15.3212, Review: Syntax: Alexiadou et al., ed. (2003)

[LINGUIST List]

LINGUIST List: Vol-15-3212. Tue Nov 16 2004. ISSN: 1068 - 4875.

Subject: 15.3212, Review: Syntax: Alexiadou et al., ed. (2003)                                                                                                                                                                    

Moderators: Anthony Aristar, Wayne State U <aristar at linguistlist.org>
            Helen Aristar-Dry, Eastern Michigan U <hdry at linguistlist.org>
 
Reviews (reviews at linguistlist.org) 
        Sheila Collberg, U of Arizona  
        Terry Langendoen, U of Arizona  

Homepage: http://linguistlist.org/

The LINGUIST List is funded by Eastern Michigan University, Wayne
State University, and donations from subscribers and publishers.

Editor for this issue: Naomi Ogasawara <naomi at linguistlist.org>
================================================================  

What follows is a review or discussion note contributed to our 
Book Discussion Forum. We expect discussions to be informal and 
interactive; and the author of the book discussed is cordially 
invited to join in. If you are interested in leading a book 
discussion, look for books announced on LINGUIST as "available 
for review." Then contact Shiela Collberg at collberg at linguistlist.org. 

===========================Directory==============================  

1)
Date: 16-Nov-2004
From: Alexandra Galani < ag153 at york.ac.uk >
Subject: The Unaccusativity Puzzle: Explorations of the Syntax-Lexicon Interface 
 

	
-------------------------Message 1 ---------------------------------- 
Date: Tue, 16 Nov 2004 02:55:00
From: Alexandra Galani < ag153 at york.ac.uk >
Subject: The Unaccusativity Puzzle: Explorations of the Syntax-Lexicon Interface 
 

EDITORS: Alexiadou, Artemis; Anagnostopoulou, Elena; Everaert, Martin 
TITLE: The Unaccusativity Puzzle 
SUBTITLE: Explorations of the Syntax-Lexicon Interface 
SERIES: Oxford Studies in Theoretical Linguistics 
PUBLISHER: Oxford University Press 
YEAR: 2003 
Announced at http://linguistlist.org/issues/14/14-3229.html


Alexandra Galani, Department of Language and Linguistic Science, 
University of York

DESCRIPTION OF THE BOOK 

This volume is a collection of twelve papers on unaccusativity, along with 
an introductory chapter. The book has its origin in a workshop on 
unaccusativity held in Berlin (1998) but it includes contributions which 
were not presented at that event. The discussions vary from semantic 
versus syntactic approaches to the phenomenon, unaccusativity diagnostics, 
what determines verb classification, thematic roles and the importance of 
special morphology in relation to unaccusative predicates, to the 
properties of unaccusatives in (second) language acquisition.

In what follows, I give a brief summary of what is discussed in each paper 
and make only some general remarks. I only aim to give an overall view of 
the volume as a whole and not discuss any insufficiencies individual 
papers may present.

Introduction (pp. 1-21) Artemis Alexiadou, Elena Anagnostopoulou and 
Martin Everaert

This chapter introduces the volume. It sets off with the theoretical 
background of the Unaccusative Hypothesis (cf. Perlmutter 1978), the 
diagnostics for determining the unaccusative/unergative pattern and 
unaccusativity mismatches. The authors then discuss the lexicon-syntax 
interface in relation to unaccusativity by making a short reference to the 
levels of representation, the Universal Alignment Hypothesis (Perlmutter 
and Postal 1984), the syntax of unaccusativity (cf. Larson 1988) as well 
as the study of unaccusativity in language acquisition (cf. van Hout et al 
1993). The last part of the chapter discusses briefly the contributions in 
the volume and highlights links between them. 

Chapter 1: A semantics for unaccusatives and its syntactic consequences 
(pp. 22-59) by Gennaro Chierchia

In Chierchia's semantic algebra theory, properties are considered 
primitives and predication serves as the link between them and their 
arguments. Truth conditions are recursively specified. He assumes the 
Predication Principle to interpret the mapping of LF to lf. According to 
the principle, features of unaccusatives are also captured; verbs should 
have specific characteristics, such as that their arguments should be 
within the VP and associated with an expletive subject. Moreover, he 
claims that unaccusatives instantiate a type of reflexivisation. In this 
way, he accounts for a number of patterns; the unstable pattern of 
valence, the association of unaccusatives with reflexive morphology and 
the aspectual properties of unaccusatives. The theory finally leads to a 
reformulation of the auxiliary selection rule in Italian. The paper is 
generally well-presented and argued. The parts of the discussion which 
might require a fair amount of brain twist benefit from the rich 
exemplification and the set out of the paper in small sections.

