Ala'a Mohsen - Academia.edu (original) (raw)
Papers by Ala'a Mohsen
Ms., University of Tromsø. Talk at the University of …, Jan 1, 2007
Linguistic Inquiry, Jan 1, 2001
... position within the sentence, as illustrated in (i). (i) a. huwwe zeena ʃeefUt-o he Zeina saw... more ... position within the sentence, as illustrated in (i). (i) a. huwwe zeena ʃeefUt-o he Zeina saw.3SF-him 'Him, Zeina saw him.' b. karim zeena ʃeefUt-o Karim Zeina saw.3SF-him 'Karim,Zeina saw him.' 3 ... (i) a. *naadia ≈aalit ≈Unno ha-l-maÇduube saχanit Nadia said.3SF that this ...
Journal of psycholinguistic research, Jan 1, 2000
The syntax of features is a complicated and densely researched domain, from a variety of theoreti... more The syntax of features is a complicated and densely researched domain, from a variety of theoretical perspectives. The present paper takes one influential syntactic framework [the minimalist program of as its vantage point, and discusses the major issues that arise within this framework in the domain of the syntax of features, with particular emphasis on Case and agreement. 5 0090-6905/00/0100-0005$18.00/0
Linguistic inquiry, Jan 1, 1999
Since the earliest days of generative grammar, control has been distinguished from raising: the l... more Since the earliest days of generative grammar, control has been distinguished from raising: the latter the product of movement operations, the former the result of construal processes relating a PRO to an antecedent. This article argues that obligatory control structures are also formed by movement. Minimalism makes this approach viable by removing D-Structure as a grammatical level. Implementing the suggestion, however, requires eliminating the last vestiges of D-Structure still extant in Chomsky's (1995) version of the Minimalist Program. In particular, it requires dispensing with the u-Criterion and adopting the view that u-roles are featurelike in being able to license movement.
Minimalism in a deductive perspective. Master's thesis, …, Jan 1, 1999
When I started writing my thesis last year, I didn't foresee that writing a thesis takes so much ... more When I started writing my thesis last year, I didn't foresee that writing a thesis takes so much time, effort, but also pleasure. For this last reason I want to thank a number of people: first of all my supervisor Michael Moortgat for his constant encouragement, help and enthusiasm through the whole process of research and writing; Tom Cornell, Alain Lecomte and Christian Retoré, because their articles and ideas on 'Minimalism in a deductive perspective' gave me confidence to study this topic further; my second and third supervisor, Vincent van Oostrom and Ed Stabler for their careful reading of my thesis; Iris Mulders for helping me out with the chapter on the Minimalist Program; Brenda Kennelly for checking my English grammar and style; all my friends at the Uil-OTS: Anne-Marie, Dirk, Esther, Paola, Patrick, Richard and Tamara, for the conversations during lunch, coffee and tea breaks; but especially Raffaella for all the laughs during good times and comfort during times of depression.
Germania et alia: a linguistic Webschrift for Hans den …, Jan 1, 2003
This essay in honor of Hans den Besten highlights what seems to me to be his major contribution t... more This essay in honor of Hans den Besten highlights what seems to me to be his major contribution to the study of West-Germanic syntax: the analysis of verb placement in strict adherence to the structure preserving hypothesis. What Den Besten discovered, seemingly out of nowhere, was that, behind the confusing data of the left periphery of West-Germanic sentences, lies a regular alteration of heads and phrases, dictated by the rules of phrase structure, yielding positions to be filled out by various types of elements moving to the left. This specifier-head configuration was adopted in Chomsky (1986), who (on p. 6) makes explicit reference to the verb-second phenomenon as one of its prime motivations, and, in one form or other, it has been a key ingredient of syntactic theory ever since.
mlsk.or.kr
... 1993) claims that there is an additional applicative verbal head, which can add a theta-role ... more ... 1993) claims that there is an additional applicative verbal head, which can add a theta-role to the ... arguments and the internal arguments (direct and indirect objects) are assigned Case byfunctional heads ... In order to check the EPP feature on T, Maria moves to the Spec-T position ...
