ISBN: 978-80-244-4060-6 | ISBN online: 978-80-244-4059-0 | DOI: 10.5507/ff.14.24440606
Language Use and Linguistic Structure
Proceedings of the Olomouc Linguistics Colloquium 2013
- Joseph Emonds, Markéta Janebová
The articles in this volume are based on papers and posters presented at the Olomouc Linguistics Colloquium (OLINCO) at Palacký University in the Czech Republic in June 2013. This conference welcomed papers that combined analyses of language structure with generalizations about language use. The essays here represent, we think, the best of the conference contributions (together with those selected among them for a separate themed monograph entitled Nominal Structures: All in Complex DPs). All these papers have been doubly reviewed, with one reviewer always external to Palacký University, and revised on the basis of these reviews. The sections of this volume roughly represent the different sections for papers presented at OLINCO, but the groupings in the Table of Contents have been determined, in the final analysis, by their subject matter rather than by a priori “areas.” Because the papers on noun phrase structure have been grouped in a separate volume, the grammatical essays appearing here focus on the verb phrase and clausal structure, and have then been divided according to which of these latter two domains figures more prominently in any given paper.
1. edition, Published: 2014, online: 2014, publisher: Palacký University Press, Olomouc
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Contents
Yes-No Questions, Subjects, Adverbs, and the Left Periphery: New Evidence from Portuguese1
Manuela Ambar
DOI: 10.5507/ff.14.24440606.01
This paper proposes a syntactic account of Portuguese yes-no questions. I argue they do not have the structure of declaratives, rather they parallel wh-questions, and intonation is not its exclusive licensing-device in Portuguese, against the traditional view. Moreover, intonation exists in all types of clauses. New empirical evidence (discourse-licensers, subjects) leads to the ban on QPs and indefinites in topic-like positions and to the hypothesis that, as in wh questions, C is filled in Portuguese as in other languages. The subject occupies a higher topic position. A strong counterargument (based on indefinites) which appears to cancel the viability of the hypothesis turns out to support it. Because this work is pioneering (forcing consideration of other facts and phenomena), and the space restricted, not all data that support our position can be presented.
No Such Thing as “Parameterized Structural Deficiency” in the Left Periphery1
J. Marc Authier, Liliane Haegeman
DOI: 10.5507/ff.14.24440606.02
Some embedded finite domains in English resist main clause phenomena (MCP). The incompatibility of MCP with these domains applies to argument fronting, among others. In contrast, clitic left dislocation (CLLD) in Romance has a wider distribution. A number of authors have argued that the restricted distribution of English MCP follows from a structural deficiency of the English left periphery (LP). To account for the wider availability of CLLD in the Romance LP, it is proposed that the structural deficiency of the LP varies parametrically. This article challenges the appeal to parametric variation to account for the distribution of MCP. We show that PP preposing and infinitival TP preposing in French share the syntactic properties and distribution of English movements falling under MCP.
Focus Fronting and Root Phenomena in Spanish and English
Victoria Camacho-Taboada and Ángel L. Jiménez-Fernández
DOI: 10.5507/ff.14.24440606.03
Our purpose in this work is to explore the syntax of focus fronting and negative preposing in embedded contexts in English and Spanish. It is standardly assumed that contrastive focus preposing targets the CP area in English. Emonds (1970, 2004) and Haegeman (2012) show that negative preposing and topic/focus fronting are all root transformations in English. Within the intervention-based analysis of Haegeman (2012) this constraint is explained by assuming the existence of an event operator in factive clauses (Aboh 2005), which stops the discourse-oriented constituent from moving to the left periphery. If so, focus preposing is predicted to be incompatible with referential clauses which are complements of factive predicates. This prediction is not borne out in languages such as Spanish. We propose that crosslinguistic differences can be accounted for by analyzing Spanish focus fronting as movement to spec-TP rather than to spec- CP, thus no blocking effect will be caused by the referential operator in spec-CP.
