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Conference Paper: An OT model of case marking in Fore
Title | An OT model of case marking in Fore |
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Authors | |
Issue Date | 2013 |
Citation | The 7th Annual International Free Linguistics Conference (FLC 2013), Hong Kong, China, 27-28 September 2013 How to Cite? |
Abstract | This paper addresses a complex interaction of morphology, syntax and pragmatics and proposes a formal model to account for such phenomena. In particular, I present and discuss data from Fore, a Papuan language, which is both head- and dependent-marking. In head-marking (pro-drop) languages when both arguments of a transitive verb are third person, there is a potential ambiguity as to the identity of the subject and object. In Fore, this potential ambiguity is avoided by adding NPs to the clause and a few apparent strategies for distinguishing the core arguments may be observed: these include appealing to a ‘default’ interpretation based on the (relative) animacies of the arguments, word order freezing, and case marking (Donohue & Donohue 1998). These phenomena have a natural explanation in terms of the markedness of associations between animacy and grammatical function, but such functional explanations typically have no place in generative grammar. In this paper, I develop an account of these data that formalizes the intuitive functional explanation within Optimality Theory. I make use of harmonic alignment of universal prominence scales following Aissen (1999, 2003) to define the contexts, ‘floating’ constraints to model the optionality of case marking, and use comprehension-directed bidirectional optimization to model the general interpretive principle of ambiguity avoidance. Keywords: case-marking, Fore, Optimality Theory. References: Aissen, Judith. 1999. Markedness and subject choice in Optimality Theory. Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 17: 673–711. Aissen, Judith. 2003. Differential object marking: Iconicity vs. economy. Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 21: 435–483. Donohue, Cathryn, and Mark Donohue. 1998. Fore case marking. Language and Linguistics in Melanesia 28 (1-2): 69–98. |
Description | Individual Papers no. 51 |
Persistent Identifier | http://hdl.handle.net/10722/202127 |
DC Field | Value | Language |
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dc.contributor.author | Donohue, CJ | en_US |
dc.date.accessioned | 2014-08-21T08:04:56Z | - |
dc.date.available | 2014-08-21T08:04:56Z | - |
dc.date.issued | 2013 | en_US |
dc.identifier.citation | The 7th Annual International Free Linguistics Conference (FLC 2013), Hong Kong, China, 27-28 September 2013 | en_US |
dc.identifier.uri | http://hdl.handle.net/10722/202127 | - |
dc.description | Individual Papers no. 51 | - |
dc.description.abstract | This paper addresses a complex interaction of morphology, syntax and pragmatics and proposes a formal model to account for such phenomena. In particular, I present and discuss data from Fore, a Papuan language, which is both head- and dependent-marking. In head-marking (pro-drop) languages when both arguments of a transitive verb are third person, there is a potential ambiguity as to the identity of the subject and object. In Fore, this potential ambiguity is avoided by adding NPs to the clause and a few apparent strategies for distinguishing the core arguments may be observed: these include appealing to a ‘default’ interpretation based on the (relative) animacies of the arguments, word order freezing, and case marking (Donohue & Donohue 1998). These phenomena have a natural explanation in terms of the markedness of associations between animacy and grammatical function, but such functional explanations typically have no place in generative grammar. In this paper, I develop an account of these data that formalizes the intuitive functional explanation within Optimality Theory. I make use of harmonic alignment of universal prominence scales following Aissen (1999, 2003) to define the contexts, ‘floating’ constraints to model the optionality of case marking, and use comprehension-directed bidirectional optimization to model the general interpretive principle of ambiguity avoidance. Keywords: case-marking, Fore, Optimality Theory. References: Aissen, Judith. 1999. Markedness and subject choice in Optimality Theory. Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 17: 673–711. Aissen, Judith. 2003. Differential object marking: Iconicity vs. economy. Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 21: 435–483. Donohue, Cathryn, and Mark Donohue. 1998. Fore case marking. Language and Linguistics in Melanesia 28 (1-2): 69–98. | en_US |
dc.language | eng | en_US |
dc.relation.ispartof | Annual International Free Linguistics Conference, FLC 2013 | en_US |
dc.title | An OT model of case marking in Fore | en_US |
dc.type | Conference_Paper | en_US |
dc.identifier.email | Donohue, CJ: donohue@hku.hk | en_US |
dc.identifier.authority | Donohue, CJ=rp01762 | en_US |
dc.identifier.hkuros | 233290 | en_US |