Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t7fkt Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-30T15:27:28.514Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Case variation: Viruses and star wars

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 April 2013

Halldór Ármann Sigurðsson
Halldór Ármann Sigurðsson*
Affiliation:
SOL, Centre for Language and Literature, Box 201, 221 00 Lund, Sweden. [email protected]
Get access

Abstract

This article discusses morphological case variation, arguing that individual cases are not syntactic objects or features but PF interpretations of a range of different underlying syntactic relations. Nevertheless, it turns out that case variation can, to a large extent, be analyzed in terms of only two atomic ‘ingredients’: event licensing of NPs and PF marking of the licensing relation (where marking is analyzed in terms of Chomskyan case stars). Ergative is a Voice/ag*-case, whereas accusative is a v*-case, licensed under c-command by Voice/ag (ergative and accusative marking thus being two sides of the same coin). Individual cases in case-expanding morphological/PF case systems, it is argued, behave like viruses, striving to expand beyond their original ‘reasonable’ domain.

Keywords

casecase expansioncase growthcase star augmentationcase star deletioncase variationexternalizationinternal vs. external language
Type
Research Article
Information
Nordic Journal of Linguistics , Volume 35 , Special Issue 3: Case Variation and Change in the Nordic Languages , December 2012 , pp. 313 - 342
Copyright
Copyright © Nordic Association of Linguistics 2013