Chapter 2: Unaccusativity as telicity checking (pp. 60-83) 
by Angeliek van Hout 

According to van Hout, telicity is a property of unaccusativity. Based on 
evidence from two-argument verbs in Dutch, she further claims that the 
single argument of verbs moves (the movement is only triggered with telic 
predicates) to the specifier of AgrS through the specifier of AgrO (AgrOP 
being the locus of telicity checking) and unaccusativity reflects this 
mapping. The way transitivity and telicity interact is explained via a 
semantic feature checking mechanism in the lexicon-syntax interface. She 
predicts that telic single-argument predicates are unaccusative. Moreover, 
the unergative-unaccusative pattern is seen in a parallel fashion to the 
telic-atelic one on the basis of two unaccusative diagnostics in Dutch; 
auxiliary selection and prenominal perfect participles. The discussion is 
rounded off with a comparison between her theory and other theories of 
unaccusativity. The data is clearly set out and the analysis follows 
straightforwardly from it. There are a couple of points which have not 
been explored (as for instance, the reasons for which auxiliary selection 
and participles serve as unaccusativity diagnostics as well as whether 
this theory holds cross-linguistically) but van Hout refers to them 
briefly in the conclusion of the paper.

Chapter 3: Unergative adjectives and psych verbs (pp. 84-113)
by Hans Bennis 

Bennis offers a purely syntactic analysis of unaccusativity. His starting 
point is the representation of arguments; light v introduces the external 
argument, following Chomsky (1995), which he then uses to implement 
Burzio's generalisation. He suggests that v assigns accusative case and 
introduces the external argument. He identifies two constructions; one 
where the v-P is absent and there is no external argument and the second 
where there is a v-P but there is not an external argument (cases of 
ergativity), along with constructions where there is a v-P as well as an 
external argument (transitive cases). Moreover, he claims that there are 
three types of unaccusative adjectives (adjectives with an external 
argument, complex and simplex adjectives) and these configurations can be 
further extended to Belletti and Rizzi's (1988) class of verbs. Bennis 
offers an interesting approach to the phenomenon which is worth reading.

Chapter 4: Voice morphology in the causative-inchoative alternation: 
Evidence for a non-unified structural analysis of unaccusatives (pp. 114-
136) by Artemis Alexiadou and Elena Anagnostopoulou

Alexiadou and Anagnostopoulou discuss the distribution of voice morphology 
in relation to detransitivisation in the causative-inchoative alternation. 
They investigate consistency and gaps in detransitivising morphology as 
well as the syntactic and semantic properties of the detransitivising 
morphemes in Greek. They argue that there are three types of 
anticausatives depending on the XP embedded under BECOME/RESULT; an 
AdjectiveP, a VoiceP and a possessive construction. Consequently, they 
claim that anticausatives do not have a unified structure. The paper is 
elegant, well-argued and reads easily, whereas the data is also well-
presented and discussed.

Chapter 5: Unaccusative syntax and verbal alternations (pp. 137-158) 
by David Embick 

Embick discusses unaccusatives, passives and reflexives from a 
morphosyntactic point of view by looking at u-syncretism (morphological 
syncretism) within Distributed Morphology (Halle and Marantz 1993). He 
proposes that the common pattern they share is a syntactic property which 
is seen as the absence of an external argument. He further claims that u-
syncretism also shows in cases where morphology is underspecified with 
respect to syntax. Embick draws data mainly from Greek, Fula and 
Tolkapaya. The discussion is generally straightforward and accessible. 
Some of the questions which remain open (such as the possibility of the 
existence of a uniform syntactic structure for constructions with 
reflexive interpretations) are discussed in the final section of the paper.

Chapter 6: Against an unaccusative analysis of reflexives (pp. 159-180) 
by Tanya Reinhart and Tal Siloni 

In this paper, Reinhart and Siloni argue against the unaccusative analyses 
of reflexives. They claim that reflexive verbs and unaccusatives are 
derived from their transitive ones via a reduction operation. The 
differences identified between French-type and Hebrew-type reflexives are 
attributed to the lexicon or the syntax, the components in which the 
reduction operation is applied, respectively. The authors argue fairly 
convincingly for the stand they take.

Chapter 7: Unaccusatives and anticausatives in German (pp. 181-206) 
by Markus Steinbach 

The derivation of anticausatives in German is discussed in Steinbach's 
paper. He claims that transitive reflexive sentences have a reflexive, 
middle and inherent-reflexive interpretation. Crucially the difference 
between these types is not syntactic but lies on the semantic/thematic 
interpretation. The theory (a modified version of binding theory) is based 
on the distinction between nominative and accusative versus dative case in 
German.

Chapter 8: Syntactic unaccusativity in Russian (pp. 207-242) 
by Maaike Schoorlemmer 

Schoorlemmer argues for a syntactic approach to unaccusativity and 
provides two diagnostics for the phenomenon in Russian. She further argues 
against the direct mapping approach to the unaccusative-unergative pattern 
by showing that the semantic feature related is also relevant in other 
syntactic constructions and not only in determining the argument 
projection in non-transitive verbs. A linking rule deriving unaccusative 
verbs in Russian has also been looked at. Overall, the paper is relatively 
elegant and nicely presented, although certain points -- in some cases in 
relation to the data as well as the section on the linking rules -- could 
have been justified in greater detail.

