16.1301, Review: Syntax/Historical Ling/Romance Ling: Scida (2004)

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LINGUIST List: Vol-16-1301. Sat Apr 23 2005. ISSN: 1068 - 4875.

Subject: 16.1301, Review: Syntax/Historical Ling/Romance Ling: Scida (2004)

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1)
Date: 22-Apr-2005
From: Silke Jansen < silkejansen at yahoo.de >
Subject: The Inflected Infinitive in Romance Languages 

	
-------------------------Message 1 ---------------------------------- 
Date: Sat, 23 Apr 2005 13:55:42
From: Silke Jansen < silkejansen at yahoo.de >
Subject: The Inflected Infinitive in Romance Languages 
 

AUTHOR: Scida, Emily
TITLE: The Inflected Infinitive in Romance Languages
SERIES: Outstanding Dissertations in Linguistics
YEAR: 2004
PUBLISHER: Routledge (Taylor and Francis)
Announced at http://linguistlist.org/issues/15/15-2837.html


Silke Jansen, Romanisches Seminar, Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg 
(Germany)

This book analyzes the use of the inflected infinitive in Romance 
languages within the framework of Relational Grammar. It also 
provides an overview about the current theories concerning its origin 
and its distribution in the Romance Languages.

SYNOPSIS

CHAPTER 1: Introduction 
The inflected infinitive, an infinitive form with verbal inflection existing 
in Portuguese and some minor Romance languages, has been 
considered as an anomaly among the Romance languages. The first 
chapter gives an overview about the two prominent issues that have 
arisen regarding this particular form, namely the description of its 
occurrences in modern Portuguese and its probable origin and 
historical development. The author states that the previous attempts 
to describe the use of the inflected infinitive have failed due to the lack 
of an adequate theoretical approach, and pronounces herself in favor 
of the Relational Grammar as an appropriate basis for structural 
analysis. 

CHAPTER 2: The syntactic distribution of the inflected infinitive
This chapter starts with a short introduction to Relational Grammar 
which provides the theoretical framework of the following analysis. 
The author shows that Relational Grammar offers an economical way 
to represent complex predicates, periphrastics, auxiliation and the like 
by assuming that a single clause may have more than one predicate. 
Whether a sentence is mono-, bi- or multiclausal can be determined 
by a range of tests such as clitic position, predicate clefting, and 
negation. As a general condition on the use of the inflected infinitive in 
Portuguese, the author proposes that in multiclausal sentences, "The 
inflected infinitive must be the final predicate of its clause" (p. 17). This 
condition entails that the uninflected form is never obligatory but can 
be used as an optional variant in contexts where the uninflected 
infinitive occurs, but only if it is a final predicate. However, the 
appearance of the inflected infinitive may be influenced by stylistic 
considerations such as the emphasis of the subject or the desire to 
avoid ambiguity. Lastly, the author gives some verifiable predictions 
for the use of the inflected infinitive in Portuguese. Predictable 
contexts for the inflected form are sentences where the infinitive 
occurs with an overt nominative subject, exclamative and interrogative 
clauses, sequences of conjoined infinitives, constructions with verba 
dicendi, constructions with impersonal verbs or expressions (é 
provavel, é pena etc.), and constructions with prepositions. In all this 
cases, the author points out that the acceptability of the inflected 
infinitive follows correctly from her analysis.

CHAPTER 3: Previous accounts for the distribution of the inflected 
infinitive
In chapter 3 previous studies on the use of inflected infinitive in 
Portuguese and Galician are surveyed. It appears that virtually all 
occurrences of the inflected form quoted by Scida have been 
discussed before. However, as the previous accounts are based on a 
traditional, pre-theoretical approach, none of them captures the 
syntactic restrictions underlying the use of the inflected infinitive. In 
fact, these studies are concentrated on listing rules, contexts, 
examples and counterexamples, and therefore fail to develop a 
consistent and explanatory theory of the function of the inflected 
infinitive. On the other hand, Scida claims for a unified account which 
reduces all the possible occurrences in Portuguese and Galician to 
one single rule that can be described syntactically.

CHAPTER 4: Theories of the Origin of the Portuguese Inflected 
Infinitive 
Chapter 4 takes a look at the different theories regarding the historical 
origin of the inflective infinitive. According to the "Creative" Theory, 
which goes back to Diez (1836-44), the starting point of the inflected 
infinitive was the use of the infinitive with a nominative subject. As the 
infinitive ceased to be impersonal and the verbal endings in 
Portuguese are separable in the future and conditional tenses, the 
verb inflection was transferred to the infinitive form. Scida expresses 
herself against this theory, stating that "[...] controlled infinitives in 
other Romance languages are equally personal in this sense [...], but 
have not acquired inflection as in Portuguese" (p. 89). Another 
objection to this theory is the low frequency of occurrence of an overt 
nominative subject with the infinitive in Old Portuguese texts. 

