for some major typological differences having to do mainly with word order in sentences and noun phrases. Although the various discussions it contains are conducted within the Chomskyan framework, Functional Categories and Parametric Variation is comprehensible to linguists of all theoretical persuasions. It is an original and important contribution to syntactic theory in general.

Functional Categories and Parametric Variation

Functional Categories and Parametric Variation PDF Author: Jamal Ouhalla
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134934742
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 278

Get Book Here

Book Description
This book explores the idea that functional categories are the flesh and blood of grammar'. From within the context of the Principles and Parameters framework put forward by Chomsky and others, Jamal Ouhalla develops the argument that much of what we understand by the term grammar and grammatical variation involves functional categories in a crucial way. His main thesis is that most, if not all, of the information which determines the major grammatical processes and relations (movement, agreement, case, etc.) and consequently parametric (or crosslinguistic) variation is associated with functional categories. By identifying parameters with a limited set of lexical properties associated with a well-defined group of functional categories, the book offers a new and highly constrained version of the theory of Lexical Parametrization. Dr Ouhalla begins by identifying a set of lexical properties which distinguish functional categories from substantives, arguing that each of them represents a parameter in its own right. He then goes on to argue on the basis of evidence drawn from a broad range of languages that functional categories, most of which are bound morphemes, behave in important respects like independent syntactic categories, and therefore should be assigned a full categorial status on a par with substantives. The remainder of the book contains detailed discussions of how this conclusion, together with the theory of Lexical Parametrization developed, account naturally for some major typological differences having to do mainly with word order in sentences and noun phrases. Although the various discussions it contains are conducted within the Chomskyan framework, Functional Categories and Parametric Variation is comprehensible to linguists of all theoretical persuasions. It is an original and important contribution to syntactic theory in general.

Functional Categories and Parametric Variation

Functional Categories and Parametric Variation PDF Author: Jamal Ouhalla
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780203317952
Category : Functionalism (Linguistics)
Languages : en
Pages : 253

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Book Description
From within the context of the Principles and Parameters framework put forward by Chomsky and others, Jamal Ouhalla develops the argument that much of what we understand by the term grammar involves functional categories.

Functional Categories and Parametric Variation

Functional Categories and Parametric Variation PDF Author: Jamal Ouhalla
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134934750
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 252

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Book Description
From within the context of the principles and parameters framework put forward by Chomsky and others, Jamal Ouhalla develops the argument that much of what we understand by the term "grammar" involves functional categories.

A Restrictive Theory of Functional Categories and Their Parametric Variation

A Restrictive Theory of Functional Categories and Their Parametric Variation PDF Author: Yeun-Jin Jung
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Grammar, Comparative and general
Languages : en
Pages : 282

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Book Description
Chapter 4 is a study of parametric differences defined over the hierarchical relations between functional projections. It shows what aspects of the hierarchy are regulated by independent principles and what aspects are governed by parametric operations. Chapter 5 further elaborates the theory of functional categories and shows that fundamental parametric variations across languages are defined over the composition and the order of internal layers of the Kase grids. Also, this chapter demonstrates by examining the cross-linguistically pervasive phenomenon of nominalization that the categorial parameter, like other parametric phenomena, can also be narrowed down to the specification of F-features in the lexicon.

Functional Categories, Argument Structure and Parametric Variation

Functional Categories, Argument Structure and Parametric Variation PDF Author: C. S. Rhys
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 179

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Book Description


The Oxford Handbook of Universal Grammar

The Oxford Handbook of Universal Grammar PDF Author: Ian G. Roberts
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199573778
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 673

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Book Description
This handbook provides a critical guide to the most central proposition in modern linguistics: the notion, generally known as Universal Grammar, that a universal set of structural principles underlies the grammatical diversity of the world's languages. Part I considers the implications of Universal Grammar for philosophy of mind and the philosophy of language, and examines the history of the theory. Part II focuses on linguistic theory, looking at topics such as explanatory adequacy and how phonology and semantics fit into Universal Grammar. Parts III and IV look respectively at the insights derived from UG-inspired research on language acquisition, and at comparative syntax and language typology, while part V considers the evidence for Universal Grammar in phenomena such as creoles, language pathology, and sign language. The book will be a vital reference for linguists, philosophers, and cognitive scientists.