Italian Polarity Fragments as Elliptical Structures
Emilio Servidio
DOI: 10.5507/ff.14.24440606.04
A class of Italian fragments is discussed in which a phrase is followed by the equivalent of either yes or no. The discourse pragmatics of the fragments makes clear that contrastive topicalization is involved, and a range of syntactic evidence makes it possible to argue that the fragments are derived via clitic left dislocation of the topic plus deletion of a TP. These fragments can also be shown to be island sensitive, and the pattern of island sensitivity complies with a nonrepair theory of islands and with the pragmatics of contrastive topics. Contrastive topics might also play a role in the licensing of the TP ellipsis.
Word Order and Scope in Hungarian Finite Embedded Non‑argument Clauses
Krisztina Szécsényi
DOI: 10.5507/ff.14.24440606.05
In my paper I contrast the scope properties of different types of finite adjunct clauses in Hungarian and (mainly) English. Finite clauses have been shown to interact with their selecting clauses in spite of the expected locality restrictions in a number of constructions. The present paper discusses high and low readings in temporal clauses, quantifier scope interaction, and binding data. The paper claims that high and low readings and dependent time interpretations are not the result of the same mechanism. While, similarly to high and low interpretations, the presence of the temporal operator is a prerequisite for the availability of dependent time interpretations, in itself it is not sufficient when other operators also appear in the sentence, as indicated by data coming from Hungarian.
An Alternative Analysis of Marginal Modals
Dagmar Machová
DOI: 10.5507/ff.14.24440606.06
The paper analyzes marginal modal elements in English from the perspective of their morphological, syntactic, and semantic properties. More precisely, it presents the hypothesis that the status of central modal verbs is related to three properties – a modal polyfunctionality, the absence of agreement, and operator properties. The paper divides structures traditionally labelled as marginal modals into operator and non-operator elements. In terms of operator elements such as need, dare, ought, and shall, it shows how the polyfunctionality, agreement, and syntactic properties are interrelated and result in the idiosyncratic behavior of each individual member. With non-operator elements such as be going, have got to, and want, the paper illustrates that polyfunctionality may trigger the development towards operator behavior by the formation of non-agreeing structures such as gonna, wanna, and gotta.
Auxiliaries as Dummies: A Late Vocabulary Insertion Approach
Mark Newson, Krisztina Szécsényi
DOI: 10.5507/ff.14.24440606.07
This paper argues for the position that the English non-modal auxiliaries are dummies used to realize functional content. Taking our lead from Grimshaw (1997), we claim that dummies are the use of meaningful words with their root content being ignored. Through the idea of late vocabulary insertion, we are able to adequately model “ignoring content” as overspecification. The analysis concentrates on the following questions: Why are be, have, and do the chosen auxiliary verbs? What do they spell out in their auxiliary uses? And what determines which auxiliary will be used in a given syntactic environment? The analysis is carried out in the Syntax First Alignment system, a heavily restricted Optimality theoretic grammar. A radical feature of this system which differentiates it from most other OT grammars and late vocabulary insertion approaches is that it operates with linear ordering rather than constituent structure.
On the Inner Aspect of Predicates with Differentially Object Marked Internal Arguments: The Case of Romanian
Alina-Mihaela Tigău
DOI: 10.5507/ff.14.24440606.08
Differentially object marked and clitic doubled internal objects act as sub-event identifiers of the predicate, endowing the sentence with particu lar aspectual propeties. They induce a telic interpretation of the predicate. The telic aspectual reading induced by differentially object marked and clitic doubled DPs on their predicate is seen as an effect of the semantics of the case marker pe and of the clitic pronoun. Pe marked direct object DPs may have an object-level reading () or a generalized quantifier reading (<t>) as pe acts a filter on the denotation of the DP it marks, excluding the property reading. The differentially object marked internal argument is thus perceived as a stable and delimited entity which modifies the internal temporal structure of the event by providing an internal boundary, hence by inducing telicity.
In and out of Places, States, and Activities: Russian Verbal Prefixes and Scales
Inna Tolskaya
DOI: 10.5507/ff.14.24440606.09
This paper explains the polysemy of Russian verbal prefixes through their positionin the VP. The lexical entry remains constant throughout all the uses of a given prefix, while the structure into which a prefix is inserted varies. I show that the meaning of a prefix is predictable on the basis of the event structure of the verb it attaches to, i.e. on the scale type provided by the verb. Every prefix measures out an event, mapping it onto a scale, which may be spatial, temporal, or a scale of change. I will concentrate on two prefixes: za-, which, as I show, denotes transition to the maximum point on a scale, and ot-, which refers to leaving the minimum point. The properties of the scale, such as boundedness, gradability, and the availability of a minimum and maximum, determine its compatibility with different prefixes, which makes reference to the different subparts of the scale.
