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This paper argues in favor of the hypothesis that there are two definite articles in natural language, a weak article which expresses uniqueness and a strong article which expresses anaphoricity. The study is based on the distribution of definite articles in Icelandic, and they are found to alternate along the same empirical dimension as weak and strong articles in German. Furthermore, the Icelandic pattern manifests a structural interaction which is similar to English do-support, and we refer to it as the-support. We argue that the similarities between do-support and the-support suggest that studies of the two phenomena can benefit from considering them to be related at a deep abstract level. Thus, consequences ensue for the theory of suffixation under adjecency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study explores how definiteness and contextual information influence the acceptability and processing of the Korean double-accusative ditransitive construction. Experiment 1 employed an acceptability judgment task, demonstrating that the acceptability of the construction is significantly enhanced when the recipient is marked with the definite ku and introduced by prior context, highlighting the role of definiteness supported by context. Experiment 2 utilized a self-paced reading paradigm to investigate the online processing of the construction, revealing that the presence of context facilitates faster reading times at critical regions, particularly at the recipient and theme arguments. Combining the results of the two experiments, it is notable that while contextual facilitation improves processing, it results in only modest improvements in acceptability ratings. We interpret the results as indicating that the double-accusative ditransitive construction is grammatically marginal despite being relatively easy to comprehend when supported by definiteness and context. These findings contribute to our understanding of the double-accusative ditransitive construction in Korean and show an interesting interplay between acceptability and sentence processing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper investigates the rare case where a single English proper name is used with two articles, e.g. the real Billy the Kid. The article placed to the right of the personal name, i.e. Billy, is called the inner article, while the article located to the left of the personal name is termed the outer article. The usage of the inner article is first explored against the historical record, and it is demonstrated that it remains robust wherever the use of modern surnames has not yet taken hold, e.g. in regnal names, nicknames, names of cartoon characters, etc. It is shown that proper names requiring the use of the inner article carry identifying information that is needed to ensure that they refer uniquely and that such information is encoded in embedded NPs, which motivates the use of the article and explains why it is placed inside the linear order of proper name constituents. The outer article is shown to mark the (in)definiteness of a referent manifestation/spatial-temporal slice created by modifying a proper name. In double article cases like the real Billy the Kid the inner article and outer articles mark thus the (in)definiteness of two different linguistic entities: the proper name itself (the inner article) and its spatial-temporal slice (the outer article). Consequently, the former is always definite while the latter can be either definite or indefinite. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research on the (in)definiteness of bare nouns has developed various proposals regarding which type-shifters exist in human language and which principles are needed to govern their distribution (Carlson 1977; Partee 1987; Chierchia 1998; Dayal 2004; i.a.). At the same time, literature on headless relative clauses (HRCs), primarily focusing on free relatives (FRs) in Indo-European languages, has also developed type-shifting principles (Jacobson 1995; Caponigro 2003, 2004). The type-shifting principles from the FR literature, however, are fundamentally different than those found in proposals for bare nouns. Here, we present case studies from two Mayan languages which diverge from one another in the behavior of bare nouns, and which possess several different kinds of headless relative clauses. We show that "super-free relative clauses" (Caponigro et al. 2021; Caponigro 2022), which lack a wh-word, pattern in ways parallel to bare nouns in the respective languages. We also demonstrate that HRCs headed by a wh-word—i.e., FRs—diverge from bare nouns; they pattern similarly to one another across the languages under investigation, and in ways similar to what has been reported for FRs crosslinguistically. We provide evidence that there is a dedicated FR type-shifter (FR-ι) used as a post-syntactic mechanism to repair a type-mismatch at the CP level, building on work by Caponigro (2004). Our novel contribution is that this type-shifter is available regardless of the presence or absence of other type-shifters in a language. This paper adds new data to our understanding of the range and applicability of different definiteness-related type-shifters as well as captures certain typological tendencies regarding HRCs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Usage of a as a marker of direct objects in Spanish has been a popular topic of research, but there is no clarity on how different factors interact. The current investigation looks at the historical change in usage of a, focussing on animacy, definiteness, and topicality. We analyzed the extent to which historical texts follow state-of-the-art theories, by combining automatic and manual annotation. The results indicate that the investigated texts to a large extent confirm existing theories, with some aspects worth noting. First of all, inanimate definite objects sometimes carry a, which is impossible according to prescriptive grammars. Second, we found an increase in the usage of a with definite human referents through time, which was predicted by Aissen (2003), although the limited amount of available data prevents us from drawing definitive conclusions. Furthermore, there is tentative evidence that topicality plays a role. