Subject raising in Zulu and the nature of PredP

Buell, Leston; Dreu, Merijn de

doi:10.1515/tlr-2013-0013

Cited by 10 publications

(14 citation statements)

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“…For example, expletive constructions in Zulu are similar to semantic locative inversion constructions in important respects: all arguments of the verb remain inside the νP and therefore appear post-verbally; none of these arguments can be object-marked or relativized; transitive expletive constructions are acceptable for many Zulu speakers; and expletive constructions with predicate-internal arguments cannot be formed with non-verbal predicates (cf. Buell 2008;Buell and de Dreu 2013;Halpert 2012;Zeller 2008). Given these parallels, it is worthwhile to consider the hypothesis that in expletive constructions, the νP/VP is also selected by Pr.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…6 Importantly, how-6 The segmental copulative morpheme has three allomorphs in Zulu (ng(a)-, y(i)-and w(u)-). There is also a non-segmental copula which is expressed with a depressor tone (breathy voice) on the initial syllable of the nominal predicate (Buell 2008;Buell and de Dreu 2013). The situation is more complex with negated nominal predicate constructions, which involve the use of pronominal forms in addition to the nominal predicate.…”

Section: (28) A-ba-fundimentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Crucially, none of these constructions involves a verbal copula. See van der Spuy (2001), Buell (2008) and Buell and de Dreu (2013) for detailed discussion of non-verbal predication in Zulu.…”

Section: (28) A-ba-fundimentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Copulative particles are phonological realizations of Pr. According to this proposal, which has been adopted for Zulu in Zeller (2012) and Buell and de Dreu (2013), the syntax of non-verbal predication in Bantu does not include a verb or verbal projection. (30) represents the structure underlying the example in (27): (30) (30) shows that the argument of a non-verbal predicate is introduced in [Spec, Pr] and moves to [Spec, T] to become the grammatical subject.…”

Section: (28) A-ba-fundimentioning

confidence: 99%

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Locative inversion in Bantu and predication

Zeller

2013

Linguistics

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In generative grammar, locative inversion in Bantu languages is typically analyzed in terms of A-movement of the locative from a VP-internal position to the subject position. I present an alternative analysis, according to which the locative subject-DP is introduced above the νP/VP, in the specifier of a functional category whose head selects the νP/VP as its complement. I suggest that this category is Pr (for "predication"), i.e., the same category that also introduces the subject argument of adjectival or nominal predicates in non-verbal predication constructions (see Bowers 1993, and especially Baker 2003a for Bantu). In locative inversion, Pr establishes a non-canonical predication relation between a νP/ VP that expresses a state or event, and a DP that denotes the location of which this state/event is predicated as a property. My analysis is developed on the basis of a detailed discussion of "semantic" locative inversion in the Bantu language Zulu (Buell 2007), a construction in which the inverted subject-DP is not formally marked as a locative, but receives its interpretation solely by virtue of the locative semantics of its head noun.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: (28) A-ba-fundimentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: (28) A-ba-fundimentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: (28) A-ba-fundimentioning

confidence: 99%

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Locative inversion in Bantu and predication

Zeller

2013

Linguistics

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“…The neuter subject pronoun in these languages can only refer to people when the predicate is nominal, as shown in (25) In this way, Zulu noun class 17 subject agreement is taken to correspond to the use of het and ce as subjects in Dutch and French. As argued in Buell (2012) and Buell & De Dreu (2011), the subject agreement in (23a) is triggered by a^ro with noun class 17 features, and the logical subject is in a position higher than the canonical subject position. More precisely, then, it is this noun class 17 pro that corresponds to Dutch het and French ce.…”

Section: Use As Subject Of Nominal Predicationmentioning

confidence: 79%

Neuter gender in a sexless language

Dreu

Buell²

2012

AVT

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In some Germanic languages, neuter gender is used both as a lexical gender and for certain grammatical functions, while in Romance languages, neuter gender is only employed for grammatical functions. Zulu, a Bantu language, has a much more elaborate noun class system than those languages, but one not rooted in sex or animacy as in Germanic or Romance. However, it is shown that Zulu noun class 17 is used for the same range of grammatical functions as neuter gender in Indo-European. Specifically, Indo-European neuter gender and Zulu class 17 are used when the referent has no specific noun class properties, for expletive subjects, and as the subject of nominal predication, even when the referent is human. Aside from its use in some languages as a gender for nouns, then, neuter gender can be understood as a cluster of grammatical functions, independently of the way the lexicon is organized.

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The locus of parametric variation in Bantu gender and nominal derivation

Fuchs

Wal

2021

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In this paper, we capture the crosslinguistic variation in Bantu nominal structure in a unified analysis of gender on n (Kramer 2014, 2015). We demonstrate that this analysis accounts for the morphosyntactic properties of basic nouns as well as locative and diminutive derivations. Moreover, it allows us to capture intra- and inter-language morphosyntactic variation by reference to just three parameters – one strictly morphological and two structural. The presence of one or two n heads, and the size of the complement distinguish between different types of locatives (structural variation); the presence or absence of a spell-out rule of adjacent n heads differentiates “stacking” versus “non-stacking” prefixes in diminutive and augmentative derivations (morphological variation only).

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Subject raising in Zulu and the nature of PredP

Cited by 10 publications

References 0 publications

Locative inversion in Bantu and predication

Locative inversion in Bantu and predication

Neuter gender in a sexless language

The locus of parametric variation in Bantu gender and nominal derivation

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