DP ellipsis in Tongan: is syntactic ergativity real?

Otsuka, Yuko

doi:10.1007/s11049-010-9096-y

Cited by 4 publications

(13 citation statements)

References 36 publications

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“…Finally, Otsuka (2006) challenges the Ergative Parameter by arguing that Tongan displays syntactic ergativity inĀ extraction, but ergative in Tongan is not an inherent case. She proposes that syntactic ergativity arises in a portion of the grammar when that portion contains case-sensitive syntactic rules (Otsuka 2006(Otsuka , 2010. In the next section, I expand on this view; in the remainder of this section, I present a new argument that it must be taken seriously.…”

Section: Challenges and Alternativesmentioning

confidence: 98%

“…The implicational relationship is plausibly as follows: 4,5 (12) Restrictions on absolutives in nonfinite clauses → Restrictions onĀ extraction of ergatives → Ergativity in case/agreement At least two related grammatical ingredients need to be recognized, then, beyond ergative morphology, to explain the contrast between Dyirbal (with ergative behavior both inĀ extraction and in nonfinite clauses) and West Greenlandic (with ergative behavior only inĀ extraction). Further conclusions of this type may be necessary for other reported instances of syntactic ergativity, such as coreference in coordinated clauses (Dixon 1979, Otsuka 2010. The first parts of this article are devoted to the analysis of this range of facts.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 93%

“…The major premise of Otsuka's (2006Otsuka's ( , 2010 analysis of syntactic ergativity in Tongan is that syntactic rules apart from those assigning case may nevertheless make reference to case values. For syntactic ergativity inĀ movement, the crucial rules in her system are those that match case features on C heads against the wh-DPs they seek to attract.…”

Section: Syntactic Ergativity Without Inherent Ergativementioning

confidence: 99%

“…This is the situation, for instance, in the Peruvian language Shipibo (Panoan) (Valenzuela 2002, Baker 2014. In Section 4, drawing on ideas from Otsuka (2006Otsuka ( , 2010, Bobaljik (2008), and Preminger (2014), I present an alternative view of syntactic ergativity inĀ extraction that can account for the Shipibo facts without requiring that ergative be an inherent case. One consequence of this view is that a ban on Pure head-marking language: a language with an overt morphological agreement system but not an overt morphological case system wh-agreement: a special form of agreement indexing an A-extracted argument Antiagreement: a special absence of agreement, or appearance of default agreement, found when the argument expected to control agreement has A-extracted ergative extraction is expected only in languages with ergative morphological case systems-not, for instance, in ergatively aligned pure head-marking languages.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Syntactic Ergativity: Analysis and Identification

Deal

2016

Annu. Rev. Linguist.

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Some languages showing morphological ergativity in case and/or agreement also show ergative patterns in core syntactic domains-syntactic ergativity. The most-studied type of syntactic ergativity is a ban on theĀ movement of ergative subjects; an additional type concerns the distribution of absolutives in nonfinite clauses. This article first presents the standard view of syntactic ergativity, which is closely connected to the treatment of ergative as an inherent case. Evidence from Shipibo suggests that a ban on erga-tiveĀ extraction does not require inherent ergative. This points to a view of syntactic ergativity centered around morphological case discrimination. One consequence is that pure head-marking languages cannot feature a true ban on ergative extraction, because ergative morphological case is not in use. This conclusion highlights the challenging tasks of diagnosing extraction restrictions in pure head-marking languages, as in the Mayan and Salish families, and of distinguishing extraction restrictions from instances where extraction merely interacts with agreement. A variety of crosslinguistic evidence suggests that agreement/extraction interactions are fully possible in morphologically ergative languages, and not only for ergative arguments. Special morphology in the context of transitive subject extraction is therefore not necessarily evidence of syntactic ergativity.

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Section: Challenges and Alternativesmentioning

confidence: 98%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 93%

Section: Syntactic Ergativity Without Inherent Ergativementioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Syntactic Ergativity: Analysis and Identification

Deal

2016

Annu. Rev. Linguist.

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“…18 18 For further discussion on the difference between the two types of coordination reduction, see Otsuka 2010. …”

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confidence: 99%

PRO Versus Null SE: Case, Tense, and Empty Categories in Tongan

Otsuka¹

2011

Syntax

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Abstract. This paper examines the null arguments occurring in adverbial ‘o‐clauses in Tongan, whose characteristics are distinct from other kinds of empty categories attested in the language. I argue (a) that the empty category in question should be understood as a phonetically null SE anaphor and (b) that local‐ and medium‐distance binding of SE anaphors must be licensed by Agree with the functional category that assigns the primary case (i.e., T in accusative languages and v in ergative languages). The study also observes that ‘o‐clauses are similar to telic to‐clauses in English as well as control subjunctives in Balkan languages in that they contain anaphoric tense, and suggests that some instances of what has been regarded as PRO in the literature might be better understood as an instance of a null SE.

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Deriving VOS from VSO in Tongan

Polinsky¹,

Potsdam²

2021

Polynesian Syntax and Its Interfaces

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Research on word order has established several possible ways in which VOS order can be derived from VSO order. This chapter considers the derivational relationship between VSO and VOS in the Polynesian language Tongan. VSO order is basic in Tongan, and we address the derivation of VOS from this basic order in the context of multiple possibilities. We argue that Tongan VOS is better analyzed as rightward displacement of the subject as opposed to leftward displacement of the object proposed by Otsuka (2005a,c). The clause-final subject shows many of the hallmarks of rightward movement, including information-structural restrictions, locality with respect to the matrix clause, lack of clitic doubling, and connectivity with respect to case and binding. Given that rightward movement has an uneasy place in syntactic theory, we take pains to establish that the analysis is successful and worth further scrutiny.

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DP ellipsis in Tongan: is syntactic ergativity real?

Cited by 4 publications

References 36 publications

Syntactic Ergativity: Analysis and Identification

Syntactic Ergativity: Analysis and Identification

PRO Versus Null SE: Case, Tense, and Empty Categories in Tongan

Deriving VOS from VSO in Tongan

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