An anti-locality requirement for extraposition from subject

A possessor NP may move out from the Spec position of a containing NP in some Asian languages such as Chinese and Korean, yielding the so-called ‘Possessor Raising Construction’. From the perspective of a syntactic theory based on principles and parameters of Universal Grammar, rather than on differing sets of rules for different particular languages, we in this article argue that the diverse Possessor Raising phenomena can well be subsumed along with ‘Passivization’ and ‘Subject Raising’ under the general syntactic process of ‘NP Movement’. The movement of Possessor Raising is driven by a functional motivation, which is to separate the possessor NP from the possession NP in order to emphasize the former. It has been demonstrated that the operation of Possessor Raising is well under the constraint of UG principles in interaction with independently explainable language-particular properties, in particular, it is mainly determined by the following three factors: (1) Whether the raised possessor NP can be properly Case-marked in its new site; (2) Whether the nominal residue left behind by the NP movement can be Case-marked; and (3) Whether other applicable conditions on movement such as the Subjacency can be satisfied. Most of our arguments are constructed on the basis of the analysis of a whole set of comparable language phenomena from Chinese, Korean and English, and those phenomena, most of which are well observed in the literature, are recast and explained in a very much principled way.

Reviewed by: Phrase structure composition and syntactic dependencies by Robert Frank Caroline Heycock Phrase structure composition and syntactic dependencies. By Robert Frank. (Current studies in linguistics 38.) Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2002. Pp. 324. ISBN 0262062291. $45 (Hb). The content of this book may be viewed in at least two ways. Most straightforwardly, it is an exposition of tree adjoining grammar (TAG) as the formal basis for a theory of syntax. TAG was first defined in Joshi et al. 1975 and has been developed since by Joshi and a number of his students and colleagues, the author having been one of the former. While those with an interest in formal grammars and computational linguistics know TAG from a number of papers that have been written on its formal properties, this book is aimed at syntacticians who do not necessarily have any prior interest in (or belief in the relevance of) the position on the Chomsky hierarchy of the grammar formalism they or others employ. From another angle, this book may be seen as an interesting and original exploration of the notion of locality in syntactic theory—the empirical pervasiveness of such a concept, how it can be reconciled theoretically with unbounded movement, and, most centrally, the claim that it is a fundamental property of the underlying grammatical system. After a brief preface, the book consists of six chapters. Ch. 1 accomplishes two goals. First, it situates TAG within the history of the generative paradigm—a discussion of more than just historical interest, since both TAG and the minimalist program are illuminated by an understanding of their mutual relation via the generalized transformations of Chomsky 1955. Second, it outlines how the formalism works, in particular the two ways in which the finite tree structures called elementary trees can be combined: by substitution and adjunction. The first may be thought of as a way of inserting a subtree into an unexpanded node at the frontier of another tree; the latter allows a subtree to be inserted at any node within another tree. Both operations introduce the possibility of unbounded recursion into the grammar, but in importantly different ways that are explored in the remainder of the book. In this chapter Frank discusses what he calls the fundamental tag hypothesis: that every syntactic dependency is expressed locally within a single elementary tree. For example, dependencies such as the one between a ‘raised subject’ like John and its trace in the lowest object position (or, more theory-neutrally, between the NP and the verb of which it is an argument) in John seems to have been expected to be elected t, or the one between a wh-phrase and its trace in Who do you think that they will say will be allowed t to leave?, are restricted by the nature of the formalism itself to a particular domain (the elementary tree); the apparent unbounded nature of these dependencies can only arise through subsequent adjunction operations introducing one or more subtrees between the head and the tail of the dependency. Having established that elementary trees constitute the domain of locality within the formalism, F argues in Ch. 2 for a particular definition of this domain as the extended projection of a lexical head (Grimshaw 1991) and discusses the formal details of how this can be implemented. Ch. 3 applies the theory as developed up to this point to one well-known and long-discussed syntactic phenomenon, NP-movement or ‘raising’. His goal is to show how a number of limitations on this construction (including the ungrammaticality of ‘superraising’, the position of the associate of expletive there, the absence of raising in nominals and (some) gerunds, and the behavior of predicate nominals) follow from the nature of the formalism itself without recourse to additional principles such as minimalism’s ‘shortest move’, ‘extension condition’, the preference for Merge over Move, and so on. Ch. 4 explores how to characterize crucial properties of elementary trees in the absence of these principles and includes an attempt to adapt Chomsky’s system of feature-checking in a way that is consistent with the TAG framework. It also includes an extensive discussion of how to handle apparent violations of locality...