On the Cross-Linguistic Predictability of Functionally Equivalent Structures: Decausativization in French and German as a Test Case for Formal and Functional Grammars1
Roland Wagner
DOI: 10.5507/ff.14.24440606.10
The aim of the paper is to evaluate the cross-linguistic predictive power of generative and functionalist theories with respect to one tightly limited area of interest: causative alternation. Several recent studies of decausativization are reviewed in order to determine whether the formal marking of a decausative in a target language, specifically, the appearance of a reflexive, can be predicted from the type of formal marking of a translational equivalent in a source language. It will be demonstrated that the generative analyses under consideration do not allow for predictions of the intended kind, as the necessary information cannot be deduced from the formal apparatus but is already implicitly presupposed at the input level of the suggested models. Functionalist analyses, on the other hand, allow for probabilistic predictions; they fail, however, to formulate precise predictions on the formal marking of individual lexical items.
Creativity and Innovation in Word Formation by Japanese Young People
Ivona Bareąová, Halina Zawiszová
DOI: 10.5507/ff.14.24440606.11
The aim of the present paper is to demonstrate how contemporary young Japanese people use creativity and innovation in word formation so as to fulfil their communicative needs. The selected word formation processes include compounding, blending, clipping, the creation of alphabetisms, derivation, syllable inversion, and the formation of neologisms based on the playful use of Chinese characters. The primary data collection methods included audio recordings of spontaneous conversations of young Japanese people, their textual interactions on selected social networking sites and blogs, and their assessment of wordlists created on the bases of Japanese youth language dictionaries and secondary literature on the subject.
Logical and Pragmatic Meaning in the Interpretation of Connectives: Scalar Implicatures and “Shallow” Processing
István Fekete, Mátyás Gerőcs, Anna Babarczy, and Balázs Surányi
DOI: 10.5507/ff.14.24440606.12
On one prominent view, endorsed by several authors pursuing neo-Gricean approaches, scalar implicatures like “but not both” in the exclusive interpretation of the conjunction or “A or B but not both,” are generated automatically by default in the absence of context. By contrast, the contextualist view holds that scalar implicatures arise only when licensed by the context. We addressed this dispute by performing a sentence-picture verification task experiment, comparing the processing of two connectives in Hungarian: és (“and”) and vagy (“or”). Crucially, the verification task required only a shallow processing of the meaning of target sentences. The results suggest that in such a task, while the entailment of the connective and was computed automatically, the implicature of or was not activated. This finding speaks against defaultism, and favors contextualist approaches to generalized conversational implicatures.
Exhaustivity in Focus: Experimental Evidence from Hungarian
Mátyás Gerőcs, Anna Babarczy, and Balázs Surányi
DOI: 10.5507/ff.14.24440606.13
This study presents the results of two experiments investigating the nature of exhaustivity of pre-verbal focus in Hungarian, both doing so in an indirect way. Experiment 1 contrasts the responses given in long versus short time windows in a truth-value judgment task. Experiment 2 makes the task itself indirect and compares pre-verbal focus with three other types of focus in the same language. Through these multiple comparisons we provide evidence that exhaustivity in pre-verbal focus is not entailed, unlike exhaustivity in clefts, with which it has been treated as being on a par. Instead, it is due to pragmatic implicature, in particular, conventional implicature.
Linguistic Strategies of Offensive and Defensive Argumentation
Marie Krappmann
DOI: 10.5507/ff.14.24440606.14
The article focuses on the analysis of the linguistic means of defensive and offensive argumentation in the dialogical form of argumentation. The theoretical basis for the analysis is the model developed by Harald Wohlrapp (2008). He defines the fundamental operations of asserting, reasoning and criticizing as a system of specific possibilities of moves and subsequent moves in dialogical argumentations. At the same time, the focus is on identifying various linguistic realizations of offensive strategies and avoidance maneuvers. A relatively prototypical example of a dialogical text type was chosen for the analysis of the argumentation process: an interview between Holger Stanislawski, long-time coach of the traditional German football club St. Pauli, and a reporter. The article pursues two basic goals: 1. to verify the thesis of Wohlrapp that the argumentation processes are realized in simple repetitive argumentation moves; 2. To prove the fact that the argumentation strategies could already be partially identified on the level of linguistic expression.
