Volume 21, Winter 1999

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Browsing Volume 21, Winter 1999 by Department "Linguistics"

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    Calgary Working Papers in Linguistics, Volume 21, Winter 1999
    (University of Calgary, 1999-01) Atkey, Susan; Belland, Jana; Rowsell, Lorna V; Strickland, Melanie
    The editors of, this volume, Susan Atkey, Jana Belland, Melanie Strickland and Lorna Rowsell are pleased to present the twenty-first issue of the Calgary Working Papers in Linguistics published by the department of Linguistics at the University of Calgary. The papers contained in this volume represent works in progress and as such should not be considered in any way final or definitive.
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    Chickens and eggs: the undying issue of the primacy of r/l or z/š in Altaic historical linguistics
    (University of Calgary, 1999-01) Therien, Tania L
    For the better part of this century, the Turkic language family has posed some difficulties for both typological and historical linguistics. The pivotal issue lies with four modern Turkic phonemes /r, l, z, š/ and their reflexes in the peripheral Turkic language Chuvash, spoken south of Moscow along the Volga River. Historically, the question that arises is, which set of phonemes, greater-Turkic or Chuvash, is the older one? And, in turn, what does the potential answer to this question have to say about the classification of Turkic? The Chuvash reflexes /r, I/ (but not z and š) correspond perfectly with cognates in Mongolian and Manchu-Tungus languages, leading one to believe that not only are the Chuvash phonemes older, but also that Turkic is most certainly an Altaic language. The aim of this paper is to explore each side of the Altaic argument with the issue of the phonemes serving as the focal point.
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    Event structure and syntax: German*
    (University of Calgary, 1999-01) Wilhelm, Andrea
    This paper deals with the role of the lexicon versus the syntax in event structure by examining particle verb formation in German. There are two types of particles in German: Delimiting particles, which derive accomplishments or activities from activity base verbs, and nondelimiting ones, which leave the aspectual class of the base verb (activity) unchanged. A theory such as Ritter & Rosen (1998, to appear), which explicitly represents event structure in the syntax (e.g., through an FF-delimitation) is not able to account for the German facts, as it cannot explain the uniform morphosyntactic behavior of all particles. An analysis which combines syntactic structure (VP-shells, following Hale & Keyser (1994), Chomsky (1995)) and lexical features is adapted. It treats particles as heads of an empty PP in the lower VP. Delimiting particles are distinguished from nondelimiting ones through a lexical feature [+delim]. This analysis is also successful in providing homogeneous case-marking for all internal arguments. It questions Ritter & Rosen's purely syntactic analysis of event structure, where delimitation is assumed to be a grammatical primitive.
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    Infant bilingualism and the Pro-drop parameter
    (University of Calgary, 1999-01) Andrews, Ellen
    No research has been done to assess the occurrence of null and overt subjects in young bilinguals simultaneously acquiring a [+pro-drop] and a [-pro-drop] language. Previous research indicates that monolinguals set the pro-drop parameter at a very early age. Failure to use null and overt subjects language appropriately in this population can be attributed to performance, rather than competence, factors. Research also indicates that bilingual language acquisition is neither significantly qualitatively nor quantitatively different from monolingual language acquisition. However, code-mixing is a phenomenon that characterizes bilingual acquisition. Syntactic code-mixing is extremely rare. Code-mixing does not stem from a lack of language differentiation (the Unitary Language Hypothesis) but is instead attributable to factors such as language dominance, stage of development and sociolinguistic factors. As such, it is predicted that young bilinguals simultaneously acquiring a [+pro-drop] and a [-pro-drop] language will have similar levels of null and overt subjects to monolinguals acquiring each type of language. However, syntactic code-mixing may lead to a slightly higher incidence of null subjects in the [-pro-drop] language than in monolinguals acquiring this type of language. It is proposed that a longitudinal study be carried out to test these predictions.
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    Multiple wh-movement and superiority effects in Czech
    (University of Calgary, 1999-01) Atkey, Susan
    This paper examines multiple wh-movement in Czech. Rudin (1988) argues that Czech is a [-Multiply Filled Spec, CP] language in which only one wh-word appears in Spec,CP while the rest are IP-adjoined. It is argued that [-MFS] languages do not exhibit Superiority; however, recent research has shown Superiority to obtain in other [-MFS] languages such as Serbo-Croatian and Russian. I apply this research to Czech data to see if Superiority can be shown to account for the ordering of the multiply fronted wh-words. I conclude by showing that multiple wh-word order in Czech cannot be accounted for solely by the syntax. Rather, it is the complex relationship between syntactic and discoursal factors that determines wh-word order in Czech.
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    Split INFL and the acquisition of Neg and Aux
    (University of Calgary, 1999-01) Hanson, Rebecca
    Because child language is human language, it is important that proposed linguistic theories be able to account equally well for both child and adult speech. This paper examines a model of split-INFL, which was proposed for adult language, from the perspective of acquisition. With a focus on the acquisition of English negatives auxiliaries, I test the ability of this model to account for the earliest observed stages of child speech in these areas. Data from several children learning English is considered and the model is found able to predict and explain the common patterns. The hierarchical structure within INFL accounts for the word order in the first instances of negation, the relative order of appearance between negatives and auxiliaries, and the fact that the earliest auxiliaries were negated. The success in these areas suggests that a further, crosslinguistic look at the role of split-INFL in acquisition would be worthwhile.
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    What's all the fuss about 16 words? A new approach to Holtzman's Law*
    (University of Calgary, 1999-01) Smith, Laura Catharine
    This paper provides a unified analysis for Holtzmann's Law or the Germanic Verscharfung (hereafter, GV). This Germanic phenomenon is usually described as the strengthening of the PIE glides +i and +u to Gothic and and Old Norse and respectively. In the present work, I posit plausible sound changes based on the assumption that laryngeals were extant in early Germanic when the accent was still mobile. Furthermore, I contend that the laryngeals rather than glides underwent GV strengthening. The motivation for sound changes, as I assert, can be explained by the preference laws of syllable structure. The analysis provided herein also accounts for parallel phonological developments of GV and non-GV forms from common PIE roots, e.g. ON snūa 'to turn' versus ON snugga 'to look askance'. Finally, the analysis offers an explanation for the existence of GV reflexes in West Germanic.