The paper presents some empirical consequences resulting from the application of Chomsky's phase-... more The paper presents some empirical consequences resulting from the application of Chomsky's phase-based system and, specifically, the implementation of feature spread between phase heads (C, v) and their complements (T,V) , respectively. We begin with a brief overview of the "old" rules for the syntactic derivation and proceed with the description of the innovative concept of feature spread and the way it modifies the derivational process. Next, we hint at some problematic areas for the new system, i.e. extraction from the subject as well as that trace phenomenon. As for the former, we present, based on the comparison of the behaviour of raising as well as control verbs (including, among others, raising and control constructions), some evidence for the theory of Control as movement. What follows, we derive a parametrised version of Subject Condition. Finally, we look at certain facts from Polish (e.g. Genitive of Negation) that seem to lend credibility to the feature spread analysis.
… Structure: Proceedings of FDSL-7, Leipzig, Jan 1, 2007
Ms. University of Michigan, Jan 1, 2002
This paper defends three interconnected claims: (1) selection is the only licensing procedure ava... more This paper defends three interconnected claims: (1) selection is the only licensing procedure available to UG; specifically, checking is an instance of selection, (2) selection obtains in the mutual c-command relation, and (3) though a head does not mutually c-command its own specifier, it mutually c-commands the specifier of its complement. A head may therefore license the specifier of its complement (as well as its complement), but not its own specifier (it is not local enough). This effectively eliminates the spec-head relation from the repertoire of syntactic relations. This analysis has empirical application in solving a conflict between the promotion analysis of relative clauses, the predicate internal subject hypothesis, and certain argument/adjunct asymmetries. An analysis of relative clause formation is proposed where the head of the relative undergoes across-theboard promotion from both the relative clause and the matrix predicate simultaneously.
Studies in Modern Grammars, Jan 1, 2001
Cahiers de linguistique-Asie orientale, Jan 1, 1995
... i) les marqueurs aspectuels du chinois sont des éléments lexicaux porteurs de traits faibles ... more ... i) les marqueurs aspectuels du chinois sont des éléments lexicaux porteurs de traits faibles invisibles au niveau de la PF, ne nécessitant pas une montée ouverte vers Infl (Asp°), et ce, en vertu du principe Procrastinate, (ii ... he frighten-ASP my child one jerk 'He startled my child.1. ...
... Feature Structure of Functional Categories A Comparative Study of Arabic Dialects Elabbas Ben... more ... Feature Structure of Functional Categories A Comparative Study of Arabic Dialects Elabbas Benmamoun Page 2. The Feature Structure of Functional Categories ...
Linguistic Inquiry, Jan 1, 2001
... Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press. Chomsky, Noam. 2000. Minimalist inquiries: The framework. In Ste... more ... Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press. Chomsky, Noam. 2000. Minimalist inquiries: The framework. In Step by step: Essays on minimalist syntax in honor of Howard Las-nik, ed. Roger Martin, David Michaels, and Juan Uriagereka, 89155. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press. ...
Poznań Studies in Contemporary Linguistics, Jan 1, 2008
... adjacency between V and DP does not seem to play any important role in case ... 2001 a) intro... more ... adjacency between V and DP does not seem to play any important role in case ... 2001 a) introdu-ces an important departure from the the classical concept of feature checking in two ... projections are f lly dispensed with, being replaced by multiple specifiers of functional heads, to ...
In our paper Cyclic Computation (1999), henceforth CC, considerable progress was made in simplify... more In our paper Cyclic Computation (1999), henceforth CC, considerable progress was made in simplifying syntactic computation, within the general framework of the Minimalist Program (MP). Comparison of derivations was eliminated from the theory, along with the need for numerations. Chomsky's Derivation by Phrase , henceforth DBP, proceeded along partially overlapping lines. In DBP, Chomsky introduced the important i d e a o f v alued versus unvalued features and shifted from the idea of feature checking to the idea of feature valuation. We adopt this idea and proceed by rst reviewing the main ideas of the feature valuation analysis, then suggest that feature valuation is best seen as feature sharing. Rather than a valued feature giving a value to an unvalued counterpart, agreement will be realized as the sharing of a single feature between two s y n tactic terminals. 2 With the mechanism of feature sharing in hand, we will then be in a position to revisit the analysis in CC and dramatically simplify both the analysis and the computation which it speci es.
Studies in Modern Grammar, Jan 1, 2000
In this paper we will restrict our attention to the EPP-feature of T, and propose to eliminate it... more In this paper we will restrict our attention to the EPP-feature of T, and propose to eliminate it on the ground that it is redundant with Case-feature. The organization of this paper is as follows. Section 2 argues that infinitival T lacks EPP-feature and the Merge over Move ...
