This book explores the idea that functional categories are the flesh and blood of grammar'. From within the context of the Principles and Parameters framework put forward by Chomsky and others, Jamal Ouhalla develops the argument that much of what we understand by the term grammar and grammatical variation involves functional categories in a crucial way. His main thesis is that most, if not all, of the information which determines the major grammatical processes and relations (movement, agreement, case, etc.) and consequently parametric (or crosslinguistic) variation is associated with functional categories. By identifying parameters with a limited set of lexical properties associated with a well-defined group of functional categories, the book offers a new and highly constrained version of the theory of Lexical Parametrization. Dr Ouhalla begins by identifying a set of lexical properties which distinguish functional categories from substantives, arguing that each of them represents a parameter in its own right. He then goes on to argue on the basis of evidence drawn from a broad range of languages that functional categories, most of which are bound morphemes, behave in important respects like independent syntactic categories, and therefore should be assigned a full categorial status on a par with substantives. The remainder of the book contains detailed discussions of how this conclusion, together with the theory of Lexical Parametrization developed, account naturally for some major typological differences having to do mainly with word order in sentences and noun phrases. Although the various discussions it contains are conducted within the Chomskyan framework, Functional Categories and Parametric Variation is comprehensible to linguists of all theoretical persuasions. It is an original and important contribution to syntactic theory in general.

From within the context of the principles and parameters framework put forward by Chomsky and others, Jamal Ouhalla develops the argument that much of what we understand by the term "grammar" involves functional categories.

Parametric variation in linguistic theory refers to the systematic grammatical variation permitted by the human language faculty. This book is a defence of the parametric approach to linguistic variation, set within the framework of the Minimalist Program.

This monograph is intended as a contribution to the field of bilingualism from a generative syntax perspective at a variety of levels. It investigates code-switching between Korean and English and also between Japanese and English, which exhibit several interesting features. Due to their canonical word order differences, Korean and Japanese being SOV (Subject-Object-Verb) and English SVO (Subject-Verb-Object), a code-switched sentence between Korean/Japanese and English can take, in principle, either OV or VO order, to which little attention has been paid in the literature. On the contrary, word order is one of the most extensively discussed topics in generative syntax, especially in the Principles and Parameter’s approach (P&P) where various proposals have been made to account of various order patterns of different languages. By taking the generative view that linguistic variation is due to variation in the domain of functional categories rather than lexical roots (e.g. Borer 1984; Chomsky 1995), this monograph investigates word order variation in Korean-English and Japanese-English code-switching, with particular attention to the relative placement of the predicate (verb) and its complement (object) in two contrasting word orders, OV and VO, which was tested against Korean-English and Japanese-English bilingual speakers’ introspective judgments. The results provide strong evidence indicating that the distinction between functional and lexical verbs plays a major role in deriving different word orders (OV and VO, respectively) in Korean-English and Japanese-English code-switching, which supports the hypothesis that parametric variation is attributed to differences in the features of a functional category in the lexicon, as assumed in minimalist syntax. In particular, the explanation pursued in this monograph is based on feature inheritance, a syntactic derivational process, which was proposed in recent developments the Minimalist Program. The monograph shows that by studying diverse and creative word order patterns of code-switching, we are at a better disposal to understand how languages are parameterized similarly or differently in a given domain, which is the very topic that generative linguists have pursued for a long time.

This handbook provides a critical guide to the most central proposition in modern linguistics: the notion, generally known as Universal Grammar, that a universal set of structural principles underlies the grammatical diversity of the world's languages. Part I considers the implications of Universal Grammar for philosophy of mind and the philosophy of language, and examines the history of the theory. Part II focuses on linguistic theory, looking at topics such as explanatory adequacy and how phonology and semantics fit into Universal Grammar. Parts III and IV look respectively at the insights derived from UG-inspired research on language acquisition, and at comparative syntax and language typology, while part V considers the evidence for Universal Grammar in phenomena such as creoles, language pathology, and sign language. The book will be a vital reference for linguists, philosophers, and cognitive scientists.

A COMPANION TO CHOMSKY Widely considered to be one of the most important public intellectuals of our time, Noam Chomsky has revolutionized modern linguistics. His thought has had a profound impact upon the philosophy of language, mind, and science, as well as the interdisciplinary field of cognitive science which his work helped to establish. Now, in this new Companion dedicated to his substantial body of work and the range of its influence, an international assembly of prominent linguists, philosophers, and cognitive scientists reflect upon the interdisciplinary reach of Chomsky's intellectual contributions. Balancing theoretical rigor with accessibility to the non-specialist, the Companion is organized into eight sections—including the historical development of Chomsky's theories and the current state of the art, comparison with rival usage-based approaches, and the relation of his generative approach to work on linguistic processing, acquisition, semantics, pragmatics, and philosophy of language. Later chapters address Chomsky's rationalist critique of behaviorism and related empiricist approaches to psychology, as well as his insistence upon a "Galilean" methodology in cognitive science. Following a brief discussion of the relation of his work in linguistics to his work on political issues, the book concludes with an essay written by Chomsky himself, reflecting on the history and character of his work in his own words. A significant contribution to the study of Chomsky's thought, A Companion to Chomsky is an indispensable resource for philosophers, linguists, psychologists, advanced undergraduate and graduate students, and general readers with interest in Noam Chomsky's intellectual legacy as one of the great thinkers of the twentieth century.

Syntax – the study of sentence structure – has been at the centre of generative linguistics from its inception and has developed rapidly and in various directions. The Cambridge Handbook of Generative Syntax provides a historical context for what is happening in the field of generative syntax today, a survey of the various generative approaches to syntactic structure available in the literature and an overview of the state of the art in the principal modules of the theory and the interfaces with semantics, phonology, information structure and sentence processing, as well as linguistic variation and language acquisition. This indispensable resource for advanced students, professional linguists (generative and non-generative alike) and scholars in related fields of inquiry presents a comprehensive survey of the field of generative syntactic research in all its variety, written by leading experts and providing a proper sense of the range of syntactic theories calling themselves generative.

Focuses on French applied linguistics

Grammatical categories (e.g. complementizer, negation, auxiliary, case) are some of the most important building blocks of syntax and morphology. Categorization therefore poses fundamental questions about grammatical structures and about the lexicon from which they are built. Adopting a 'lexicalist' stance, the authors argue that lexical items are not epiphenomena, but really represent the mapping of sound to meaning (and vice versa) that classical conceptions imply. Their rule-governed combination creates words, phrases and sentences - structured by the 'categories' that are the object of the present inquiry. They argue that the distinction between functional and non-functional categories, between content words and inflections, is not as deeply rooted in grammar as is often thought. In their argumentation they lay the emphasis on empirical evidence, drawn mainly from dialectal variation in the Romance languages, as well as from Albanian.

LC number: 2005048395