Towards a grammar of meaning of the V wh pattern: 'Communicating' sequences (original) (raw)

On Wh-movement and the Nature of Wh-Phrases – Case Re-Examined

2005

The difference in wh-movement vs. wh-in-situ strategies in the formation of wh-questions cross-linguistically is often attributed to the fact that wh-elements differ in their morphological properties. This paper argues that wh-expressions are universally the same in that they are underspecified wh-proforms whose semantics/ quantificational force is undetermined while in a lexicon. Once selected for computation a wh-proform can be combined with another element (particle/suffix) resulting in interrogative, relative, existential or universal functional constructs. We argue that the driving force of whmovement is the internal need of a [+ Q]-feature of a question operator to be in an appropriate position, where it can be interpreted at the interfaces.

F Nuessel Ray S. Jackendoff X bar Syntax A Study of Phrase Structure Grammar 1979 pdf

Lingua. Vol. 49. Pp. 255-259;, 1979

Chomsky's grammatical theory since Aspects has undergone frequent and fundamental modification. One significant metamorphosis in the evolution of his hypethesis originated in a series of lectures delivered at MIT in the fall of 1967 in which he proposed th: expansion of the base into a more complex and central component of his theoretical framework. These lectures were subsequently published as ' Remarks on Nominalization' (1970, 1972). In this study, Chomsky proposed that derived (as opposed to gerundive) nominals l be generated directly by the base rather than by transformation. Such a suggestion (the Lexicalist Hypothesis) has profound theoretical consequences in that it permits a nontransformational linking of related lexical items. Specifically, it allows a transformation to refer to more than one syntactic category within the term of its structural description. Such enrichment of the base consequently impoverishes the transformational component. This has the immediate effect of severely constraining the power of the transformational component-a highly desirable goal in generative theory during the 1970's. One must question, however, whether or not such a "trading relation" (Chomsky 1970: 185) has any significant impact on grammatical theory since it merely shifts problems from one domain of the grammar to another. The book contains ten chapters. The first ('Preliminaries', pp. l-6) presents Jackendoff's (henceforth J) theoretical beliefs. 4 The second ('Notation for the X Convention', pp. 7-27) sketches Chomsky's ideas (1970) and presents an outline of the remainder of the book. The next chapter (*A Theory of Phrase Structure', pp. 29-56) is the theoretical core in which J tries to explicate Chomsky's sometimes vague suggestions. Somewhat ironically, J begins this chapter with a quote from Chomsky (1957)5 concerning the necessity co have precisely stated models of grammar for empirical verification. The 57 (= X-bar) convention makes three essential claims according to the author, namely, ".. . the class of possible lexical categories is determined by a set of distinctive features; the class of syntactic categories is determined by elaborating the lexical categories in terms of the prime notation; relies of grammar are to be stated in terms of these features and primes" (p 53).

Two types of wh-adverbials: A typological study of

Linguistic Variation Yearbook, 2004

This paper presents cross-linguistic arguments for distinguishing between two types ofwh-adverbials: causalhow, causalwhy, and epistemicwhypattern together in taking an IP scope, functioning as operators, whereas methodhow, mannerhow, and purposewhypattern together in taking a VP scope, functioning as predicates of underlying events. For the former group, there is always a cause-effect relation underpinning their syntactic distributions across languages, which is semantically realized as a causative predicate taking two events as its arguments, i.e., a cause event and an effect event. In a causal question, it is the cause event that is bound by the question operator; in a resultative question, the effect event is bound instead. For the latter group, they surface as conjuncts of main predicates in Tsou, which in turn argues for a neo-Davidsonian treatment of adjunct association in syntax (Parsons 1990). The fact that a conjunctivehowcan be construed as either a manner/method question...