Ms., University of Tromsø. Talk at the University of …, Jan 1, 2007
Linguistic Inquiry, Jan 1, 2001
... position within the sentence, as illustrated in (i). (i) a. huwwe zeena ʃeefUt-o he Zeina saw... more ... position within the sentence, as illustrated in (i). (i) a. huwwe zeena ʃeefUt-o he Zeina saw.3SF-him 'Him, Zeina saw him.' b. karim zeena ʃeefUt-o Karim Zeina saw.3SF-him 'Karim,Zeina saw him.' 3 ... (i) a. *naadia ≈aalit ≈Unno ha-l-maÇduube saχanit Nadia said.3SF that this ...
Journal of psycholinguistic research, Jan 1, 2000
The syntax of features is a complicated and densely researched domain, from a variety of theoreti... more The syntax of features is a complicated and densely researched domain, from a variety of theoretical perspectives. The present paper takes one influential syntactic framework [the minimalist program of as its vantage point, and discusses the major issues that arise within this framework in the domain of the syntax of features, with particular emphasis on Case and agreement. 5 0090-6905/00/0100-0005$18.00/0
Linguistic inquiry, Jan 1, 1999
Since the earliest days of generative grammar, control has been distinguished from raising: the l... more Since the earliest days of generative grammar, control has been distinguished from raising: the latter the product of movement operations, the former the result of construal processes relating a PRO to an antecedent. This article argues that obligatory control structures are also formed by movement. Minimalism makes this approach viable by removing D-Structure as a grammatical level. Implementing the suggestion, however, requires eliminating the last vestiges of D-Structure still extant in Chomsky's (1995) version of the Minimalist Program. In particular, it requires dispensing with the u-Criterion and adopting the view that u-roles are featurelike in being able to license movement.
Minimalism in a deductive perspective. Master's thesis, …, Jan 1, 1999
When I started writing my thesis last year, I didn't foresee that writing a thesis takes so much ... more When I started writing my thesis last year, I didn't foresee that writing a thesis takes so much time, effort, but also pleasure. For this last reason I want to thank a number of people: first of all my supervisor Michael Moortgat for his constant encouragement, help and enthusiasm through the whole process of research and writing; Tom Cornell, Alain Lecomte and Christian Retoré, because their articles and ideas on 'Minimalism in a deductive perspective' gave me confidence to study this topic further; my second and third supervisor, Vincent van Oostrom and Ed Stabler for their careful reading of my thesis; Iris Mulders for helping me out with the chapter on the Minimalist Program; Brenda Kennelly for checking my English grammar and style; all my friends at the Uil-OTS: Anne-Marie, Dirk, Esther, Paola, Patrick, Richard and Tamara, for the conversations during lunch, coffee and tea breaks; but especially Raffaella for all the laughs during good times and comfort during times of depression.
Germania et alia: a linguistic Webschrift for Hans den …, Jan 1, 2003
This essay in honor of Hans den Besten highlights what seems to me to be his major contribution t... more This essay in honor of Hans den Besten highlights what seems to me to be his major contribution to the study of West-Germanic syntax: the analysis of verb placement in strict adherence to the structure preserving hypothesis. What Den Besten discovered, seemingly out of nowhere, was that, behind the confusing data of the left periphery of West-Germanic sentences, lies a regular alteration of heads and phrases, dictated by the rules of phrase structure, yielding positions to be filled out by various types of elements moving to the left. This specifier-head configuration was adopted in Chomsky (1986), who (on p. 6) makes explicit reference to the verb-second phenomenon as one of its prime motivations, and, in one form or other, it has been a key ingredient of syntactic theory ever since.
mlsk.or.kr
... 1993) claims that there is an additional applicative verbal head, which can add a theta-role ... more ... 1993) claims that there is an additional applicative verbal head, which can add a theta-role to the ... arguments and the internal arguments (direct and indirect objects) are assigned Case byfunctional heads ... In order to check the EPP feature on T, Maria moves to the Spec-T position ...
