LINGUIST List 10.899

Mon Jun 14 1999

Confs: Grammatical Functions

Editor for this issue: Scott Fults <scottlinguistlist.org>

Directory

1. Stanley Dubinsky, Workshop on Grammatical Functions (LSA Institute)

We would like to announce the final program for:

The Role of Grammatical Functions in Transformational Syntax,
 (A workshop at the 1999 LSA Linguistic Institute)

Location of Workshop: University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
 Levis Faculty Center Third Floor.

Dates of Workshop: Saturday, July 10, 8:00 am - 5:45 pm
 Sunday, July 11, 8:30 am - 3:40 pm

Organizers: William D. Davies (University of Iowa) and
 Stanley Dubinsky (University of South Carolina)

Registration: $10
 The registration fee will partially subsidize
 conference amenities (breakfasts & coffee breaks)
 Registration will be done ON-SITE only. However,
 an e-mail message to dubinskysc.edu indicating
 that you plan to attend will greatly assist in
 planning.

Below is a decription of the workshop and a list of the
scheduled presentations. Further information (including
abstracts for each presentation) is available at:

http://www.cla.sc.edu/LING/faculty/dubinsky/GF-workshop.html

***********************************************************************

Workshop Desciption

This (NSF-funded) workshop will explore the place of grammatical
functions (GFs) in transformational theories of syntax, which since
Chomsky 1965 have held GFs such as subject and object are not
primitives of the theory but are definable in terms of phrase structure
configurations. Recent instantiations of these theories, such as
Principles & Parameters and the Minimalist Program, have undergone
revisions which incorporate principles utilizing GFs in a way that
appears to admit their roles as primitives, as in the Extended Projection
Principle, the introduction of functional phrase structure projections
such as AgrS and AgrO, and other innovations. These innovations
raise the fundamental question of whether or not GFs can indeed be
configurationally defined on phrase structure representations.

The workshop will bring together the work of leading researchers
relating to these issues, including:
 * the ways in which GFs have been incorporated into current
 transformational theories;
 * whether unitary configurationally defined GFs can be identified
 in current transformational syntax;
 * if configurational definitions of GFs have been reduced to
 axioms of the theory, the degree to which these structural
 representations of GFs yield significant insights;
 * the inventory of GFs that must be recognized in the theory;
 * and whether all languages instantiate all projections involved
 in defining Gfs.

********************************************************************

Program

 Saturday, 10 July 1999

 8:00 a.m. - Registration and coffee

 8:30 a.m. - Opening remarks

 8:45 a.m. - Section I: On the nature of the EPP

 8:45 The (non)universality of EPP effects
 James McCloskey (University of California, Santa Cruz)

 9:25 Subjects, Objects, and the EPP
 Howard Lasnik (University of Connecticut)

 10:05 Discussion
 Discussants: Richard Campbell, Samuel Epstein, Daniel Seely

 10:45 a.m. - Break

 11:00 SPEC-ifying the GF "subject:" eliminating A-Chains and the EPP
 Samuel Epstein and Daniel Seely
 (U of Michigan and Eastern Michigan U)

 11:40 On the Dual Nature of Extended Projection Principle Effects
 Richard Campbell (Oakland University)

 12:20 Discussion
 Discussants: James McCloskey, Howard Lasnik

 1:00 p.m. - Lunch break

 2:30 p.m. - Section II: On the nature of subjects

 2:30 Subjects in Spanish
 Grant Goodall (U of Texas, El Paso)

 3:10 Subject extraction without subjects
 Norvin Richards (MIT)

 3:40 Discussion:
 Discussants: Mark Baker, Grant Goodall

 4:30 p.m. - Break

 4:45 The syntax of non-NP subjects in an exploration of subject properties
 William Davies and Stanley Dubinsky
 (U of Iowa and U of South Carolina)

 5:25 Discussion
 Discussant: Norvin Richards

 7:00 p.m. Workshop dinner/party

 Sunday, 11 July 1999

 8:30 a.m. - Registration and coffee

 9:00 a.m. - Section III: Objects and other subjects

 9:00 Distinctions among objects:
 The counterparts of grammatical functions in the P&P framework
 Alex Alsina (Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona)

 9:40 Direct Objects and Syntactic Theory:
 Evidence from Brazilian Portuguese
 Patrick Farrell (U of California, Davis)

 10:20 Discussion
 Discussants: Lisa Travis, Alex Alsina

 11:00 a.m. - Break

 11:15 Objects in Malagasy and in English
 Lisa Travis (McGill University)

 11:55 Discussion
 Discussant: Patrick Farrell

 12:15 p.m. - Lunch break

 1:40 Phrase structure as a representation of
 "primitive" grammatical relations
 Mark C. Baker (Rutgers University)

 2:20 Discussion
 Discussant: Frederick Newmeyer

 2:40 p.m. - Panel Wrap-up