Section 2 of this paper will put forth a Hungarian sentence structure from which all and only the grammatical orders of the major constituents of a sentence, as well as the interpretation and stress differences of the various permutations are deducible. The sentence structure argued for divides primarily into a topic and a VP, which occupy the specifier and complement positions of a TenseP, respectively. The VP consists of a flat V-initial V’ component, a preverbal focus located in the specifier position of VP, and quantifiers left-adjoined to VP. That is: Section 3 of the paper will point out the differences between the proposed sentence structure and alternative analyses of Hungarian (those in Brody (1990), Horvath (this volume), and Maracz (1990)), and will discuss the empirical evidence supporting the proposed approach.

In this paper I offer an analysis of the DP structure in Bangla (Bengali) based on specificity effects obtained within the DP. I propose that the Bangla DP has a three-layered structure, the layer intermediate between the DP and NP being a QP, based on the position of the Q/Num + Classifier complex in the DP. The specifier of the QP acts as the landing site for specific NPs. This leftward movement, I suggest, is due to a [specificity] feature of the Q head. Kinship Inversion is another instance of DP-internal NP movement which I claim to be driven by the same [specificity] feature of the Q head. These two types of movement out of a nP-shell are instances of overt NP movement inside the DP in Bangla.

Nuu-chah-nulth possessor raising is semantically unrestricted and affects only subjects: subject agreement matches the person and number of the possessor (rather than the possessed subject), and the possessive-marking clitic attaches to the head of the clause (rather than to the possessum). Nuu-chah-nulth possessor raising is analyzed as a syntactic dependency between the possessive clitic in the main clause and the base-generated possessor position within DP. A Possessive Phrase can appear in either the DP or the clausal domain, and the possessive clitic may be generated in either position. When the possessive clitic is generated in the main clause, a possessor may raise out of subject position via feature-driven movement; the Minimal Link Condition prevents such movement from occurring out of object position.

Nuu-chah-nulth possessor raising is semantically unrestricted and affects only subjects: subject agreement matches the person and number of the possessor (rather than the possessed subject), and the possessive-marking clitic attaches to the head of the clause (rather than to the possessum). Nuu-chah-nulth possessor raising is analyzed as a syntactic dependency between the possessive clitic in the main clause and the base-generated possessor position within DP. A Possessive Phrase can appear in either the DP or the clausal domain, and the possessive clitic may be generated in either position. When the possessive clitic is generated in the main clause, a possessor may raise out of subject position via feature-driven movement; the Minimal Link Condition prevents such movement from occurring out of object position. Résumé

Theories of agreement processing typically focus on the mechanisms by which comprehenders relate the morphological features of the agreement-controlling NP and those of the verb. However, agreement is fundamentally a syntactic relation. In this paper, I examine the processing of default agreement with clausal subjects (“[cp That the doctors studied hard] was reassuring”) vs. the processing of agreement with near-synonymous NPs (“[np The fact that the doctors studied hard] was reassuring”). In the NP subject case, there is a syntactic agreement dependency between the head noun fact and the verb was but not in the the CP case. I show that the agreement processing profile for CP subjects differs from those of NP subjects. This suggests that agreement configurations with similar morphology and semantics may be processed using different strategies when embedded in different syntactic structures.

