Information Structure and Agreement

The existing syntactic accounts of null arguments typically rely either on the specific licensing conditions for different types of empty categories such as pro and (topic-)bound variables, or else on different kinds of ellipsis. In trying to address the radical argument drop character of Catalan Si...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Camacho Taboada, María Victoria, Jiménez-Fernández, Ángel, Martín-González, Javier, Reyes-Tejedor, Mariano
Format: eBook Book
Language:English
Published: Amsterdam John Benjamins Publishing Company 2013
John Benjamins
Edition:1
Series:Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today
Subjects:
Arthropod pests
Contrastive linguistics
Control
Disease and pest resistance
Focus (Linguistics)
Generative linguistics
Grammar, Comparative and general
Grammar, Comparative and general > Syntax
Grammar, Comparative and general > Topic and comment
Host plants
Insect resistance
Insects
Language
LANGUAGE ARTS & DISCIPLINES / Linguistics / General
Plants
Syntax
Theoretical linguistics
Syntax
Generative linguistics
Theoretical linguistics
ISBN:9789027273024, 9027273022, 9789027255808, 9027255806
Online Access:Get full text
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Summary:The existing syntactic accounts of null arguments typically rely either on the specific licensing conditions for different types of empty categories such as pro and (topic-)bound variables, or else on different kinds of ellipsis. In trying to address the radical argument drop character of Catalan Sign Language (LSC), this paper critically reassesses the two main trends in the analysis of this phenomenon in East Asian languages and their extensions to American Sign Language (ASL). Both hybrid and uniform approaches to empty arguments turn out to be unable to account for the non-negligible differences observed across East Asian and sign languages. Most importantly, the availability of sloppy readings for empty arguments as a criterion to identify ellipsis vis-à-vis empty pronouns is shown to be empirically incorrect on the basis of fresh data from Catalan and English. After intensive research in this domain over the years, a satisfactory theory of null arguments that does justice to the wealth of crosslinguistic variation is still lacking.
Bibliography:Includes bibliographical references and index
ISBN:9789027273024
9027273022
9789027255808
9027255806
DOI:10.1075/la.197