Serial verb constructions and the syntax-prosody interface
Publication Date
2022-02Journal Title
Natural Language and Linguistic Theory
ISSN
0167-806X
Publisher
Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Volume
40
Issue
1
Pages
285-306
Language
en
Type
Article
This Version
VoR
Metadata
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Tyler, M., & Kastner, I. (2022). Serial verb constructions and the syntax-prosody interface. Natural Language and Linguistic Theory, 40 (1), 285-306. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11049-021-09507-0
Abstract
<jats:title>Abstract</jats:title><jats:p>Rolle (2020) identifies an apparent morphophonological conspiracy in serial verb constructions (SVCs) in Degema. He argues that it constitutes evidence for a partly-unified postsyntactic module, in which morphology and prosody are built in parallel (by ‘Optimality-Theoretic Distributed Morphology’). We argue that the pattern Rolle identifies in Degema SVCs instead results from the simultaneous interaction of two independently-attested syntax-prosody phenomena: (1) the pressure for adjacent verbs in an SVC to form a single prosodic unit, and (2) the suppression of redundant agreement within a single prosodic word (a.k.a. ‘Kinyalolo’s Generalization’). Thus the Degema SVC conspiracy can be localized to the syntax-prosody interface, and there is no need to adopt a unified postsyntactic morphology-prosody module like Rolle’s. We offer some further conceptual critiques of his model.</jats:p>
Keywords
Article, Clitics, Syntax-prosody, Degema, Serial verb constructions
Sponsorship
Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (AL 554/8-1)
Identifiers
s11049-021-09507-0, 9507
External DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11049-021-09507-0
This record's URL: https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/handle/1810/333154
Rights
Licence:
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
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