LINGUIST List 17.1490

Mon May 15 2006

Diss: Syntax: Wiklund: 'The Syntax of Tenselessness...'

Editor for this issue: Meredith Valant <meredithlinguistlist.org>

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Directory         1.    Anna-Lena Wiklund, The Syntax of Tenselessness: On copying constructions in Swedish

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Message 1: The Syntax of Tenselessness: On copying constructions in Swedish
Date: 14-May-2006
From: Anna-Lena Wiklund <anna-lena.wiklundhum.uit.no>
Subject: The Syntax of Tenselessness: On copying constructions in Swedish


Institution: Umeå University Program: Philosophy and Linguistics Dissertation Status: Completed Degree Date: 2005

Author: Anna-Lena Wiklund

Dissertation Title: The Syntax of Tenselessness: On copying constructions in Swedish

Dissertation URL: http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:umu:diva-468

Linguistic Field(s): Syntax
Dissertation Director:
Lars-Olof Delsing Anders Holmberg Görel Sandström
Dissertation Abstract:

This thesis investigates three construction types in Swedish where two (ormore) verbs display identical inflectional morphology (COPYING) and shareone overt subject. The constructions are referred to as (i)T(ENSE)M(OOD)A(SPECT)-COPYING complements, of the form John started andwrote (John started writing), (ii) PARTICIPLE COPYING complements, of theform John had been-able written (John had been able to write), and (iii)PSEUDOCOORDINATIONS, of the form John sat and wrote (John was writing). (i)and (ii) differ from (iii) in alternating with infinitives. (ii) differsfrom (i) and (iii) in restricting copying to participial form and in beingincompatible with a linking element (corresponding to 'and'). The mainclaim is that the construction types are three surface variants of one andthe same phenomenon, involving complementation and semantically vacuousinflection on the embedded verb(s). The differences between them are arguedto be derivable from independent factors. (i) and (iii) are shown to differfrom (ii) w.r.t. amount of functional structure present in the embeddedclause. Matrix verbs in (iii) are shown to instantiate light verb uses ofotherwise lexical verbs. Copying complements are argued to instantiatesubtypes of 'tenseless' infinitivals (infinitivals whose tenseorientation fully overlaps with that of the matrix clause), characterizedby an underspecified functional domain. Copying is assumed to be a surfacereflection of (Agree-type) dependencies between functional heads of thesame label; features of the embedded functional heads copy values from thecorresponding functional heads in the matrix clause. Arguments for treatingcopying complements as instantiating restructuring are presented. It isproposed that copying complements differ from non-copying infinitivalcomplements in being subject to valuation from the matrix functionaldomain. This suggests that an important aspect of (possibility of)restructuring is alternation between unmarked (negatively specified) andunvalued varieties of the same features.