The article deals with the analysis of the grammatical features of Lesya Ukrainka’s individual style. In the focus is the identification of the locative functions in the fairy-drama “The Forest Song”. Locative is defined as a component of the semantic-syntactic structure of a sentence, dependent on a verbal predicate that expresses varieties of spatial meaning. The article argues the notion of syntactic dependency applicability in the analysis of a sentence structure. The study has revealed that the predicates expressing the locative dependency have the correlated semantics in sentence constructions. In the semantic-syntactic structure of sentence constructions, predicates of static semantics, predicates of process, and predicates of action determine the locative’s components. The author lays emphasis on the semantic meanings of the locative's components. They are dependent on the predicates of static semantics, predicates of process, and predicates of action. In the sentence structures of the fairy-drama The Forest Song, most locatives' components express static location, the starting point of movement, a path of movement, and the destination point. The semantic special features of syntactic units represent Lesya Ukrainka’s holistic worldview, indicate her individual style. The locative reflects the world around represented in spatial nominations. The explicit locative component has been recorded in the sentence constructions with predicates of static semantics as well as there are elliptical sentences with the implicit predicate of static semantics. The predicates of process and action predetermine explicit and implicit locative components. It was found that the locative is mainly represented by prepositional case forms. It turns out that the distinctive feature of all sentences with locative components is presence of prepositions as markers of locative dependency. The locative components are presented in two-member and one-member sentences, in elliptical and imperative sentence constructions.

In this chapter, we want to introduce issues of bounding in syntax and the far more controversial issue of bounding in LF. Starting with groundbreaking work by Huang, Kayne, Pesetsky and others, the notion of extraction domain has gained increasing attention in linguistic theory over the past decade. The basic idea in this work is that extraction is only possible from domains which are governed, and that it is in addition constrained by tree geometric properties. Pesetsky (1982) proposed that paths of movement may overlap but must not intersect. More relevant for our concerns is Kayne (1983) where directionality of government is considered as a parametrical option in syntactic theory the chosen value of which (partially) determines extractability. The idea is that a head X can start a g(overnment) projection along which extraction from its minimal maximal projection XP can be licensed. This may take place when a g-projection can be built. In a language like English, where the head takes its complement to the right, a g-projection can be built along the lines of positions which are on the right branches with respect to a governing element. Thus, extraction from object position and positions inside an object position is predicted to be licit. Extraction from the subject position, however, is not possible because a g-projection cannot be built beyond the subject position, since the subject is on a left branch. With this machinery Kayne could derive hitherto unexplained subject/object asymmetries in English and in the Romance languages. Chomsky’s (1986a) Barriers-system is in this spirit insofar as every maximal category is taken to be a potential bounding node (a barrier) for syntactic movement and that there are several options for circumventing barrierhood. It differs from Kayne’s work, however, in not taking directionality into account. Chomsky’s theory is largely based on θ-government and the availability of intermediate landing sites to avoid the effects of barriers. The classical case of long movement from COMP to COMP is supplemented with an adjunction operation that can apply to XPs which are θ-marked but fail to be L-marked due to the fact that they are not selected by a lexical head. According to Chomsky, I selects and also θ-governs VP but is not a lexical head. VP is then a blocking category (BC) which will turn the next XP up, namely IP, into a barrier. Chomsky provides a mechanism by which the BC-status of VP can be suspended. This mechanism is adjunction to VP. As we shall see, these assumptions do not constrain derivations sufficiently; this becomes particularly clear in languages with a mixed system of governing heads, such as German and Dutch. The work that has assigned movement constraints based on directionality of government a central place in syntactic theory, and, in addition, deals with the intricacies of Dutch and German word order, is Koster’s (1987) theory of Domains and Dynasties. This is the reason why I will take Koster’s work as a starting point for the following discussion.KeywordsMatrix ClauseGifted StudentQuantification DomainScope DomainWide Scope ReadingThese keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.

The development of micro-electro-mechanical systems (MEMS) is a subject of intense research due to the significant impact of miniaturization. The assembly of micro-devices involves handling of parts that are extremely small. A micro-gripper compliant mechanism is one of the key elements in micro-robotics as well as micro-assembly technologies for handling and manipulating micro-objects without damage. Topology optimization has proven to be a power- ful method for the conceptual design of structures and mechanisms. This paper presents topology optimization of three-dimensional micro-gripper compliant mechanism with straight-line path and with parallel movement gripping arms. A three-dimensional finite element analysis model using ANSYS is constructed for the propose design domain. The optimal configuration micro-grippers, which can realize a straight-line path and parallel movement of the gripping arms, are demonstrated.

