The Generative Enterprise Revisited
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The Generative Enterprise Revisited
Spanning more than two decades of thinking about generative approaches to Universal Grammar, the two interviews with Noam Chomsky in this book permit a rare and illuminating insight into his views on numerous issues in linguistics and beyond. The first discussion dates from the early days of the so-called Government Binding Theory, the second one took place after a decade of Minimalism. Thereby the evolution and the dynamics in linguistic theorizing are dramatically revealed. Scholars of grammar, cognitive scientists, philosophers will profit by reading this book, but anyone with an ardent interest in this marvellous, eminently human achievement of evolution called language will want to read about it in the words of the undisputed grand master of linguistic research, Noam Chomsky.
Syntactic Reconstruction and Proto-Germanic
Author: George Walkden
language: en
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
Release Date: 2014
This book offers reconstructions of various syntactic properties of Proto-Germanic, including verb position in main clauses, the syntax of the wh-system, and the (non-)occurrence of null pronominal subjects and objects. Although previous studies have looked at the lexical and phonological reconstruction of Proto-Germanic, little is currently known about the syntax of the language, and it has even been argued that the reconstruction of syntax is impossible. Dr Walkden uses extensive evidence from the early Germanic languages - Old English, Old High German, Old Saxon, Old Norse, and Gothic - to show that syntactic reconstruction is not only possible but also profitable. He argues that while the reconstruction of syntax differs from lexical-phonological reconstruction due to the so-called 'correspondence problem', this is not insurmountable. In fact, the approach taken in current Minimalist theories, in which syntactic variation is attributed to the properties of lexical items, opens the door for syntactic reconstruction as lexical reconstruction. The book also discusses practical solutions for circumventing the correspondence problem, in particular the use of both distributional properties of lexical items and the phonological forms of such items in order to establish cognacy. The book will be of interest to historical linguists working on syntactic reconstruction and the Germanic languages, from graduate level upwards, as well as to advanced students of syntactic change more generally.
The Limits of Syntactic Variation
Author: Theresa Biberauer
language: en
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
Release Date: 2008-09-17
Against the background of the past half century’s typological and generative work on comparative syntax, this volume brings together 16 papers considering what we have learned and may still be able to learn about the nature and extent of syntactic variation. More specifically, it offers a multi-perspective critique of the Principles and Parameters approach to syntactic variation, evaluating the merits and shortcomings of the pre-Minimalist phase of this enterprise and considering and illustrating the possibilities opened up by recent empirical and theoretical advances. Contributions focus on four central topics: firstly, the question of the locus of variation, whether the attested variation may plausibly be understood in parametric terms and, if so, what form such parameters might take; secondly, the fate of one of the most prominent early parameters, the Null Subject Parameter; thirdly, the matter of parametric clusters more generally; and finally, acquisition issues.