Word Order Matters

Word order and syntactic structure are intertwined. Cross-linguistically, focus, clefts and topic can be located in sentence left-periphery or elsewhere. Syntactic derivations may be freed from lexical features. Reason clauses are accountable within the theory of relativization. Gradient acceptability is a crucial tool for linguistic evaluation.

This book contains a selection of papers on issues of current interest in syntax and morpho-syntax. Most topics pertain to the question of the relation between word order and syntactic structure. The discussion starts with a proposal of extending the theory of relativization to reason clauses. It continues with the analysis of the realization of focus in Basque and the discussion of current views on the syntax of cleft constructions. Next, an inquiry into the rigidity of sentence left-periphery is offered in a cross-linguistic perspective. The two final contributions discuss feature-free derivations in syntax applied to a single morpho-syntactic problem, and the question of gradient acceptability of Polish sentences featuring possessive items in the context of the competition between their reflexive and pronominal forms.

Autorentext

Przemyslaw Tajsner is professor of linguistics at the Adam Mickiewicz University (AMU), Poznañ, Poland. His major research area is the interface of information structure and syntax, but his interests extend to comparative linguistics, minimalist syntax and biolinguistics.

Jacek Witkos is a professor of linguistics at AMU, with a record of research in English/Polish comparative morpho-syntax from the generative and minimalist perspective. He has published on a variety of topics, including wh-movement and its reconstruction, negation, control, reflexives and distribution and properties of pronouns.

Inhalt

syntax - morpho-syntax - comparative linguistics - minimalism - word order - reason clauses - relative clauses - focus - topic - cleft sentences - information structure - left-periphery - sentence cartography - lexical features - derivation - phase - introspective judgments - gradient acceptability - reflexives - pronouns