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This paper presents a constraint-based account of verb form alternations (Short and Long Forms) in Mauritian which, basically, is syntactically driven: Short Forms appear with Canonical complements while Long Forms are expected with no realized complements. However, in specific contexts, Long Forms are unexpectedly authorized in declaratives with canonical complements and expresses Verum Focus.
We contrast two types of sentences with a preposed NP in French in a construction based HPSG grammar. They differ with respect to different grammatical aspects (syntax, semantics, pragmatics and phonology), which cluster uniquely into constructions. Both are colloquial, a reason why they have been recognized only recently (see Zribi-Hertz 1986, 1996, Sabio 1995, 2006). Accordingly, we rely for the data on spoken corpora (Corpaix, CFRP) as well as on our intuitions. Both constructions involve a partitioned semantics but this mode of composition is associated with different effects. One construction is characterized semantically: the preposed NP is the theme of a categorical proposition. The other construction is characterized pragmatically: it is associated with an independent declarative clause, a typical use of which is to signal a break in the interaction.
Transparent heads
(2008)
Head-complement structures in HPSG identify most properties of the phrase with those of the head daughter, except for that valence property (e.g. SUBCAT or COMPS) whose constraints are met by the non-head daughter(s) in the phrase. In this paper I present several phenomena in English syntax where idiosyncratic properties of a non-head daughter in a phrase must remain visible on the phrasal node, in order to preserve the strong version of the principle of locality in subcategorization. I propose a general formal mechanism to effect this occasional transparency of heads with respect to certain properties of their complements.
Transparent free relatives (TFRs) are constituents involving a WH-gap dependency in which the phrase that is predicated of the gap associated with 'what', not the wh-phrase itself, functions as the syntactic and semantic "nucleus." Previous analyses have either treated TFRs as a construction radically different from ordinary FRs, utilizing such mechanisms as parenthetical placement or grafts, or assimilated them to ordinary FRs, relying on abstract/empty head elements and a vague semantic relation holding between the gap and the predicate phrase. In this paper, we investigate how the puzzling properties of English TFRs can be accounted for in HPSG. The paper shows that the transparency effect of TRFs can be handled by feature inheritance from the nucleus predicate phrase, together with a constructional constraint that deals with the exocentric property of TFRs.
We present an analysis of adjuncts which, while based on the traditional binary adjunction schema, accommodates the phenomena that motivate the alternative Adjunct-as-Complement approach, such as adjunct extraction and case marking. The key idea is to enable the syntactic head (modifiee) to select for its modifier (adjunct) via the new valence feature dedicated for adjuncts, while leaving its values underspecified. Thus the selectional property of the modifiee percolates as well as that of the modifier, dispensing with the need to endow adjuncts a complement-like status.
Preposition-noun combinations (PNCs) are compositional and productive, but not fully regular. In school grammars and many theoretical approaches, PNCs are neglected, but they have recently been addressed in an HPSG analysis by Baldwin et al. (2006). After discussing some basic properties of PNCs, we show that statistical methods can be employed to prove that PNCs are indeed productive and compositional, which again implies that PNCs should receive a syntactic analysis. Such an analysis, however, is impeded by the limited regularity of the construction. We will point out why adding semantic conditions to syntactic schemata might be necessary but not sufficient and turn then to a framework which allows the derivation of syntactic (and semantic) generalizations from linguistic data without taking recourse to introspective judgments.
In this paper we address the question of which transitive verbs allow there-insertion in Danish. We propose that two constraints have to be met in order for verbs to appear in Danish there-constructions. Firstly, as have been noted by others, an empty direct object position must be available. This constraint is not sufficient for restricting the set of verbs in there-constructions. We further propose a locative constraint. The transitive verbs allowing there-insertion will be shown to coincide with verbs that allow a locative analysis.
Freeze (1992) argued on the basis of data from several different languages that there is a close relationship between existential sentences (stating the existence of an entity) and locative sentences (stating the location of an entity). Freeze (1992) proposes that they are both derived from the same base structure and that the surface differences are rather due to the distinct information structures.This paper argues against this position with the data from Serbian existentials, which show clear syntactic differences from the locatives. Thus, the close relationship between existential and locative sentences that Freeze (1992) observes is conceptual, but not (necessarily) part of the syntax of the language. In order to account for the data, we propose that existential sentences originate from a different syntactic predication structure than the locative ones. The existential meaning arises, as we will show, from the interaction of this predication structure with the structure and meaning of the noun phrase.
My objective in this paper is to integrate scalar exclamatives into an HPSG grammar of French. First, a procedure to sort out scalar exclamatives from declaratives and interrogatives is proposed. Then, the main semantic and dialogical properties of exclamatives are presented: veridicity, ego-evidentiality, illocutionary double life and scalarity. Finally, assuming Ginzburg & Sag 2000, the exclamative clause type is defined.
Whether the Coordinate Structure Constraint (CSC) (Ross, 1967) is a syntactic constraint has been discussed much in the literature. This paper reconsiders this issue by drawing on evidence from Japanese and Korean. Our examination of the CSC patterns in relative clauses in the two languages reveals that a pragmatically-based approach along the lines of Kehler (2002) predicts the relevant empirical patterns straightforwardly whereas alternative syntactic approaches run into many problems. We take these results to provide strong support for the view that the CSC is a pragmatic principle rather than a syntactic constraint.