Chapter 9: Gradience at the lexicon-syntax interface: Evidence from 
auxiliary selection and implications for unaccusativity (pp. 243-268) 
by Antonella Sorace

Sorace looks in to the Auxiliary Selection Hierarchy (ASH) and proposes 
that it captures the variation intransitive verbs exhibit in relation to 
auxiliary selection based on evidence drawn from Italian. She proposes 
that telicity and agentivity are the main features of ASH and define a 
structure hierarchy of verb types on the basis of aspectual relations. She 
further examines the predictions which are made for first and second-
language acquisition theories. It is an interesting and solid piece of 
work.  

Chapter 10: Unaccusativity in Saramaccan: The syntax of resultatives (pp. 
269-287) by Tonjes Veenstra

The author investigates the syntax of the resultative constructions and 
argues for a unified analysis of their syntax in languages with or without 
serialisation. He mainly analyses resultatives expressed in serial-verb 
constructions in Saramaccan and concludes that transitive verbs are not 
the only types which appear in resultative serial-verb constructions. 
Veenstra presents a large amount of data which he discusses 
satisfactorily. The paper, though, concludes with an analysis which could 
have been justified in greater detail. The addition of a concluding 
section could have also given a smoother touch to (the end of) the paper.

Chapter 11: The grammar machine (pp. 288-331) by Hagit Borer 

Borer discusses the acquisition of unaccusativity based on an argument-
structure approach. She argues that argument and event structures are 
independent of the vocabulary, the items of which -dominated by verb 
functions -- are seen as modifiers. She further claims that children have 
a syntactic knowledge of argument and event structure projections which is 
not related to the knowledge of vocabulary. Finally, she proposes that two 
development stages exist; the morphophonological and the morphosyntactic 
stages. Data is drawn from Hebrew. The discussion unfolds nicely and flows 
throughout. In this paper, the question which remains open ("the recovery 
from the morphosyntactic stage leading to adult performance", pp.330) is 
acknowledged in the concluding section.

Chapter 12: Acquiring unaccusatives: A cross-linguistic look (pp. 332-353) 
by Janet Randall, Angeliek van Hout, Jürgen Weissenborn and Harald Baayen  

The authors discuss the acquisition of unaccusatives in Dutch and German 
and conclude that semantic factors -- telicity and actor -- determine 
unaccusativity. They further formulate two linking rules; the telicity 
linking rules classify verbs as unaccusatives, whereas the actor linking 
rule as unergatives. Nevertheless, in cases where both telicity and actor 
are present, the telicity linking rule takes precedence over the actor 
linking rule. They account for this pattern in terms of the geometry of 
the rules' conceptual structure representation. It is a well-presented 
piece of work, although the second section of the paper could have been 
enriched for the readers' better understanding.

GENERAL EVALUATION

The editors bring together many different threads to the analysis of the 
phenomenon of unaccusativity. A wide range of data is covered and cross-
references are well-managed.

A couple of references are missing from the references section (for 
example, Zombolou in progress) but this should not undermine the value and 
the high quality of the work put by the authors and the editors.

Despite the very high standard of the papers, the volume reads easily, is 
well-organised, coherent, user-friendly and consistent. It is convincingly 
challenging, high in the quality and interest of each chapter and complete 
in the sense it addresses all the questions it was designed for.

REFERENCES

Belleti, A. and Rizzi, L. (1988). "Psych verbs and theta theory". Natural 
Language and Linguistic Theory, 6:3;291-352.

Chomsky, N. (1995). The minimalist program. Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press. 

Halle and Marantz. (1993). "Distributed Morphology and the pieces of 
inflection". In K. Hale and J.S. Kayser (Eds.) The view from building 20: 
Essays in honour of Sylvain Bromberger. Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press, 111-
178.

Larson, R. (1988). "On the double object construction". Linguistic Inquiry 
19:3:335-391.

Perlmutter, D. (1978). "Impersonal passives and the unaccusative 
hypothesis". Papers from the annual meeting of the Berkeley Linguistic 
Society, 4:157-819.

Perlmutter, D. and Postal, P. (1984). "The I-advancement exclusiveness 
law". In Perlmutter and Rosen (Eds.) Studies in relational grammar. 
Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Van Hout, A., Randall, J. and Weissenborn, J. (1993). "Acquiring the 
unergative-unaccusative distinction". In M. Verrips and F. Wijnem (Eds.) 
The acquisition of Dutch. Amsterdam: University of Amsterdam, 79-120. 

ABOUT THE REVIEWER

Alexandra Galani is a member of the Department of Language and Linguistic 
Science at the University of York (England). She is working on the 
morphosyntax of tense and aspect in Modern Greek within Distributed 
Morphology. Her main research interests are: syntax/morphology interface, 
morphology/phonology interface, allomorphy, suppletion and the lexicon.




-----------------------------------------------------------
LINGUIST List: Vol-15-3212