Grammatical Categories: Variation in Romance Languages

by M. Rita Manzini , Leonardo M. Savoia

• ISBN13: 9780521765190
• ISBN10: 0521765196
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2011-05-09
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Summary

Grammatical categories (e.g. complementizer, negation, auxiliary, case) are some of the most important building blocks of syntax and morphology. Categorization therefore poses fundamental questions about grammatical structures and about the lexicon from which they are built. Adopting a 'lexicalist' stance, the authors argue that lexical items are not epiphenomena, but really represent the mapping of sound to meaning (and vice versa) that classical conceptions imply. Their rule-governed combination creates words, phrases and sentences - structured by the 'categories' that are the object of the present inquiry. They argue that the distinction between functional and non-functional categories, between content words and inflections, is not as deeply rooted in grammar as is often thought. In their argumentation they lay the emphasis on empirical evidence, drawn mainly from dialectal variation in the Romance languages, as well as from Albanian.

Table of Contents

List of tables	p. x
Acknowledgements	p. xi
Introduction: grammatical categories and the biolinguistic perspective	p. 1
The structure and interpretation of (Romance) complementizers	p. 13
Romance complementizers are nominal and head their own noun phrase	p. 14
Structure of the complementizer phrase	p. 19
Combining a left periphery in the complementizer phrase and in the embedded sentence; combining two complementizers	p. 23
Some potential problems	p. 30
The left periphery beyond complementizers	p. 37
Is order dictated by interpretation - or interpretation by order?	p. 38
Embedded contexts	p. 43
Conclusions	p. 47
Variation in Romance k-complementizer systems	p. 49
Systems with twok-complementizers	p. 49
Definite and indefinite complementizers - and alternative analyses	p. 54
Generalized wh-complementizers	p. 61
'If	p. 65
The interaction with (non-)finiteness	p. 73
Sentential negation: adverbs	p. 80
Sentential negation adverbs are nominal and argumental	p. 83
Further evidence	p. 88
Sentential negation adverbs as nominal arguments	p. 92
Ordering sentential negation with respect to other adverbs	p. 94
The order of negation with respect to aspectual adverbs	p. 106
The order of negation with respect to quantificational and manner adverbs	p. 111
General discussion	p. 118
The interaction of adverbial and verbal positions: the participle	p. 120
Sentential negation: clitics	p. 128
Interactions of negation clitics and subject clitics	p. 131
Interactions of negation clitics with object clitics	p. 138
Non-negative n	p. 145
Negative concord and negative doubling	p. 152
The middle-passive voice: evidence from Albanian	p. 159
Data	p. 160
Middle-passive morphologies	p. 160
The interpretation of the middle-passive morphologies	p. 164
The Arbëresh varieties	p. 169
The u-clitic	p. 172
Specialized inflections	p. 184
Be-participle	p. 188
The auxiliary: have/be alternations in the perfect	p. 196
Evidence	p. 196
Theoretical background	p. 203
Auxiliary selection independent of transitivity/voice	p. 208
Auxiliary selection according to person	p. 209
Splits according to transitivity/voice	p. 216
Auxiliary selection according to voice	p. 216
Auxiliary selection according to transitivity	p. 218
Irreversibility	p. 222
Finer parametrization	p. 223
Interactions between auxiliary selection according to transitivity/voice and according to person	p. 224
The third auxiliary	p. 228
Some conclusions	p. 233
The noun (phrase): agreement, case and definiteness in an Albanian variety	p. 236
Theoretical and empirical background	p. 237
Nominal inflections in Albanian	p. 239
Generative approaches to case	p. 244
Analysis of Albanian nominal inflections	p. 246
Consonantal inflections	p. 250
Vocalic case inflections and lack of inflections	p. 255
Prepositional contexts	p. 259
Summary	p. 261
The Albanian noun phrase	p. 262
The genitive	p. 262
The adjective	p. 266
Adjectives as heads of the noun phrase	p. 272
Concluding remarks	p. 275
(Definite) denotation and case in Romance: history and variation	p. 276
The Latin case system	p. 277
Romance case systems: Romanian	p. 286
Other Romance case systems - and alternative accounts	p. 295
Loss of case in Romance: Romansh-s	p. 302
Pronouns - and some conclusions	p. 308
Notes	p. 312
References	p. 331
Index	p. 345
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