Featureless Expressions: When Morphophonological Markers Are Absent

Abstract

Ackema and Neeleman (2003) discuss three phenomena that arise in the context of agreement and pronominals: agreement asymmetries, cliticization, and null subjects. They develop a unified analysis for these phenomena, claiming that they all involve a process of weakening within prosodic domains. While we agree with their important insight that the PF interface is responsible for some of these phenomena, we will argue against their weakening analysis. We provide arguments that agreement asymmetries cannot be uniformly analyzed as involving the same processes as phonological cliticization or null subjects. We instead propose that the observed asymmetries arise because of the alternative forms of spelling out features at the PF interface.

Dutch 2nd Singular Prosodic Weakening: Two Rejoinders

“…I have also shown that A&N's arguments, to the effect that the presence versus absence of -t is conditioned by an ''initial prosodic phrase,'' are not compelling. In general terms, these conclusions support objections to A&N's framework made by Benmamoun and Lorimer (2006) on the basis of Modern Standard Arabic. However, B&L's use of facts regarding Dutch d-weakening verbs to support their objections rests on a misinterpretation of those facts.…”

“…In their rejoinder to A&N, Benmamoun and Lorimer (2006) reach a conclusion similar to the one reached here, although they do so mainly by examining Modern Standard Arabic. They briefly discuss A&N's proposal about Modern Dutch, objecting to the narrow range of just the single morphological form of 2sg.…”

Closest conjunct agreement in head final languages

“…Haskell and MacDonald 2005, Franck et al 2002, 2006, Benmamoun and Lorimor 2006). Thus agreement takes place in two steps: first in the syntax and then in the PF.…”

Complementizer Agreement and the T0‐Φ Parameter in Jordanian Arabic

“…On the other hand, in an SVO clause the verb displays full agreement (i.e. in person, gender, and number) as (7b) below demonstrates (see Fassi Fehri 1993, Mohammad 2000, Benmamoun 2000, Benmamoun & Lorimor 2006, Soltan 2007, Aoun et al 2010and Jarrah 2019 Additionally, as is the case in other Arabic varieties, JA has grammatical gender. All nouns of the language bear either masculine or feminine gender.…”

“…On the other hand, in an SVO clause the verb displays full agreement (i.e. in person, gender, and number) as (7b) below demonstrates (see Fassi Fehri , Mohammad , Benmamoun , Benmamoun & Lorimor , Soltan , Aoun et al . and Jarrah ) (the following examples are taken from Musabhien :23).…”