The Definite Marker in Arabic: Morphological realization of the syntactic head D or a [DEF] feature

Abstract

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt from the text:In Arabic, the definite marker can render a noun phrase (NP) definite and it appears as a proclitic on adjectives that modify a definite NP (a phenomenon known as definiteness agreement). Arabic also has a complex adjectival construction known as Construct State Adjective (CSA) that also exhibits the definiteness agreement property. Moreover, in cardinal number constructions in Standard Arabic, the definite marker appears as a proclitic on both the numeral and the enumerated noun (another case for definiteness agreement). This CSA construction and cardinal number constructions are interesting in that definiteness agreement is optional as opposed to the canonical cases of noun-adjective constructions (with post nominal adjectives) where definiteness agreement is obligatory. This paper argues that, given these facts about definiteness agreement, it is more plausible to treat the definite marker whish appears on nominal heads as the realization of the syntactic D head while the definite marker appearing on adjectival and nominal complements as a [DEF] feature added at PF.