Depuis Spitta-Bey (1880), une littérature riche et détaillée décrit invariablement l'inventaire vocalique de surface de l'arabe du Caire comme incluant des voyelles moyennes brèves, [e] et [o]. Une nouvelle ère s'ouvre un siècle plus tard avec l'apparition soudaine d'un consensus massif sur l'idée que les voyelles moyennes brèves ne sont pas attestées en arabe cairote. Une différence d'une telle nature et d'une telle ampleur a nécessairement des conséquences sur l'analyse du système phonologique. Certaines de ces conséquences sont mises en évidence dans le présent article. Il est montré que le déni de la présence de [e] et [o] dans la langue conduit mécaniquement à inférer l'existence de processus phonologiques fictifs, et qu'une description de la réalité impose la reconnaissance de ces voyelles. La littérature pertinente est passée en revue, des tests originaux permettant de vérifier cette affirmation sont proposés, ainsi que le témoignage de mesures instrumentales.

This article examines passive-type constructions in Mauritian Creole, arguing that they are topic, not passive constructions. I claim that their initial argument (the displaced object) occupies the specifier position of a Topic Phrase, not the structural subject position. This proposal is motivated by the fact that nothing at the surface identifies the displaced object as a grammatical subject, except its position relative to an auxiliary or verb. The topic analysis is supported by both semantic restrictions relating to specificity and animacy and syntactic restrictions relating to distribution (word order) and coordination. It is also supported by the fact that these same restrictions do not apply in unaccusatives, a structurally similar type of construction. The important contribution of this article is that passive-type constructions in Mauritian Creole are ‘apparent’ rather ‘real’ passives, with the wider implication being that creoles, like many languages, do not use canonical passives to express passive meaning.

We investigate whether Palestinian Arabic (PA), as spoken by the local Palestinian refugee population in Beirut, is converging with Lebanese Arabic (LA), the majority variety. Using a sociolinguistic framework, we target three variables considered to be susceptible to convergent change. We find evidence of contact-induced change in PA in the variable raising of word-medial /a:/ to [e:], as well as in the attrition of socially marked exponents of verbal negation. By contrast, in the case of the third variable, the future temporal reference system, the evidence for convergence is less compelling on account of key differences between the contact varieties, including the vertiginous rise of the proclitic future marker ħa- in PA. We implicate the respective social salience of the targeted variables in their differential susceptibility to convergence. Our results afford new insights into dialect contact and elucidate under-studied patterns of grammatical variation and change in Levantine Arabic.

This article provides the first systematic account of relativization in Likpakpaln, an understudied Mabia (Gur) language of Ghana. Broadly speaking, Likpakpaln features two types of relative clauses: restrictive and non-restrictive. Both types of relative clauses are finite and marked by a relative pronoun as well as a clausal definite determiner. The first type is always headed by an indefinite noun. The second is invariably headed by a definite head noun, is additionally marked by a prosodic break, and is usually under focus. The relative pronoun is a composite form comprised of a noun class agreement marker and an invariant relative marker. A number of the features of relative clauses in Likpakpaln align it with other Mabia languages of the region, whereas others distinguish it from these languages. This analysis situates Likpakpaln within its genealogical and areal context while providing new typological perspectives on the Mabia languages as a whole.

Cinque (2020) presents a unified theory positing that various types of relative clauses (RCs) originate from a single, double-headed universal structure via raising or matching. The Frame Noun-Modifying Clause (FRC) as described and analyzed by Matsumoto et al. (2017a, 2017b) presents a significant challenge to Cinque's framework, as it does not conform to any of Cinque's identified RC types, which include amount RCs, kind(-defining) RCs, restrictive RCs and non-restrictive RCs. The FRC eludes derivation via the proposed matching or raising mechanisms. Determining the semantic link between the head noun and the FRC, as well as its external merger position, remains elusive. One might suggest that inserting additional material into the FRC, which incorporates a plausible internal head, could clarify their connection. This approach falls short of providing a systematic and coherent syntactic criterion, relying instead on semantic intuition that lacks operational reliability.

This squib discusses a construction heard during weather reports on CBC Radio One in Manitoba whereby personal pronouns appear as the subjects of weather predicates. We show that the use of we/you in statements like we are minus 15 degrees and Brandon, you are sunny is unlike other non-prototypical uses for personal pronouns that have been noted in the literature and argue they index place rather than person. We note that the deictic coordinates of the utterance that are spelled out by these pronouns are necessary for a felicitous interpretation of weather statements, even though they are typically implicit. This implicit deixis, in turn, sheds light on a long-standing claim that weather-it, in contrast to a true expletive, is ‘quasi-argumental’ (Chomsky 1981). That is, we suggest that the deictic coordinates of an utterance are ‘quasi-arguments’.