Parametric Variation

Parametric Variation PDF Author: Theresa Biberauer
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 0521886953
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 375

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Book Description
Parametric variation in linguistic theory refers to the systematic grammatical variation permitted by the human language faculty. This book is a defence of the parametric approach to linguistic variation, set within the framework of the Minimalist Program.

OV and VO variation in code-switching

OV and VO variation in code-switching PDF Author: Shim Ji Young
Publisher: BoD – Books on Demand
ISBN: 3961103038
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 190

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Book Description
This monograph is intended as a contribution to the field of bilingualism from a generative syntax perspective at a variety of levels. It investigates code-switching between Korean and English and also between Japanese and English, which exhibit several interesting features. Due to their canonical word order differences, Korean and Japanese being SOV (Subject-Object-Verb) and English SVO (Subject-Verb-Object), a code-switched sentence between Korean/Japanese and English can take, in principle, either OV or VO order, to which little attention has been paid in the literature. On the contrary, word order is one of the most extensively discussed topics in generative syntax, especially in the Principles and Parameter’s approach (P&P) where various proposals have been made to account of various order patterns of different languages. By taking the generative view that linguistic variation is due to variation in the domain of functional categories rather than lexical roots (e.g. Borer 1984; Chomsky 1995), this monograph investigates word order variation in Korean-English and Japanese-English code-switching, with particular attention to the relative placement of the predicate (verb) and its complement (object) in two contrasting word orders, OV and VO, which was tested against Korean-English and Japanese-English bilingual speakers’ introspective judgments. The results provide strong evidence indicating that the distinction between functional and lexical verbs plays a major role in deriving different word orders (OV and VO, respectively) in Korean-English and Japanese-English code-switching, which supports the hypothesis that parametric variation is attributed to differences in the features of a functional category in the lexicon, as assumed in minimalist syntax. In particular, the explanation pursued in this monograph is based on feature inheritance, a syntactic derivational process, which was proposed in recent developments the Minimalist Program. The monograph shows that by studying diverse and creative word order patterns of code-switching, we are at a better disposal to understand how languages are parameterized similarly or differently in a given domain, which is the very topic that generative linguists have pursued for a long time.

The Limits of Syntactic Variation

The Limits of Syntactic Variation PDF Author: Theresa Biberauer
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
ISBN: 9027290660
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 531

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Book Description
Against the background of the past half century’s typological and generative work on comparative syntax, this volume brings together 16 papers considering what we have learned and may still be able to learn about the nature and extent of syntactic variation. More specifically, it offers a multi-perspective critique of the Principles and Parameters approach to syntactic variation, evaluating the merits and shortcomings of the pre-Minimalist phase of this enterprise and considering and illustrating the possibilities opened up by recent empirical and theoretical advances. Contributions focus on four central topics: firstly, the question of the locus of variation, whether the attested variation may plausibly be understood in parametric terms and, if so, what form such parameters might take; secondly, the fate of one of the most prominent early parameters, the Null Subject Parameter; thirdly, the matter of parametric clusters more generally; and finally, acquisition issues.

Grammaticalization and Parametric Variation

Grammaticalization and Parametric Variation PDF Author: Montserrat Batllori
Publisher: OUP Oxford
ISBN: 0191534064
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 332

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Book Description
In this outstanding collection of new work the methods and theories of formal syntax are focussed on grammatical variation and change. The editors open the volume with an extensive and accessible introduction to the ideas and techniques deployed in the book and the phenomena and issues on which they are brought to bear. Seventeen chapters follow, divided into two parts, the first concerned with grammaticalization and the second with parametric variation. These show what the application of contemporary theories of syntax and language variation can reveal about syntactic change and variation and the processes of parametric change which lie behind them. They also demonstrate the value of testing and constructing synchronic theories on the basis of historical data. The analyses range over many languages and language families, including Germanic, Romance, Greek, and Chinese. This book will interest scholars and students of grammatical change and theory at graduate level and above.