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An existential clause is a clause that shows a proposition about the existence or an event. This paper aims to describe the structure of existential clauses, the types of existential clauses, and the constraints of noun phrases that fill the existence elements in Balinese. This study used the descriptive qualitative method. The data used are primary data taken from five Balinese language teachers. The Balinese language teachers elicited the data made by the first teacher. Written data from Balinese stories are also used to assist the oral data. The data analysis technique chosen is comparison, omission, and replacement. Some research results are found in this paper. The core structure of Balinese existential clauses is verb ada + existence, and the extended structure of Balinese existential clauses is verb ada + existence + extension. There are two types of existential clauses in Balinese: bare and extended existential clauses. The definiteness of a noun phrase filling the existence element determines the choice of existential or non-existential clauses. This paper is helpful as a reference for Balinese grammar, which concerns the existential clauses of Balinese. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The noun category exhibits diverse dissimilarities, characterised at the semantic (e.g., countable/uncountable) or/and morphosyntactic (e.g., determined/determinerless) level, which may be more or less important depending on languages. In this paper, we would like to discuss those differences, which we named inter-word and inter-process morphosyntactic variations. The Riffian language served us as a reference in our enquiries, before referring to other languages to show how our discoveries could be applied to them. By putting in perspective those aspects, this led us to propose a formal mathematical model denoted as a Template-Based and Modular Cognitive model. The latter is able to predict the nonlinear dynamic mapping of lexical items onto morphological templates. The aims of this article are thus manifold and cover theoretical issues. We demonstrate that nouns are organised and distributed in modular cognitive sets, having their own morphological template and unmarked forms. The extent of these sets and their number as well as the template, are specific to each language. All sorts of markers can compose with the template, but some, namely countability markers, are prevalent among several languages with no relationship. This approach allows us to explain the marking discrepancies existing between different kinds of nouns (borrowed, proper, countable and uncountable nouns) for a given linguistic variety or between languages. The main assumption of this model is that these irregular markings are caused by a template shift, occurring when items undergo a process of word and meaning formation. Our contribution represents an initial stride toward understanding the fundamental patterns of morphosyntax and opens venues for applying this mathematical model with other behavioural and natural phenomena. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of RumeliDE Journal of Language & Literature Research / RumeliDE Dil ve Edebiyat Araştırmaları Dergisi is the property of RumeliDE Uluslararasi Hakemli Dil & Edebiyat Arastirmalari Dergisi and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This article presents a case study on the differential marking of direct objects (DOM) in Balkan Judeo-Spanish, an endangered language (sub)group that still lacks detailed, systematic documentation of its (comparative) morphosyntax. Countering recent claims that the phenomenon is frequently absent in Judeo-Spanish, I demonstrate the robust presence of so-called a-marking as a highly systematic, multi-dimensional DOM strategy in early 20th century fieldwork recordings from the understudied dialect of Monastir (present-day Bitola, North Macedonia). I show that, in our corpus, a-marking in transitive (S)V(S)O(S) structures is primarily regulated by (grammatical) animacy/person and (syntactic) definiteness, such that indefinite DOs are excluded and specificity plays no role. Theoretically, the empirical distribution of a-marking broadly conforms with, yet – crucially – cannot be fully subsumed under, scale-based hierarchies that model DOM in terms of referential prominence. Rather, our findings support the conclusion that a-marking of the DO occurs if and only if the argument is syntactically specified for animacy/person and definiteness. From the typological perspective, the (non-)coincidence of Monastirli a-marking with a co-referential accusative clitic exhibits a hitherto undescribed distribution distinct from other patterns documented for (Balkan) Romance. The present article thus not only advances description of, and inquiry into, the cross-linguistic landscape of DOM, but contributes more broadly to redressing the conspicuous absence of empirical and theoretical investigation into Judeo-Spanish dialect syntax. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to test the hypothesis that prototypical discourse profiles of productive constructions are stored independently by speakers. As a case study, the paper presents an empirical investigation of definite prepositional possessive constructions in Hebrew (e.g. ax ʃeli ‘my brother’). The research explores the source of definiteness of these constructions, i.e. whether definiteness is a property of kinship terms in and of themselves (Danon 2001) or of the possessed structures as a whole (Neuman 2015). A corpus study of spoken Hebrew confirms that the prototypical discourse profile of the possessive construction involves definite reference and reference to kinship terms. An acceptability judgment task experiment supports the hypothesis that these discourse profiles are independently represented. A cluster analysis suggests theses representations are specified at an intermediate level of abstraction. This study thus contributes to the study of definiteness in Hebrew and joins a growing body of research arguing for the role of low-level constructions in the organization of grammar.

