Optimal Typology of Determiner Phrases

在该项目的两年时间里，研究小组将对12种遗传多样性的语言样本进行几种关于所有格和分词结构的实证和理论研究。所有格结构和分词结构是研究形态、语义和语用方面的跨语言变异以及它们之间的相互作用的重要但相对较少被研究的领域。在进行描述性基础工作的过程中，该小组将为这12种语言中的每一种建立可比较的在线语料库，并辅之以与母语人士进行的启发工作的结果。这些实证研究的结果将在最优化理论(OT)的框架内进行正式分析。这些对个别语言的OT分析将受到进一步的理论考虑，为一系列跨语言概括提供可靠的基础。从这个项目衍生出来的所有格和分词结构的类型学可以为语言类型学家提供一套建立在可靠的经验工作和严格的理论框架基础上的假设，这些假设可以与其他语言的分析进行比较。最后，这个项目的结果将为语言学家提供大量的材料，供关注于寻找小句层面和名义层面的形态合成、语义和语用现象之间的相似之处的语言学家考虑。因此，项目结果将是几种类型的。研究小组的实证工作将产生：(A)一套跨语言多样化的电子语料库，将向其他研究人员提供(有待适当许可)和(B)一套关于不同语言中所有格和分词短语的结构、语义和语用特性的描述性陈述。研究小组的理论工作以学术论文、一本书和会议演示文稿的形式提供，将导致对OT型普遍限制及其在特定语言中的相对排名的详细说明。这些分析将增进对这些结构的跨语言概括中重要的语言维度的了解，以及关于OT框架的类型权力和预测的知识。这些分析还将允许从句的多个方面与跨语言工作进行比较。该项目将建设波士顿大学和布兰代斯大学语言学研究生培训的能力，经验产品-语料库-将在项目期间和之后供高级人员用作教材。将学习的语言样本包括粤语、捷克语、英语、芬兰语、德语、冰岛语、韩语、马来亚兰语、北波莫语、西班牙语、瑞典语和沃尔夫语。基本的描述性基础工作将包含与母语人士引出的结果和语料库中的例子。OT理论分析将集中于(1)人称/生命标记等级(Silverstein 1976，Aissen 1999)在我们的样本中各种类型的所有格结构中的作用；(2)限定词的语义及其对“部分限制”的贡献；(3)影响格和相关现象在这些结构中分布的各种因素，以及它们与小句级格模式的关系。

Over the two years of the project, the research team will carry out several kinds of empirical and theoretical studies of possessive and partitive constructions in a sample of twelve genetically diverse languages. Possessive and partitive constructions are important but relatively unexamined sites for the consideration of crosslinguistic variation in morphosyntax, semantics, and pragmatics, and interactions among these. In the process of carrying out the descriptive groundwork, the team will construct comparable on-line corpora for each of the twelve languages, supplemented by the results of elicitation work with native speakers. The results of these empirical studies will be subjected to formal analyses conducted within the framework of Optimality Theory (OT). These OT analyses of individual languages will then be subjected to further theoretical consideration, providing a sound basis for a set of crosslinguistic generalizations. The typology of possessive and partitive constructions derived from this project can then provide linguistic typologists with a set of hypotheses, based on sound empirical work and a rigorous theoretical framework, that can be tested against analyses of other languages. Finally, the results of this project will provide substantial material for consideration by linguists concerned with finding parallels between clause-level and nominal-level morphosyntactic, semantic, and pragmatic phenomena.The project outcomes will thus be of several types. The research team's empirical work will result in (a) a cross-linguistically diverse set of electronic corpora which will be made available to other researchers (pending appropriate permissions) and (b) a set of descriptive statements about the structural, semantic and pragmatic properties of possessive and partitive phrases in a diverse set of languages. The research team's theoretical work, made available in scholarly papers, a book and conference presentations, will result in detailed accounts of OT-type universal constraints and their relative rankings in specific languages. These analyses will advance knowledge both about the linguistic dimensions that are important in crosslinguistic generalizations concerning these structures, and about the typological power and predictions of the OT framework. The analyses will also allow comparisons with crosslinguistic work on the clause along a number of dimensions. The project will build capacity for the training of graduate students in linguistics at Boston University and Brandeis University, and the empirical products-the corpora-will be used as teaching materials by the senior personnel during and after the project.The sample of languages to be studied includes Cantonese, Czech, English, Finnish, German, Icelandic, Korean, Malayalam, Northern Pomo, Spanish, Swedish, and Wolof. Basic descriptive groundwork will contain results of elicitations with native speakers and examples from corpora. OT theoretical analyses will center on (1) effects of person/animacy markedness hierarchies (Silverstein 1976, Aissen 1999) in possessive constructions of various types within and across languages in our sample; (2) the semantics of determiners and their contribution to the "Partitive Constraint," and (3) the various factors contributing to the distribution of case and related phenomena within these constructions, and their relationship to clause-level case patterns.