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Evidence for a DP-projection in West Greenlandic Inuit

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 December 2016

Kathleen Manlove
Kathleen Manlove*
Affiliation:
University of Washington
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Abstract

Evidence for a DP-projection in West Greenlandic Inuit Abstract The goal of this paper is to argue in favor of a DP-layer in West Greenlandic Inuit noun phrases and in doing so contribute to the argument that the absence of overt D-elements is not directly indicative of the absence of a DP-layer. Inuit is a polysynthetic, ergative language with no overt articles; for this reason it has been argued that a D-head is unnecessary. Others have argued contrastively that a functional projection KP (Case) is necessary (often assuming DP). This paper differs from both camps in the sense that it considers syntactic features specific to D. I present three primary arguments in support of a D-head in West Greenlandic: (i) the D-head acts as the locus of agreement features in possessive DPs, (ii) the D-head is the locus of the syntactic/semantic feature of definiteness; and (iii) a DP-layer is needed to provide a landing site for movement in DP-internal word order variations.

Résumé

Résumé

Cet article a pour but de soutenir l’idée selon laquelle il existe une couche SD dans la structure nominale de l’inuktitut groenlandais de l’ouest et de ce fait, nous contribuons à à la littérature qui propose que l’absence de déterminants visibles n’indique pas forcément l’absence du SD. L’inuktitut est une langue polysynthétique et ergative sans déterminants visibles; pour cette raison, certains chercheurs ont proposé que la catégorie D n’est pas nécessaire. D’autres ont soutenu qu’une projection SK (Cas) est obligatoire (souvent prenant pour acquis la présence d’un SD). Cet article se distingue de ces deux camps dans la mesure où nous nous intéressons aux propriétés qui sont propres à D. Nous présentons trois arguments pour appuyer la présence de D en groenlandais de l’ouest: (i) la tête D porte les traits d’accord dans les SD possessifs, (ii) la tête D porte le trait syntaxique/sémantique de la définitude, et (iii) une couche SD est nécessaire afin de fournir une position pour le déplacement dans les variations de l’ordre des mots à l’intérieur du SD.

Keywords

West GreenlandicDP hypothesisminimalist syntaxdefinitenesspossessive structuregroenlandais de l’ouesthypothèse du SDsyntaxe minimalistedéfinitudestructure possessive
Type
Articles
Information
Canadian Journal of Linguistics/Revue canadienne de linguistique , Volume 60 , Issue 3 , November 2015 , pp. 327 - 360
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Linguistic Association/Association canadienne de linguistique 2015 

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