This paper focuses on the uses of the definite marker -tì in Longxi Qiang, a Tibeto-Burman language. Although the selection of referring expressions made by speakers is based on referent accessibility or cognitive status, at the same time, referring expressions have pragmatic and interactive dimensions. The concept of identifiability can account for the uses of the definite marker -tì; however, this concept is not sufficient to explain the selection of -tì in certain discourse contexts. Accordingly, this paper discusses the discourse uses of non-referential definite noun phrases. In addition to encoding definiteness, -tì serves as a prominence marker to trigger the interpretation that an entity, an action or a property is prominent, and the speaker intended to highlight the topicality. With respect to discourse functions, -tì is attached not only to noun phrases but also to verb and adjective phrases, fillers and connectors. These uses of -tì have been expanded into Wenchuan Mandarin. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates a type of empty morph that attaches to noun forms and that will be called "noun affix" here. Based on six case studies from unrelated African and American genera, I arrive at a diachronic typology of noun affixes that in many ways confirms and in other ways expands on the findings of Joseph Greenberg, whose work on the topic remains the yardstick. One claim is that noun affixes may emerge directly from gender markers and that this is reflected in the paradigm size of noun affixes. Furthermore, there is evidence for the idea that old noun affixes may be repurposed for the creation of phonologically minimal word forms. The main interest of this study is in what the development of noun affixes reveals about processes of grammaticalization. The current literature mostly focuses on the fact that grammaticalization is initiated by semantic changes (mostly semantic reduction) rather than by formal changes. This raises the question of whether semantic reduction is also completed before formal reduction. The noun affixes provide compelling evidence for this idea and thus suggest that empty morphs may arise via grammaticalization. This runs counter to approaches on which form and function erode in parallel. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the formation of spatial locative relativization in three African varieties of Portuguese. While research on relative constructions in Portuguese has deserved considerable attention in the literature, it tends to focus on the European and Brazilian varieties, with locative relativization being only marginally addressed. Using data extracted from spoken corpora of contemporary, urban varieties of Angolan, Mozambican, and Santomean Portuguese, we aim to discuss whether there is a correlation between syntactic and semantic variables and the selection of the two main locative relative morphemes, onde 'where' and que 'that'. Overall, the three varieties at stake behave similarly with respect to the analyzed syntactic variables and follow the tendency found in Portuguese varieties toward the use of pied-piping and P-chopping as the dominant relativization mechanisms, independent of the syntactic relation between the antecedent and the relative clause. Semantically, we identified some fine-grained differences between the three varieties, with Santomean Portuguese generally being the outlier or one of the outliers. Crucially, definiteness of the head noun stands out as the one variable that plays a major role in the selection of the relative morpheme: [−definite] head nouns show a proportionally higher preference for que in both AP and STP, which is particularly visible with bare nouns in the latter. This motivates the hypothesis that less specified head nouns show a preference for the un(der)specified relative morpheme que. We further show that the role of language contact is at best very limited. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper I propose that the host of the definite suffix in Daco-Romanian languages like Modern Romanian, Old Romanian, Megleno-Romanian, Istro-Romanian, and Aromanian (DacRom) is determined at PF, as a consequence of the conditions that apply to the Spell-Out of chains. The relevant chains are the result of an Agree relation obtained between the [def] feature of the D head and a matching feature of other heads within the DP, such as N and A. I propose that Agree chains are subject to restrictions that are similar to those affecting movement chains, so no new mechanisms need to be posited in order to account for the overt realization of the suffixal definite article in DacRom. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous research on superlatives in Romance languages has established three major types: (i) in Italian and Ibero-Romance, the definite article does not form part of the superlative, except for modal superlatives; (ii) in French, a definite article form functions as a superlative marker in some positions (DP-external, quantity and postnominal superlatives) but not in prenominal superlatives; (iii) in Romanian, the marker cel, historically identical to the strong definite article form, has been generalized as a superlative marker. I investigate the distributional and semantic correlates of this threefold distinction. I argue that in Romanian prenominal superlatives may sit in SpecDP, which explains the availability of relative readings, whereas in types (i) and (ii) they sit in a dedicated SpecSupP position, which is a scope position. Moreover, the existence of an overt marker allows Romanian prenominal superlatives to combine with determiners other than the definite D. The restrictions on the distribution of DP-external and quantity superlatives in type (i) are analyzed using a specific version of Heim’s (1999) raising analysis. Finally, I discuss the consequences of the data of Romance for the general debate concerning relative superlatives.