The paper presents some empirical consequences resulting from the application of Chomsky's phase-... more The paper presents some empirical consequences resulting from the application of Chomsky's phase-based system and, specifically, the implementation of feature spread between phase heads (C, v) and their complements (T,V) , respectively. We begin with a brief overview of the "old" rules for the syntactic derivation and proceed with the description of the innovative concept of feature spread and the way it modifies the derivational process. Next, we hint at some problematic areas for the new system, i.e. extraction from the subject as well as that trace phenomenon. As for the former, we present, based on the comparison of the behaviour of raising as well as control verbs (including, among others, raising and control constructions), some evidence for the theory of Control as movement. What follows, we derive a parametrised version of Subject Condition. Finally, we look at certain facts from Polish (e.g. Genitive of Negation) that seem to lend credibility to the feature spread analysis.
… Structure: Proceedings of FDSL-7, Leipzig, Jan 1, 2007
Ms. University of Michigan, Jan 1, 2002
This paper defends three interconnected claims: (1) selection is the only licensing procedure ava... more This paper defends three interconnected claims: (1) selection is the only licensing procedure available to UG; specifically, checking is an instance of selection, (2) selection obtains in the mutual c-command relation, and (3) though a head does not mutually c-command its own specifier, it mutually c-commands the specifier of its complement. A head may therefore license the specifier of its complement (as well as its complement), but not its own specifier (it is not local enough). This effectively eliminates the spec-head relation from the repertoire of syntactic relations. This analysis has empirical application in solving a conflict between the promotion analysis of relative clauses, the predicate internal subject hypothesis, and certain argument/adjunct asymmetries. An analysis of relative clause formation is proposed where the head of the relative undergoes across-theboard promotion from both the relative clause and the matrix predicate simultaneously.
Studies in Modern Grammars, Jan 1, 2001
Cahiers de linguistique-Asie orientale, Jan 1, 1995
... i) les marqueurs aspectuels du chinois sont des éléments lexicaux porteurs de traits faibles ... more ... i) les marqueurs aspectuels du chinois sont des éléments lexicaux porteurs de traits faibles invisibles au niveau de la PF, ne nécessitant pas une montée ouverte vers Infl (Asp°), et ce, en vertu du principe Procrastinate, (ii ... he frighten-ASP my child one jerk 'He startled my child.1. ...
... Feature Structure of Functional Categories A Comparative Study of Arabic Dialects Elabbas Ben... more ... Feature Structure of Functional Categories A Comparative Study of Arabic Dialects Elabbas Benmamoun Page 2. The Feature Structure of Functional Categories ...
Linguistic Inquiry, Jan 1, 2001
... Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press. Chomsky, Noam. 2000. Minimalist inquiries: The framework. In Ste... more ... Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press. Chomsky, Noam. 2000. Minimalist inquiries: The framework. In Step by step: Essays on minimalist syntax in honor of Howard Las-nik, ed. Roger Martin, David Michaels, and Juan Uriagereka, 89155. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press. ...
Poznań Studies in Contemporary Linguistics, Jan 1, 2008
... adjacency between V and DP does not seem to play any important role in case ... 2001 a) intro... more ... adjacency between V and DP does not seem to play any important role in case ... 2001 a) introdu-ces an important departure from the the classical concept of feature checking in two ... projections are f lly dispensed with, being replaced by multiple specifiers of functional heads, to ...
In our paper Cyclic Computation (1999), henceforth CC, considerable progress was made in simplify... more In our paper Cyclic Computation (1999), henceforth CC, considerable progress was made in simplifying syntactic computation, within the general framework of the Minimalist Program (MP). Comparison of derivations was eliminated from the theory, along with the need for numerations. Chomsky's Derivation by Phrase , henceforth DBP, proceeded along partially overlapping lines. In DBP, Chomsky introduced the important i d e a o f v alued versus unvalued features and shifted from the idea of feature checking to the idea of feature valuation. We adopt this idea and proceed by rst reviewing the main ideas of the feature valuation analysis, then suggest that feature valuation is best seen as feature sharing. Rather than a valued feature giving a value to an unvalued counterpart, agreement will be realized as the sharing of a single feature between two s y n tactic terminals. 2 With the mechanism of feature sharing in hand, we will then be in a position to revisit the analysis in CC and dramatically simplify both the analysis and the computation which it speci es.
Studies in Modern Grammar, Jan 1, 2000
In this paper we will restrict our attention to the EPP-feature of T, and propose to eliminate it... more In this paper we will restrict our attention to the EPP-feature of T, and propose to eliminate it on the ground that it is redundant with Case-feature. The organization of this paper is as follows. Section 2 argues that infinitival T lacks EPP-feature and the Merge over Move ...