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Arkadiev, Peter. 2009. Poor (two-term) case systems: Limits of neutralization. In Malchukov & Spencer (eds.), 686–699.Google Scholar
Asbury, Anna. 2010. The Morphosyntax of Case and Adpositions. Ph.D. dissertation, Utrecht University.Google Scholar
Bailyn, John Frederick. 2012. The Syntax of Russian. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Baker, Mark. 2001. The Atoms of Language. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Baker, Mark. 2008. The Syntax of Agreement and Concord. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Barðdal, Jóhanna. 2001. Case in Icelandic: A Synchronic, Diachronic and Comparative Approach. Lund: Studentlitteratur.Google Scholar
Barðdal, Jóhanna & Kulikov, Leonid. 2009. Case in decline. In Malchukov & Spencer (eds.), 470–478.Google Scholar
Bayer, Josef, Bader, Markus & Meng, Michael. 2001. Morphological underspecification meets oblique case: Syntactic and processing effects in German. Lingua 111, 465–514.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Berwick, Robert C. & Chomsky, Noam. 2011. The biolinguistic program: The current state of its development. In Di Sciullo, Anna Maria & Boeckx, Cedric (eds.), The Biolinguistic Enterprise: New Perspectives on the Evolution and Nature of the Human Language Faculty, 19–41. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Biberauer, Theresa, Holmberg, Anders, Roberts, Ian & Sheehan, Michelle. 2009. Parametric Variation: Null Subjects in Minimalist Theory. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bittner, Maria & Hale, Ken. 1996. The structural determination of case and agreement. Linguistic Inquiry 27, 1–68.Google Scholar
Blake, Barry J. 2001. Case, 2nd edn. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Boeckx, Cedric. 2011. Approaching parameters from below. In Di Sciullo, Anna Maria & Boeckx, Cedric (eds.), The Biolinguistic Enterprise: New Perspectives on the Evolution and Nature of the Human Language Faculty, 205–221. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Bresnan, Joan. 2001. Explaining morphosyntactic competition. In Baltin, Mark & Collins, Chris (eds.), The Handbook of Contemporary Syntactic Theory, 11–44. Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Caha, Pavel. 2009. The Nanosyntax of Case. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Tromsø.Google Scholar
Chomsky, Noam. 1980. On binding. Linguistic Inquiry 11, 1–46.Google Scholar
Chomsky, Noam. 1995. The Minimalist Program. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Chomsky, Noam. 2001. Derivation by phase. In Kenstowicz (ed.), 1–52.Google Scholar
Chomsky, Noam. 2005. Three factors in language design. Linguistic Inquiry 36, 1–22.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cuervo, María Cristina. 2003. Datives at Large. Ph.D. dissertation, MIT.Google Scholar
de Graf, Michael. 2001. Morphology in creole genesis: Linguistics and ideology. In Kenstowicz (ed.), 53–121.Google Scholar
Dixon, R. M. W. 1979. Ergativity. Language 55, 59–138.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dryer, Matthew S. & Haspelmath, Martin (eds.). 2011. World Atlas of Language Structures Online. http://wals.info/.Google Scholar
Emonds, Joseph E. 1987. The invisible category principle. Linguistic Inquiry 18, 613–632.Google Scholar
Haspelmath, Martin & Michaelis, Susanne. 2008. Leipzig fourmille de typologies: Genitive objects in comparison. In Crobett, Greville G. & Noonan, Michael (eds.), Case and Grammatical Relations: Studies in Honor of Bernard Comrie, 140–166. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
Hinzen, Wolfram. 2013. Narrow syntax and the language of thought. Philosophical Psychology 26, 1–23.Google Scholar
Holmberg, Anders. 1991. On the Scandinavian double object construction. In Papers from the Twelfth Scandinavian Conference of Linguistics, 141–152. Reykjavik: Institute of Linguistics.Google Scholar
Holmberg, Anders. 2010. Parameters in minimalist theory: The case of Scandinavian. Theoretical Linguistics 36, 1–48.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Holmberg, Anders & Platzack, Christer. 1995. The Role of Inflection in Scandinavian Syntax. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Iggesen, Oliver A. 2011a. Asymmetrical case-marking. In Dryer & Haspelmath (eds.), chapter 50. http://wals.info/chapter/50 (accessed 28 January 2012).Google Scholar
Iggesen, Oliver A. 2011b. Number of cases. In Dryer & Haspelmath (eds.), chapter 49. http://wals.info/chapter/49 (accessed 28 January 2012).Google Scholar
Jónsson, Jóhannes Gísli. 2000. Case and double objects in Icelandic. Leeds Working Papers in Linguistics 8, 71–94.Google Scholar
Jónsson, Jóhannes Gísli. 2003. Not so quirky: On subject case in Icelandic. In Brandner, Ellen & Zinsmeister, Heike (eds.), New Perspectives on Case Theory, 127–163. Stanford, CA: CSLI Publications.Google Scholar
Jónsson, Jóhannes Gísli. 2005. Merkingarhlutverk, rökliðir og fallmörkun [Thematic roles, arguments, and case-marking]. In Þráinsson, Höskuldur [Thráinsson] (ed.), Íslensk tunga III: Setningar [The Icelandic language III: Sentences], 350–409. Reykjavik: Almenna bókafélagið.Google Scholar
Jónsson, Jóhannes Gísli & Eythórsson, Thórhallur. 2005. Variation in subject case marking in Insular Scandinavian. Nordic Journal of Linguistics 28, 223–245.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kenstowicz, Michael (ed.). 2001. Ken Hale: A Life in Language. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
König, Christa. 2009. Marked nominatives. In Malchukov & Spencer (eds.), 535–548.Google Scholar
Kratzer, Angelika. 1996. Severing the external argument from the verb. In Rooryck, Johann & Zaring, Laurie (eds.), Phrase Structure and the Lexicon, 109–137. Dordrecht: Kluwer.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kress, Bruno. 1982. Isländische Grammatik. Leipzig: VEB Verlag Enzyklopädie.Google Scholar