This paper deals with a hitherto little studied type of superlative, so-called ‘superlative minimizers’, which in Spanish take the form el más mínimo N ‘the slightest N’. Several tests show that these superlatives are non-specific or non-referential, despite their necessarily definite shape. The semantic properties of these expressions cannot be accounted for using the usual tools in theories on definiteness or quantity superlatives. The aim of this work is to provide a compositional analysis that explains several properties of these superlatives, particularly their non-specific nature and restrictions on the type of noun they admit. Assuming a kind-based semantics for nouns and a state-based theory on gradability, I propose that superlative minimizers express uniqueness over state-kinds, thus giving rise to a non-specific meaning of the DP and a quantity meaning, since state-kinds are scalar-ordered in the extensional domain of nouns. As a consequence, this work straddles two lines of research: on the one hand, it broadens our knowledge on quantity superlatives (cf. Hackl 2009, Solt 2012, a.o.) with a new type subject to previously unstudied characteristics; on the other, SMs are a type of the much-studied weak definites (cf. Aguilar-Guevara & Zwarts 2010, Abbott 2014, a.o.).

The usage of the Basque definite and indefinite articles differs significantly from their Romance counterparts. While the definite article is used as a default article for NPs without another determiner, the exact function of the indefinite article in this system has remained somewhat unclear, although specificity has been brought up as a factor. A comparison with Eastern Armenian, which has a threefold definiteness/specificity distinction, in three parallel texts shows that the use of the indefinite article in Basque follows two different systems in different varieties: in the West it is based on discourse prominence and in the East on individuation.

In Romanian, the definite article cannot be overtly realized if the maximal nominal projection contains only the lexical N and occurs in the complement position of (most) accusative-taking prepositions. Arguing that a definite D is present in the underlying syntactic representation, I describe article drop as a PF-phenomenon. I follow Dobrovie-Sorin’s (2007) idea that article drop is conditioned by a complex head formation operation that assigns a X0-status to DPs of the form [D+def N0], but I show that her proposal of extending complex head formation to P is contradicted by the behavior of article drop in coordination. Therefore, I propose a different explanation for the limitation of article drop to the complement of P: based on the fact that article drop also occurs with prepositional case markers (which are K heads rather than Ps), I propose that article drop only occurs when D lacks Case. Underlying this analysis is a novel theory of case marking in Romanian: I propose that inflectional marking involves null Ks that trigger spreading of a Case feature to their complement (following Norris 2014, 2018), whereas prepositional marking involves an overt K and no feature spreading. Prepositions that trigger article drop are assimilated to K heads in that they take a DP, rather than a KP, complement, playing K’s role of closing-off the nominal extended projection.