Three experiments explore effects of rotational axis and velocity on observers' predictions regarding an object's future position, and begin to explore connections between this extrapolation task and representational momentum (RM). In general, observers accept as "correct" positions that are behind the correct extrapolated location, as shown in previous work (Cooper & Munger, 1993; Finke & Shyi, 1998). These prediction distortions are in the opposite direction of typical RM memory distortions, suggesting that these tasks are unrelated. However, new effects of axis for the extrapolation task are reported which parallel axis effects previously observed for RM and mental rotation tasks. Specifically, participants make larger negative distortion errors for axes of rotation that are not coincident with the viewer's coordinate system, as if these paths of rotation are harder to extrapolate. Effects of velocity and axis are examined for RM and extrapolation tasks, and the overall pattern of distortions supports a link. In particular, participants who misremember the location of an object as further along the implied path of motion also accept as "correct" positions relatively further along the extrapolated path of motion, suggesting that these apparently opposite types of errors are indeed related.

Decoding information about dynamically occluded objects in visual cortex

When two vertical short lines are alternately flashed at certain SOAs, a shortening of the apparent path of the stroboscopic movement is perceived. In the experiments reported here, factors influencing the shortening effect were studied with lines created on a CRT display. Experiment 1 was designed to study the effect of SOA. Each stimulus line was always presented for 100 ms, but intervals were varied in the range from 25 to 800 ms. With short and long SOAs almost no shortening illusion was observed, whereas the SOA for optimal stroboscopic motion (200 ms) also produced the largest illusion (ca 16%). This agrees with the classic study by Scholz (1924 Psychologische Forschung5 219 – 272) who found the largest illusion (25%) at the optimal frequency for stroboscopic motion. Experiment 2 dealt with the effect of inversions (I), mirror reflections (M), and rotations (R) of the line during the stroboscopic movement (see Kolars and Pomerantz, 1971 Journal of Experimental Psychology87 99 – 108). The particular movements were signalled by means of a short horizontal line added to one end of each of the two vertical lines of experiment 1. The configurations were (1), signifying parallel motion in one plane; (2), locomotion with rotation around the vertical axis (M); (3), locomotion with rotation around the horizontal axis (I); and (4), locomotion with rotation in the plane of the display (R). In all these conditions, the shortening illusion was significantly larger than in experiment 1. The differences between the four conditions were not statistically significant, but the illusion under condition (1) seemed smaller than in the other three conditions. With SOAs for optimal stroboscopic motion, ‘rotation’ paths tended to appear three-dimensional.

This study examines the Bulgarian motion verb system in terms of what information is typically conveyed by motion verbs in addition to motion itself. The theoretical framework is Talmy’s (1985) typological theory, which divides languages into low-manner verb-framed languages and high-manner satellite-framed languages according to what additional information is typically conflated with motion in a motion event. Bulgarian motion verbs emphasize path of motion to a greater extent than do most other (non-Balkan) Slavic languages. Non-Balkan Slavic languages more often use verbs of motion expressing manner in combination with (satellite) prefixes indicating path, while Bulgarian focuses on verbs which express the path of motion, some of which are Bulgarian innovations. These verbs are often prefixed, but the prefixes may be fused to the root to the extent that an unprefixed form of the verb does not occur, and prefixation here is no longer productive. Typical examples include the frequent use of the path verb izljaza ‘to exit, go out’ when speakers could also use izletja ‘to fly out’ or izmâkna ‘to sneak out’. This variation in the Bulgarian motion verb system brings Bulgarian closer to the other Balkan languages (especially Greek, with its parallel motion event conflation), and is viewed here as a possible instance of Balkan Sprachbund influence.

Four experiments demonstrate that lines indicating path of movement can generate rotational percepts in a multistable motion display that usually produces only horizontal or vertical motion percepts. The properties of the path-of-movement lines are predicted by a neural-network theory of visual perception. Experimental results validate the theory's predictions by demonstrating that movement of the display elements seems to follow an increasing luminance gradient in lines but not bars, and that illusory contours have similar effects. Experimental results also demonstrate that, in a choice between movement along lines drawn parallel or orthogonal to possible motion paths, observers more often see movement along the lines parallel to the motion path. These results suggest modifications to current computational and neurophysiological theories of motion perception.