The Role of Information Structure in Czech Possessive Constructions
Jan Křivan
DOI: 10.5507/ff.14.24440606.15
The paper deals with the functional properties of possessive constructions. It focuses on internal (adnominal) possession and external (affectedness) possession in Czech. The elements of both construction types (the possessor, the possessum, and the predicate) are first thoroughly investigated from a semantic and pragmatic perspective. In the main part of the article, it is claimed that the emergence of specialized possessive constructions can also be explained as a functional, speaker-oriented preference, based on different needs in terms of information structure. It concerns the hypothesis that the possessive construction types are correlated with different word order arrangements. A case study examining the relative frequency of word order patterns for each construction type corroborates this assumption. Specifically, for dative external possession, the emergence of the construction can be explained as a discourse preference of speakers to employ the possessor in the topic and the possessum in the focus.
The Role of Partitive Construction in Generating Scalar Implicatures
Mirjana Mirić, Boban Arsenijević
DOI: 10.5507/ff.14.24440606.16
The paper is concerned with the facilitating effect of the partitive construction for the availability of scalar implicatures in the interpretation of utterances with the quantifier neki (“some”) in Serbian, one of only a few languages in which even adult speakers show a relatively low rate of deriving scalar implicatures. The experimentally based research emphasizes the role of language-specific factors for the derivation of scalar implicatures, showing that the proportion of derived scalar implicatures depends on certain syntactic and semantic parameters. However, as the highest rates of scalar implicatures derived only go as high as 68%, our research argues in favor of the default status of the logical semantic component of scalar items, with the pragmatic effects being dependent on the pragmatic factors in the discourse.
Tackling “Legalese”: How Linguistics Can Simplify Legal Language and Increase Access to Justice
Janet Randall
DOI: 10.5507/ff.14.24440606.17
In US courtrooms, judges read jurors a set of “jury instructions” to help them reach a verdict. One Massachusetts instruction concerns jurors’ memories: “Failure of recollection is common. Innocent misrecollection is not uncommon.” Since most jurors find this – and many instructions – nearly incomprehensible, a task force of judges, lawyers, and linguists has started a project for reform. The project began by testing how well a sample of instructions is understood. In one experiment, subjects heard six sample jury instructions and answered true/false questions about them. The results showed that comprehension varied with linguistic complexity, significantly worse on instructions containing passive verbs and presupposed information, factors known to increase processing load. A second experiment used Plain English versions that eliminated these factors, and comprehension improved significantly. The results suggest that though legal language is entrenched and reform is difficult, psycholinguistic research can help diagnose problems and suggest a course of action toward improving verdicts – and justice – overall.
Pragmatic Aspects of Comment Clauses in Courtroom Interaction
Magdalena Szczyrbak
DOI: 10.5507/ff.14.24440606.18
The study shows different approaches to the notion of “comment,” including those of Quirk et al. (1985), Biber et al. (1999) and Huddleston and Pullum (2002). It focuses, in agreement with Stenström (1984, 1994, 1995) and Brinton (2008), on various realizations of selected comment clauses (or pragmatic markers) in courtroom discourse, based on transcripts from a high-profile libel case. It is also an attempt to find a linkage between the most frequent I- and you-oriented comment clauses, their deployment by the participants in the trial and the discourse functions they perform in courtroom talk. The study aims to show that comment clauses can be approached as a discourse phenomenon and that their examination in the context of courtroom interaction may provide insights into how pragmatic meanings are created in an institutional setting.
