Proceedings of the second Syntax AiO Meeting 2005 in Utrecht, guest-edited by Jakub Dotlačil and Berit Gehrke
* Jutta M. Hartmann (University of Tilburg): Well, there's the list reading. Dotlačil, Jakub & Berit Gehrke (eds.), UiL OTS Working Papers 2006, 1-15.
Abstract: The aim of this paper is to show that if we treat the English there-construction as a type of copula construction, we can provide a unified analysis of the existential and the list reading. Research on copula structures has distinguished at least three types: predicational, specificational and identificational (or equative). Putting aside the identificational construction, in which two referential DPs are equated, I argue that the cut between the predicational and specificational structures can be found with the there-construction as well. As has been shown previously, there are several arguments to take the existential construction as an instance of a predicational copula construction, which I will present. Following a suggestion by Safir (1985), I will show that it makes sense to treat the list reading that occurs with there as a specificational variant of the there-construction. This move rounds up the picture of looking at there-constructions as a copula structure.
* Veronika Hegedűs (University of Tilburg): Locating adpositions. Dotlačil, Jakub & Berit Gehrke (eds.), UiL OTS Working Papers 2006, 16-28.
Abstract: The aim of this paper is to show that Hungarian particles originate in extended projections of PPs, and the structure of the PP involves projections for place and for path denoting elements. Previous research on the structure of Hungarian PPs has concluded that two groups have to be distinguished within the class of postpositions, depending on whether they take caseless/nominative complements or oblique case marked complements. I will show that on the basis of their syntactic behavior, elements of the latter group are to be classified with particles. The class of postpositions, however, should include spatial case suffixes as well, because they share syntactic properties. The extended projection of the PP, on the other hand, includes all these spatial elements.
* Nataša Milićević (University of Tilburg): On negation in yes/no questions in Serbo-Croatian. Dotlačil, Jakub & Berit Gehrke (eds.), UiL OTS Working Papers 2006, 29-47.
Abstract: The phenomenon discussed in this paper is the so-called expletive negation in negated yes/no questions in Serbo-Croatian. The term expletive negation seems, at this point to be a useful descriptive term for the phenomenon in question. One of the goals of this paper, however, is to show that it is not the correct one. Proposing the existence of semantically vacuous negation is the consequence of the assumption that sentential negation has a fixed position in the clausal hierarchy (Brown and Franks 1995). This approach cannot account for the relevant data in Serbo-Croatian. My claim is that the cases under consideration involve an alternative position of NegP in Serbo-Croatian, above TP. It is confined to the derivation of one semantic type of negated yes/no interrogatives, and it cannot trigger negative concord.
* Boban Arsenijević (LUCL, Leiden University): Partitivity and reference. Dotlačil, Jakub & Berit Gehrke (eds.), UiL OTS Working Papers 2006, 48-64.
Abstract: The paper presents the partitive phrase (PartP) as a part of the general functional sequence in the nominal domain. It is argued that PartP derives grammatical number and effects related to countability, defines units of division and introduces the potentials of indefinite, non-generic and non-mass reference. Identity is established between this functional projection and the projection that derives partitive constructions. Contents of SpecPartP are related with the structural representation of the lexical meaning of nominal expressions, in order to account for observations that there are two levels in the structure of nominal expressions at which countability is determined.
* Martin Salzmann (LUCL, Leiden University): Reconstruction in German relative clauses: In favor of the Matching Analysis. Dotlačil, Jakub & Berit Gehrke (eds.), UiL OTS Working Papers 2006, 65-79.
Abstract: In this paper I argue in favor of a Matching Analysis for German relative clauses. The Head Raising Analysis is shown to fail to account for parts of the reconstruction pattern in German, especially cases where only the external head is interpreted and the absence of Principle C effects. I propose a Matching Analysis with Vehicle Change and make consistent assumptions about possible deletion operations in relatives so that the entire pattern can be captured by one analysis which therefore proves superior to previous ones.