Copyright of Biuletyn Polskiego Towarzystwa Językoznawczego is the property of Polish Linguistic Society and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The linguistic phenomenon of differential object marking (DOM) has long been recognized as a basis for typological categorization of world languages in terms of how the direct object is case -marked. Yet, DOM in Farsi constitutes a source of contention among linguists. Some of them maintain that DOM actually exists in Farsi where they assert some types of the direct object are case -marked with ―rā,‖ but, on the contrary, others give counterexamples for each instance to prove that is not the case. That is why some Iranian linguists have entirely abandoned the idea of DOM in Farsi and assigned ―rā‖ a new functional role other than an object case -marker. By elucidating the theoretical bases of DOM in general, the present analytical review aims to apply a new approach to how ―rā‖ is used in Farsi sentences with transitive verbs. The approach not only proposes explanations for the aforesaid counterexamples, but also attempts to restore its grammatical role as the case -marker of the direct object to ―rā‖ by introducing a new viewpoint on DOM in Farsi. Thus, by establishing a grammatical role to ―rā‖ as a marker of some kinds of direct objects, the present paper has attempted to redefine DOM in Persian. It is hoped that future corpus -based studies about the relative frequencies of ―rā‖ occurrences in Persian sentences will lend evidential support to this theoretical approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Nasleđe is the property of University of Kragujevac, Faculty of Philology & Arts and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This article investigates the connection and dependence between the definiteness of the totalities involved in mathematical structures and the determinateness of statements about that structure. From a logical perspective, we investigate whether logical principles expressing the definiteness of totalities license the use of classical logic. From a philosophical perspective, this article provides a reconstruction of Solomon Feferman’s claim that the definiteness of the natural number conception implies the determinateness of arithmetical statements and therefore justifies the adoption of classical logic for arithmetical theories. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research tried to investigate a specific case of pronominal enclitic (eš/aš) in colloquial Persian based on functional approach. Two novels including a total of 56,500 words and the data on the internet were used as corpus. A corpus of 110 sentences with the desired structure were extracted. The investigation revealed that the reference of pronominal enclitic is the common and assumed knowledge of interlocutors which might be represented as a proposition in the discourse or activated by an element in the language. The pronominal enclitic is structurally a presupposition trigger and adjuncts (rastaš, haqiqataš, vaqeiataš) are discourse markers. The reference enclitic holds old information and is a specified definite. The predicate following enclitic holds new information and is a specified indefinite. This predicate contains focal information. The third fason singular enclitic appears both as an adjunct and as a clause at the beginning of the sentence and can be omitted. Their semantic and pragmatic function is truth assertion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines a pair of classifiers in Longdu which show overt definiteness marking. In Longdu, the classifier pair nɛɪː¹¹ and ɑ⁵⁵ gives rise to an indefinite and a definite interpretation respectively. This pair of classifiers is compatible with nouns that denote discrete entities (e.g., apples) or homogeneous substances (e.g., water). The resulting [CLF - N] phrase expresses an accumulation of entities or substances with an underspecified number or amount. I call them ‘fuzzy’ classifiers, referring to the lack of precise quantity specification. The explicit definiteness marking in this pair of ‘fuzzy’ classifiers provides a valuable glimpse into the definiteness of classifiers when embedded in different kinds of nominal phrases. I present data showing that the indefinite and definite fuzzy classifiers in Longdu have different properties with respect to the licensing of NP-ellipsis, reduplication, and modification. Only the indefinite fuzzy classifier can license NP-ellipsis and reduplicate, while only the definite fuzzy classifier can appear in a [bare modifier - CLF - N] phrase. I will present evidence which suggests that the presence of two kinds of classifiers with definiteness contrast can be a phenomenon that spans over other Chinese varieties. All Longdu data presented here were gathered in my own fieldwork. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we present some results obtained in the theory of geodesic mappings of surfaces. It is well known that a mapping that is both conformal and geodesic is homothetic. Based on this property, we obtain new results on the definiteness of surfaces with respect to geodesic mappings, which generalize results obtained by V. T. Fomenko. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines definiteness marking in American Norwegian (AmNo), a heritage variety of Norwegian spoken in the US. The description adds another language to the much-studied variation within Scandinavian nominal phrases. It builds on established syntactic analysis of Scandinavian and investigates aspects that are (un)like Norwegian spoken in the homeland. A central finding is that the core syntax of Norwegian noun phrases is retained in AmNo, while the morphophonological spell-out is sometimes different. Indefinite determiners, for example, are obligatory in AmNo, but some speakers produce them with non-homeland-like gender agreement. One systematic change is observed: double definiteness has been partially lost. The typical AmNo modified definite phrase lacks the prenominal determiner that is obligatory for varieties in Norway. I argue that this is a syntactic change which allows the realization of D to be optional. This is a pattern not found in the other Scandinavian languages. At the same time, this innovative structure in AmNo is not like English, the dominant language of the AmNo speakers. This demonstrates heritage language change that is distinct from both the homeland language and the dominant language. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An increasing number of studies have shown that there is a subgroup inside children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) who demonstrates impaired language profiles similar to children with developmental language disorder (DLD). As a discriminative marker, the determiner element is known to be particularly vulnerable in children with DLD, while less is known about the situation in children with ASD who show accompanying language impairment (ALI). The current study therefore investigates whether and how Mandarin-speaking children with DLD and children with ALI differ in their comprehension of definite expressions.To this end, 28 children with suspected DLD (Mean=5;2, SD=0;7), 32 children with ALI (Mean=5;3, SD=0;8), and 28 typically-developing children (Mean=5;3, SD=0;5) participated in the present study. Each child was experimentally tested on a series of picture judgment tasks, in which demonstrative-classifier NPs, third-person pronouns, and bare NPs were examined in the anaphoric environment.The findings showed that neither of the suspected DLD or ALI groups performed at target-like levels on the three definite expressions. This is most likely caused by the two groups’ immature knowledge of the syntax-semantics interface within the DP construction. Nonetheless, there remains a significant difference in the interpretation of third-person pronouns between the suspected DLD and ALI groups, with the worse performance in the latter group presumably resulting from co-morbid processing differences typical of individuals with ASD.

