Arabic verbless sentences is there a null VP?

Abstract

ResumenEste trabajo pretende describir y analizar el fenómeno de la ausencia de verbo copulativo en tiempo presente en las oraciones sin verbo en árabe. Por regla general, se asume que, en árabe, las oraciones sin verbo contienen un verbo copulativo nulo o elidido. Este estudio rebate dicho supuesto y propone que, en consonancia con las bases de la sintaxis minimista (expresadas inicialmente en Chomsky 1993Chomsky , 1995, las oraciones sin verbo revelan ausencia de V y, por lo tanto, de VP. La razón es que la estructura objeto de estudio presenta dos posibilidades para expresar el tiempo presente: una mediante la ausencia de verbo, y otra que conlleva la presencia de verbo copulativo con fl exión de tiempo.Palabras clave: oración sin verbo, verbo copulativo nulo, predicación, caso. AbstractThe aim of this paper is to describe and analyze the absence of present tense verbal copula in Arabic verbless sentences. The Standard assumption is that Arabic verbless sentences contain a null or deleted copula. The present study argues contra this assumption. It proposes, building on the framework of minimalist syntax (fi rst proposed by Chomsky 1993Chomsky , 1995, that there is no V and hence no VP in verbless sentences since the relevant construction has two alternatives to express the present tense interpretation: one is achieved without a verb and the other with a verb (copula) infl ected for tense.Keywords: Verbless sentence, null copula, predication, Case. RésuméLe but de cet exposé est de décrire et d'examiner l'absense des verbes de connexion dans les phrases arabiques sans verbes. La supposition habituelle est que les phrase arabiques contiennent un verbe de connexion insignifi ant ou supprimé. Les études récentes sont contre cette supposition. Ils suggèrent, en se basant sur le cadre de la syntaxe minimaliste(d'abbord avancé par Chomsky 1993,1995) qu'il n'y a pas de V et donc de VP dans les phrases sans verbes,car la construction approprié a deux façon alternatives d'exprimer l'interprétation du temps au present. L'un est accompli sans le verbe et l'autre avec un verbe infl échi pour le temps.

An Agree-based Approach to Structural Case Assignment in Najrani Arabic

“…According to Al-Rahawi (2007), a nominal sentence can either be a verbless sentence or one with SVO word order. A verbless sentence is viewed by Al-Horais (2006) as "a sentence with the absence of an overt verbal copula in the present tense which is traditionally called, by the Arab grammarians, al-Jumlah al-ismiyah 'the Nominal Sentence' " (p. 102).…”

“…Structural Case assignment in verbless sentences is also discussed by modern Arab linguists such as Fass Fehri (1993); Benmamoun (2000); Fakih (2006);and Al-Horais (2006), among others. Let us quote Al-Horais' example in (1) and his tree-diagram in (2) for further illustration.…”

Fi in Gulf Pidgin Arabic

“…(Naess 2008:89, (12b Finally, there is a use of fi as a copula verb or marker of predication (Smart 1990:100-102, Naess 2008:81-83, Bakir 2010. We take a copula to be a verbal form that syntactically connects a subject with a predicate (see Al-Horais, 2005:102, Aoun et al 2010. The examples below show fi linking a subject with non-verbal predicates: an adjectival predicate, (25a,b,c), adverbial predicate, (25d), and a nominal predicate, (25e).…”

What does it take to be a copula?

“…(i) Copular sentences are analysed as bi-clausal Raising-constructions, in which the main clause has a rich left periphery but a poor functional layer (Heycock 1994;Heycock and Kroch 1998;Starke 1995;Den Dikken 1997); Copular predicates select a small clause with a lexical layer (AP, NP, PP) (Stowell 1981(Stowell , 1983(Stowell , 1991, surmounted by a rich functional layer, PiP (see Citko 2007Citko , 2008and Dalmi 2010and Dalmi , 2011and Dalmi , 2012and Dalmi , 2013and Dalmi , 2015, in which the case and agreement features of non-verbal predicates must be licensed via Cyclic Agree (see Bejar and Rezac 2009). Small clauses have no left periphery at all (see Bowers 1993Bowers , 2001Starke 1995;Den Dikken 1997;2006;Rothstein 2001Rothstein , 2004Adger and Ramchand 2003 for details).…”