The Analogy Theory, first proposed by Mayer-Lübke (1895)), states 
that the origin of the inflected infinitive lies in the Vulgar Latin future 
subjunctive, which arose in Portuguese as a conflation of Latin future 
perfect (am?ver?) with Latin perfect subjunctive (am?verim). However, 
according to Scida, the inflected infinitive shows a development from 
the Latin present stem, and does not share syntactic environments 
which the future subjunctive. Further evidence against this theory is 
provided by Sardinian and Old Napolitan, which possess an inflected 
infinitive, but no future subjunctive tense. 

The Composite Theory combines the "Creative" and the Analogy 
Theory, stating that personal endings were transferred to the infinitive 
with nominative subject constructions in Portuguese due to formal 
correspondences between the future subjunctive and the infinitive. 

According to the Imperfect Subjunctive Theory, which is supported by 
Scida, the existence of the Inflected Infinitive in several Romance 
languages shows that it must have a Latin source. Three arguments 
point to the Latin Imperfect Subjunctive as the source of the Inflected 
Infinitive in modern Romance languages: The formation rules of 
Portuguese Inflected Infinitive and Latin Imperfect Subjunctive are 
identical (infinitive + verbal inflection), the imperfect subjunctive 
survived in Early Romance and in modern Sardinian, and both forms 
were semantically interchangeable after verbs of command and in 
volitional and purpose clauses. Once the old imperfect subjunctive 
was reanalyzed as an infinitive with verbal ending, it was introduced in 
other contexts where infinitives normally occur, namely after 
prepositions. 

CHAPTER 5: The Imperfect Subjunctive in Latin
By comparing the forms, syntactic distribution and uses of the Latin 
imperfect subjunctive and the Inflected Infinitive in Portuguese and 
Galician, Scida gives further evidence for the Imperfect Subjunctive 
Theory in this chapter. She points out that the origin of the Inflected 
Infinitive lies in Latin purpose clauses: As the conjunction ut frequently 
was omitted in complement clauses of purpose, expressions like iussit 
( ut) facerent and  iussit facere became semantically equivalent, and 
the subjunctive imperfect could easily be reanalyzed as an infinitive 
with personal ending. In addition, the author presents other possible 
sources of the inflected infinitive such as complement clauses, 
adverbial clauses and relative clauses, which have never been 
considered in previous studies. As a conclusion, she outlines an 
overall pattern of correspondence between the syntactic contexts of 
Latin imperfect subjunctive and the inflected infinitive in Portuguese 
and Galician. In the appendix, the chapter offers a list of examples 
illustrating the environments available to the Latin, Portuguese and 
Latin forms. 

CHAPTER 6: Distribution of the Inflected Infinitive in the Romance 
Languages
This chapter examines the manifestation of the inflected infinitive in 
several lesser-known Romance languages, covering Sardinian, Old 
Neapolitan and Old Leonese and Mirandese. It also describes the 
reanalysis of other non-finite verb forms like gerunds and participle in 
these dialects. 

CHAPTER 7: Conclusion
In the last chapter of the book, the author resumes her main 
arguments, drawing attention to two main points: First, all usages of 
the inflected infinitive can be unified under one single rule in the 
framework of Relational Grammar, namely that the inflected infinitive 
must be the final predicate of its clause. Secondly, the origin of the 
inflected infinitives in Portuguese and other Romance languages lies 
in the Latin perfect subjunctive.

CRITICAL EVALUATION

The principal merit of the book lies in Scida's unified account of the 
distribution of the inflected infinitive (chapter 2). While the previous 
works on the issue easily give the impression that there are no 
dependable rules governing the occurrence of the inflected infinitive, 
Scida's analysis shows that all usages can be put down to one single 
and concise syntactic condition. What allows her to do so and what 
actually makes the essential difference between previous approaches 
and hers is the consistent application of a theoretical framework, 
namely Relational Grammar, to the inflected infinitive. It is in the 
explanation of the inflected infinitive within the framework of Relational 
Grammar that the most important and innovative idea of the book lies. 
As Scida's analysis correctly and accurately describes the distribution 
of this form in all environments listed by other scholars, it constitutes 
an important step forward in dealing with this controversial issue. 

Nonetheless, her analysis concentrates exclusively on syntactic 
constraints, disregarding possible semantic or pragmatic factors. 
Although Scida admits that pragmatic factors may have a certain 
influence, the inflected infinitive in general is presented as an optional 
variant on the uninflected form. Further investigation would be 
necessary to clarify this point.  

Another positive element of the analytical part of the book is that the 
text is very accessible. Also novice readers not familiar with the model 
of Relational Grammar can easily understand the basic key concepts 
and follow the line of reasoning. 