Definiteness has been argued to be difficult for language learners to acquire because the correct usage of definiteness requires the integration of external interfaces that involve linguistic and non-linguistic information. Previous offline studies with heritage speakers have constantly reported difficulties in the use of pragmatically appropriate definite forms. The current study aims to investigate the processing of definiteness in Turkish heritage speakers via a self-paced reading experiment and to compare heritage speakers' reading times and end-of-sentence acceptance percentage to monolingually-raised Turkish speakers. The results of the experiment indicate significant differences between the heritage and monolingually-raised Turkish speakers only in the end-of-sentence acceptance percentage data but not in the reading time data. This difference between the two groups suggests that Turkish heritage speakers perform differently from the monolingually-raised Turkish speakers only in indefinite-specific sentences when they have to use their metalinguistic knowledge. These results show that heritage speakers experience vulnerability/difficulty when they have to integrate external interfaces in indefinite-specific sentences but not in definite-specific sentences.

This paper presents an account of a Sakhalin Ainu (also Enciw'itah, isolate, Russia and Japan) construction that semantically encodes an agent-patient interaction and that is characterized morphosyntactically by the expression of the agent with an oblique. In the analysis to follow, this construction is named 'impersonal passive' by analogy with a structurally and functionally similar construction attested in the Southern Hokkaidō dialects of Ainu. Keeping the main focus on eastern dialects, the paper takes a primarily semantic approach to the East Sakhalin Ainu impersonal passive and underlines a number of striking structural differences with the Hokkaidō counterpart. In addition, it will be argued that in the north-eastern dialects of Sakhalin Ainu, the impersonal passive can be described as an object-individuation construction (oic), which marks a patient object as referential and definite and has the pragmatic extension of overtly flagging the topicality of this object at the discourse level. As such, the oic compensates for the lack or non-obligatoriness of overt marking for definiteness and topicality in Sakhalin Ainu. The present paper adds to our knowledge on the still under-described Sakhalin variety of Ainu and to our understanding of the verbal and nominal semantics of Ainu more generally, which to date remains a largely unexplored topic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nung (Tai, Kra-Dai) is a numeral-classifier language that contains the Classifier-Noun (cl-n, or 'bare classifier') construction. Drawing on Langacker's Cognitive Grammar (Langacker 1987, 2004, 2008, 2017) (CG), I argue that the use of a Nung cl-n phrase is only possible when it refers to a unique instance in the current discourse frame of the current discourse space. This explains why cl-n phrases show a definite-like meaning contrast with other types of nominal phrases (NPs) in Nung, as well as why Nung cl-n phrases can be interpreted as either specific or non-specific indefinite. This paper makes two theoretical contributions. Firstly, it shows that the existing theory of numeral classifiers within CG, which is based on the unitization function of numeral classifiers, is not sufficient to account for the meaning contrast between cl-n and other types of NP in Nung. Secondly, given that a referent that exists in the current discourse frame need not exist in the actual world or pre-exist in the discourse, this paper illustrates how a referent can satisfy a presupposition of uniqueness without satisfying a presupposition of existence in the actual world or in the discourse. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The internal structure of the DP has long been a topic of debate in the study of Modern Standard Arabic. This is due not only to the comprehensive agreement in ϕ-features, Case, and definiteness between the adjective and its head noun, but also to the difference in meaning depending on the relative placement of the adjective in relation to the noun within the DP. Previous studies have proposed two distinct basic structures for Arabic DPs, employing the notions of Agree or Feature Checking. However, these operations do not necessarily trigger the displacement of syntactic objects in the derivation, nor do they adequately capture the correlation of semantic patterns with their relevant syntactic derivations. This paper argues instead that both patterns of the Arabic DP can be derived from a unified syntactic structure and treats the agreement in definiteness differently from that of ϕ-features and Case. The presence or absence of agreement in definiteness, considering two possible positions of the adjective and their interpretations of the DP, are accounted for in terms of the parametric variations of the feature on the head D within the framework of the Minimalist Program. