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The Structural Design of Language

By Thomas S. Stroik, Michael T. Putnam

In this book, Stroik and Putnam take on Turing's challenge. They argue that the narrow syntax – the lexicon, the Numeration, and the computational system – must reside, for reasons of conceptual necessity, within the performance systems.


Book Information

   

Title: Unique Focus
Subtitle: Languages without multiple wh-questions
Written By: Marina Stoyanova
URL: http://www.benjamins.com/cgi-bin/t_bookview.cgi?bookid=LA%20123
Series Title: Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today 123
Description:

This monograph focuses on an interesting typological property shared by four languages: the ungrammaticality of multiple wh-questions in Irish, Berber, Italian and Somali. It contains a broad discussion of data related to the grammar of wh-questions, a comparative analysis of wh-constructions in the four languages, and a theoretical account for the observed phenomenon. The analysis is based on the minimalist syntax theory as developed by Chomsky since 1995. It takes up the standard assumption that wh-phrases are typical representatives of elements bearing new information, in theoretical terms referred to as information focus. Most importantly, in the languages without multiple wh-questions the information focus is licensed in a unique syntactic position. The basic claim is that languages with unique focus are languages without multiple wh-questions. The analysis makes possible the classification of the languages without multiple wh-questions into the crosslinguistic typology of wh-constructions. Furthermore, this book is a contribution to the better understanding of information structure in natural languages, especially of focusing phenomena.

Publication Year: 2008
Publisher: John Benjamins
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BibTex: View BibTex record
Linguistic Field(s): Linguistic Theories
Syntax
Typology
Subject Language(s): Irish
Italian
Somali

Versions:
Format: Hardback
ISBN: 9027255067
ISBN-13: 9789027255068
Pages: 184
Prices: Europe EURO 115.00
U.S. $ 173.00