On the Linguistic Structure of Evaluative Meaning in Czech
Kateřina Veselovská
DOI: 10.5507/ff.14.24440606.19
In this paper we present the results of preliminary research into the linguistic structure of evaluative meaning in Czech. We describe the ways evaluative meaning is expressed in Czech using means from different layers of linguistic description, mainly morphology. Moreover, we use the construction grammar framework (see Fried and Östman 2004) to capture evaluative sentences and to depict the relationship between structure, meaning, and the use of evaluative expressions in language, joining the growing body of constructional research concerning the expressions of subjective judgment, as broadly defined (e.g., Matsumoto 2008; Fried and Östman 2005; Terkourafi 2010).
Phonological Structure and Articulatory Phonetic Realization of Syllabic Liquids
©tefan Beňuą
DOI: 10.5507/ff.14.24440606.20
Syllabic liquids, such as /l/ or /r/ in Slovak words such as vlk (“wolf”) or krb (“fireplace”), occur freely in stressed positions and with complex onsets. Phonologically, they behave like vowels, which can be seen in several morpho-phonological alternations. The paper addresses two questions: how a phonetic consonant with a significant obstruction in the vocal tract can function phonologically as a vowel, and why liquids are cross-linguistically more marked syllable nuclei than vowels. Previous proposals suggested that the syllabicity of liquids relates to their coordination patterns: liquids in the nucleus position require so-called “open transition,” which facilitates the recoverability of the consonants adjacent to the syllabic liquid. Here we extend this research by examining the differences between the two articulatory liquid gestures: consonantal tongue tip raising and vocalic tongue dorsum retraction. Our articulatory data suggest that the coordination of the vocalic liquid gesture with the consonantal onset gesture also facilitates the syllabicity of Slovak liquids.
Pre-Vocalic Glottalization vs Resyllabification in Regional Varieties of Czech (A Pilot Study)
Jakub Bortlík
DOI: 10.5507/ff.14.24440606.21
This is a report of a pilot study conducted to examine some of the factors which influence pre-vocalic glottalization in Czech with respect to its form and frequency of occurrence. The main goal is to prepare a more extensive experiment for the assessment of the differences between the two basic regional varieties, Bohemian and Moravian Czech. Preliminary results suggest that examinations of glottalization should take into account different speech styles and they should not rest only on read speech. Reading seems very conducive to glottalization, especially in female speakers. The strong general preference for glottalization in samples of read speech makes the assessment of other possible factors (segmental context, prosody, gender, etc.) difficult if not impossible.
The Spanish High Front Vowel in Czech Bilinguals
©těpánka Čechová
DOI: 10.5507/ff.14.24440606.22
This paper is focused on the production of the Spanish high front vowel [i] in advanced Czech learners of Spanish. Because of the phonetic similarity between the high front vowels in both languages, there is a strong likelihood that Czech speakers will pronounce this Spanish vowel in exactly the same way as the counterpart Czech vowel [ɪ] in the same context. This suggestion was tested on ten female L2 Spanish speakers recorded in laboratory conditions. The vowel [ɪ] and [i] was elicited in four different consonantal contexts (p, t, k, and χ/x) and two styles (word list and text) in Czech and Spanish, respectively. The first and second vowel formants were measured, converted into ERB and compared. The results of the study show significant differences in F1 between Czech and L2 Spanish high front vowels in the cases of style variation and context variation, where lower values are associated with the first formant of L2 Spanish [i] in the text style and in the environments of the consonants t and p. On the other hand, little difference was found as far as F2 was concerned.
Loanwords and Foreign Proper Names in Czech: A Phonologist’s View
Tomáą Duběda, Martin Havlík, Lucie Jílková, and Veronika ©těpánová
DOI: 10.5507/ff.14.24440606.23
The objective of the present paper is to analyze phonological aspects of orthographically non-adapted loanwords and foreign proper names on a non-normative basis. A system of eight adaptation principles is put forward (1. phonological approximation; 2. spelling pronunciation; 3. original pronunciation; 4. analogy with the donor language; 5. analogy with the recipient language; 6. the influence of a third language; 7. the influence of universals; 8. Unclearly motivated pronunciation). This system is then applied to a sample of Anglicisms taken from a recently published dictionary. We show that the most important principles are phonological approximation and, to a lesser degree, spelling pronunciation. The “secondary” principles (4–8) affect only a small number of items. Differences between British and American pronunciation are unproblematic for the system.