Kulikov, Leonid. 2009. Evolution of case systems. In Malchukov & Spencer (eds.), 439–457.Google Scholar
Libert, Alan R. 2002. On the range and variety of cases assigned by adpositions. In Amberber, Mengistu & Collins, Peter (eds.), Language Universals and Variation, 131–154. Westport, CT: Praeger.Google Scholar
Andrej, Malchukov & de Swart, Peter. 2009. Differential case marking and actancy variations. In Malchukov & Spencer (eds.), 339–355.Google Scholar
Malchukov, Andrej & Spencer, Andrew (eds.). 2009a. The Oxford Handbook of Case. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Malchukov, Andrej & Spencer, Andrew. 2009b. Typology of case systems: Parameters of variation. In Malchukov & Spencer (eds.), 651–667.Google Scholar
Maling, Joan. 2002. Það rignir þágufalli á Íslandi [‘It rains dative in Iceland’]: Verbs with dative objects in Icelandic. Íslenskt mál og almenn málfræði 24, 31–105.Google Scholar
Marantz, Alec. 1993. Implications of asymmetries in double object constructions. In Mchombo, Sam (ed.), Theoretical Aspects of Bantu Grammar, 113–150. Stanford, CA: CSLI Publications.Google Scholar
Markman, Vita G. 2009. On the parametric variation of case and agreement. Natural Language & Linguistic Theory 27, 379–426.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McFadden, Thomas. 2004. The Position of Morphological Case in the Derivation: A Sudy on the Syntax–Morphology Interface. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Pennsylvania.Google Scholar
McGinnis, Martha. 2001. Variation in the phase structure of applicatives. Linguistic Variation Yearbook 1, 105–146.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Meir, Irit. 2003. Grammaticalization and modality: The emergence of a case-marked pronoun in Israeli Sign Language. Journal of Linguistics 39, 109–140.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Neeleman, Ad & Weerman, Fred. 1999. Flexible Syntax: A Theory of Case and Arguments. Dordrecht: Kluwer.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Parrott, Jeffrey K. 2007. Distributed Morphological Mechanisms of Labovian Variation in Morphosyntax. Ph.D. dissertation, Georgetown University.Google Scholar
Parrott, Jeffrey K. 2009. Danish vestigial case and the acquisition of Vocabulary in Distributed Morphology. Biolinguistics 3, 270–304.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pesetsky, David. 2010. Russian case morphology and the syntactic categories. Ms., MIT.Google Scholar
Pylkkänen, Liina. 2008. Introducing Arguments. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Quinn, Heidi. 2005. The Distribution of Pronoun Case Forms in English. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Richardson, Kylie R. 2007. Case and Aspect in Slavic. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Roberts, Ian & Roussou, Anna. 2003. Syntactic Change: A Minimalist Approach to Grammaticalization. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sandler, Wendy & Lillo-Martin, Diane. 2006. Sign Language and Linguistic Universals. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schäfer, Florian M. 2008. The Syntax of (Anti-)Causatives: External Arguments in Change-of-State Contexts. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schütze, Carson T. 2001. On the nature of default case. Syntax 4, 205–238.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sigurðsson, Halldór Ármann. 2004. Meaningful silence, meaningless sounds. Linguistic Variation Yearbook 4, 235–259.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sigurðsson, Halldór Ármann. 2006a. Agree in syntax, agreement in signs. In Boeckx, Cedric (ed.), Agreement Systems, 201–237. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sigurðsson, Halldór Ármann. 2006b. The Nom/Acc alternation in Germanic. In Hartmann, Jutta & Molnarfi, Laszlo (eds.), Comparative Studies in Germanic Syntax, 13–50. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sigurðsson, Halldór Ármann. 2008. The case of PRO. Natural Language & Linguistic Theory 26, 403–450.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sigurðsson, Halldór Ármann. 2011a. On the New Passive. Syntax 14, 148–178.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sigurðsson, Halldór Ármann. 2011b. On UG and materialization. Linguistic Analysis 37, 367–388.Google Scholar
Sigurðsson, Halldór Ármann. 2011c. Uniformity and diversity: A minimalist perspective. Linguistic Variation 11, 189–222.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sigurðsson, Halldór Ármann. 2012. Minimalist C/case. Linguistic Inquiry 43, 191–227.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Svenonius, Peter. 2002. Icelandic case and the structure of events. Journal of Comparative Germanic Linguistics 6, 197–225.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Svenonius, Peter. 2007. Adpositions, particles and the arguments they introduce. In Reuland, Eric, Bhattacharya, Tanmoy & Spathas, Giorgos (eds.), Argument Structure, 63–103. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Thráinsson, Höskuldur. 2007. The Syntax of Icelandic. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Thráinsson, Höskuldur, Petersen, Hjalmar P., Lon Jacobsen, Jogvan i & Hansen, Zakaris Svabo. 2004. Faroese: An Overview and Reference Grammar. Tórshavn: Foroya Frodskaparfelag.Google Scholar
Weerman, Fred & Evers-Vermeul, Jacqueline. 2002. Pronouns and case. Lingua 112, 301–338.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wood, Jim. 2012a. Against the movement theory of control: Another argument from Icelandic. Linguistic Inquiry 43, 322–330.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wood, Jim. 2012b. Icelandic Morphosyntax and Argument Structure. Ph.D. dissertation, New York University.Google Scholar
Woolford, Ellen. 2006. Lexical case, inherent case, and argument structure. Linguistic Inquiry 37, 111–130.CrossRefGoogle Scholar