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The neuter interrogative pronouns el qué and lo qué alternate with qué 'what' in conversational Spanish in certain contexts and types of wh-questions (e.g., – No me lo puedo creer – ¿No te puedes creer qué/el qué/lo qué?). This paper describes geographical, register and social variation in the use of el qué and lo qué and analyses the interpretive and distributional properties of these complex forms. Building on corpus data and speakers' judgements, it is shown that the form el qué is common to all Spanish dialects and is used in all registers and at all social levels, whereas lo qué is only found in Spain, Argentina and Uruguay: in Spain and Argentina, this form belongs to lower class people with little education and speakers in rural areas; in Uruguay, it does not have a social bias and occurs in both formal and informal situations. It is also argued that el qué and lo qué are used to indicate that the target of the question is identifiable in the context of utterance, and it is thus claimed that el and lo in el qué and lo qué are overt definiteness markers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper seeks to examine different functions of the augment in Cigogo (G11), a Bantu language spoken in central Tanzania. The data were collected through translational questionnaires, audio-recording of oral texts, and native speakers' grammaticality judgements of Cigogo texts. The analysis is guided by Lyons' (1999) theory of definiteness. The findings establish that the augment performs various linguistic and communicative roles in Cigogo. These include signalling definiteness, specificity, and anaphoric reference. It is further established that the augment functions as a topic marker in topicalized constructions. These findings contribute to the typological literature on the functions of the augment in Bantu languages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Idiomatic verb phrases (e.g., kick the bucket, fig. 'to die') vary in their syntactic flexibility: they can undergo operations like, e.g., passivization (“The bucket was kicked”) to varying degrees. We (re-)consider potential sources of this variability. It has been proposed that compositionality influences syntactic flexibility of idioms. In the first part of the paper, we reassess this finding from a methodological perspective by replicating earlier experiments on German and English, in which we change the previously used – and potentially biased – methods of measuring compositionality. Our results for German are compatible with the view that higher compositionality makes some of the tested structures more acceptable (most consistently: scrambling, prefield fronting, and which-questions), while we do not find a connection between compositionality and flexibility for English. In the second part of the paper, we present an additional experiment following up on the German findings. We extend the empirical domain and explore factors which – in contrast to compositionality – have the potential of explaining the syntactic flexibility of both idioms and non-idioms. We find that definiteness influences the flexibility of idioms and non-idioms in similar ways, supporting the view that both types of expressions are subject to the same grammatical rules. We discuss referentiality as a potential underlying semantic source for the behavior of both idioms and non-idioms.

It is well known that German and Dutch have productive diminutive morphology. What is much less discussed is the fact that several other Germanic languages do not have such productive morphology, notably the Scandinavian languages. Instead, these languages form compounds to express a diminutive meaning. This paper addresses the puzzle of why the Scandinavian languages do not have productive diminutive morphology. The paper argues that the culprit is the particular definite suffix that the Scandinavian languages have. This is a postnominal definite suffix that occupies a low position in the nominal functional spine. It is argued that the presence of this suffixed article accounts for the lack of productive synthetic diminutive formation in these languages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigates the second language (L2) acquisition of a constraint on definiteness in Japanese floating numeral quantifiers (NQs) by native English and Korean speakers. The constraint arises because of the specific structural relation between a floating NQ and its associated noun, resulting in an obligatorily indefinite interpretation. The indirect – or, covert – encoding of definiteness in this structure allows investigation of predictions based on the cline of difficulty proposed by Cho and Slabakova (2014), whereby L2 acquisition of a covert property may be facilitated if the first language (L1) expresses the relevant feature overtly. English is such a language, having overt morphology to express definiteness, whereas Korean has floating NQs that are obligatorily, and covertly, indefinite, as in Japanese. Sensitivity to definiteness in Japanese floating NQs was measured using an acceptability judgement task. Although both L1-Korean and L1-English speakers of Japanese showed sensitivity to the constraint at group level, follow-up analyses suggested that the Korean group had more consistent knowledge. We argue that the complexity of the acquisition task – which was greater for the English-speakers than the Korean-speakers – played a bigger role in attainment than overt versus covert encoding of the relevant feature in the L1. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]