Volume 27, Fall 2011

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Open Access
Hungarian information structure: a comparison of Lexical-Functional Grammar and cartography
(University of Calgary, 2011-09) Hracs, Lindsay
A comparison of a Lexical-Functional Grammar analysis and a Cartography-based analysis of information structure suggests that Lexical-Functional Grammar can better account for phenomena associated with information structure. Also, Lexical-Functional Grammar seems to better capture the fact that the subject and topic roles do not have to coincide. Ultimately, Cartography lacks a method of expressing the interactions with respect to syntax, semantics, and prosody in a systematic way. This is because Cartography deals with information structure as a phenomenon of the peripheries. Principles and Parameters based theories such as Cartography do not exhibit an interface between PF and LF, which is important for Hungarian. In Hungarian, prosody can affect scope-based interpretation. Lexical-Functional Grammar on the other hand, fully integrates c-structure, f-structure, i-structure, and p-structure in the Correspondence Architecture allowing for an interface between all of these components. Thus, Lexical-Functional Grammar is better suited to deal with the phenomena associated with information structure in Hungarian.