The chapters 3 and 4 are quite useful as they provide a large amount 
of information about the history and the current state of the discussion 
on the inflected infinitive. The main research works regarding the 
historical development of the inflected infinitive are presented in a very 
clear way, by splitting them up in four main theories. However, this 
part of the book remains largely descriptive, as it enumerates above 
all the well-known pros and cons and therefore contributes only few 
new ideas to the discussion. At the same time, the frequent 
recurrence of the same arguments by different authors makes the 
reading of these chapters somewhat repetitive. 

Further problems emerge when one looks at the author's arguments 
in favour of the Imperfect Subjunctive Theory in a more detailed way. 
First of all, her argument that the existence of an inflected infinitive in 
various Romance languages points to a common origin in Latin is 
entirely convincing. In contrast to previous studies, she does not only 
find one principal environment shared by the Latin and Romance 
forms (namely, volitional clauses), but illustrates that there is a high 
concurrence between certain Latin and Romance constructions also in 
purpose, complement, adverbial and relative clauses. Her arguments 
are persuasive in so far as she shows that the inflected infinitive can 
express functions like purpose, volition, condition, time etc., which are 
expressed by the subjunctive form in Latin and also in modern 
Romance languages. However, to prove that the origin of the inflected 
infinitive lies in the Latin subjunctive imperfect, it would be necessary 
to establish a direct historical connection between the syntactic 
environments available to the presumed Latin source and the modern 
forms. In this context, Scida's argumentation contains several 
questionable points. 

While previous studies in general put down the inflected infinitive only 
to volitional clauses of the type placuit (ut) traderet, Scida attempts to 
give further evidence for the imperfect subjunctive theory by searching 
other common environments for the Latin and Romance forms. 
However, many of the constructions she discusses are semantically 
equivalent, but not necessarily historically related. For example, she 
confronts Latin ut-clauses with Portuguese and Galician constructions 
which use the preposition para/pra, but does not explain why and how 
modern Romance language reintroduced prepositions in these 
contexts after the omission of Latin ut had brought into being the 
inflected infinitive (see f.ex. Caesar equos removit tu spem fugae 
tolleret vs. O número dos companheiros de Pelágio aumentava 
diáriamente com os homens generosos que ... deixavam êste, para 
salvarem a sua independência, p. 115.) As prepositional constructions 
are typical environments for infinitives in all modern Romance 
languages, this usage rather supports the Analogy Theory. 

The lack of historical continuity between the presumed source and 
target forms becomes very clear when Scida compares Latin relative 
clauses of the type tibi litteram mittit quam legas with modern 
Portuguese expressions like achei um livro para lermos (p. 122): 
semantically, both the Latin relative clause and the Portuguese 
infinitive construction can be used to express purpose, but from a 
syntactic point of view, the environments of Latin subjunctive legas 
and Portuguese inflected infinitive lermos are not related. The same 
applies for examples like hi libri sunt digni qui legantur and Leonor! tu 
eras digna de sêres filha de meu implacável pai! (p. 123), where the 
Latin relative clause and the Portuguese infinitive construction are 
used to characterize indefinite or general antecedents. Actually, the 
direct correspondence to the Latin relative construction is the 
Portuguese relative clause with que, which can be used with a 
subjunctive form, but just doesn't allow an infinitive construction. As 
the examples cited by Scida as further evidence for the subject 
imperfect theory are rather weak, her discussion of the origin of the 
inflected infinitive does not really go beyond previous works. 

By focusing her study on the imperfect subjunctive theory, Scida 
passes over the discussion of some interesting phenomena which 
point to the Analogy theory, as the coexistence of the inflected 
infinitive and the old subjunctive imperfect forms in Sardinian, the 
transfer of Sardinian first person singular ending -po from frequently 
used verbs (appo 'I have', fippo 'I was') to the inflected infinitive, and 
the existence of inflected gerunds and participles in some Romance 
varieties. 

Given that works on the inflected infinitive are rather sparse, this book 
constitutes a valuable work and an excellent overview about the most 
important theories regarding the conditions on its use as well as its 
historical development. The theoretical explanation of the syntactic 
constrains on the inflected infinitive are very interesting, persuasive 
and original. However, only a careful examination of the common 
environments available to the Latin and Romance forms through the 
centuries, based on old texts as far as possible, could clarify the origin 
and historical development of the inflected infinitive. 

ABOUT THE REVIEWER

Silke Jansen received her Ph.D. in Romance Linguistics from the 
University of Münster (Germany). She is currently a lecturer for 
Romance linguistics at the University of Erlangen-Nürnberg 
(Germany). Her teaching and research interests include semantics, 
languages in contact and historical linguistics of the Romance 
languages.





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