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<DIV dir=ltr align=left><SPAN class=Apple-style-span
style="FONT-FAMILY: Calibri; BORDER-COLLAPSE: collapse"><SPAN
style="FONT-SIZE: 11pt">The Department of Linguistics at USC proudly
presents: <BR> <BR></SPAN><FONT size=4><SPAN
style="FONT-SIZE: 14.5pt"><B>Imperfect Alignment? The Syntax and Semantics of
Chamorro Possessors<BR></B></SPAN></FONT></SPAN><SPAN class=Apple-style-span
style="FONT-FAMILY: Calibri; BORDER-COLLAPSE: collapse"><SPAN
style="FONT-SIZE: 11pt"><BR></SPAN><FONT size=4><SPAN
style="FONT-SIZE: 14.5pt">Sandy Chung</DIV>
<DIV>
<DIV>University of California, Santa Cruz</DIV></SPAN></FONT><FONT size=4><SPAN
style="FONT-SIZE: 13.5pt"><SPAN class=Apple-style-span
style="FONT-SIZE: small"><A
href="http://people.ucsc.edu/~schung/">http://people.ucsc.edu/~schung/</A></SPAN><BR></SPAN></FONT><SPAN
style="FONT-SIZE: 11pt"><BR>Monday, April 27, 2009 3:00 pm - 4:30
pm <BR>Grace Ford Salvatori 118 <BR> <BR>Following the talk,
dinner will be served in the Linguistics Conference Room GFS
330 <BR> <BR><STRONG>Abstract: <BR></STRONG><BR>
<DIV>Generative syntax famously assumes a tight fit between surface word
order </DIV>
<DIV>and hierarchical relations in syntactic structure. It also
assumes</DIV>
<DIV>that at some point in the derivation--if not in overt syntax, then
in </DIV>
<DIV>Logical Form,--hierarchical syntactic structure is transparently
aligned</DIV>
<DIV>with certain semantic notions, such as scope and information
structure.</DIV>
<DIV>This talk explores how far these assumptions can take us in
understanding </DIV>
<DIV>the syntax and semantics of possessors in Chamorro, an
Austronesian </DIV>
<DIV>language of the Mariana Islands. Possessive DP's in Chamorro have
both a </DIV>
<DIV>head determiner and a possessor, which can co-vary. In what I call
_bare </DIV>
<DIV>possessives_, the head determiner is the null indefinite article and
the </DIV>
<DIV>possessor is strong in Milsark's (1977) sense. I first establish
that </DIV>
<DIV>bare possessives are morphosyntactically indefinite; in other words,</DIV>
<DIV>there is no `definiteness spread' in possessive DP's in this language.
</DIV>
<DIV>I then show that unsurprisingly, Chamorro observes Milsark's
Generalization </DIV>
<DIV>(subjects of individual-level predicates must be strong). But
surprisingly, </DIV>
<DIV>the strong possessor of a bare possessive appears to be able to
satisfy </DIV>
<DIV>this restriction. I explore two syntactic accounts of this
pattern, </DIV>
<DIV>according to which the possessor counts as the "subject" for </DIV>
<DIV>the purposes of Milsark's Generalization because it has raised to
a </DIV>
<DIV>"subject" position, e.g. the specifier of Tense or Topic. One</DIV>
<DIV>of these accounts is empirically unsatisfactory; the other is
less </DIV>
<DIV>so, but has the consequence that the alignment between surface
word </DIV>
<DIV>order and hierarchical relations is either empirically
undiscoverable </DIV>
<DIV>or else accidental. The overall result is to raise doubts about</DIV>
<DIV>the alignment hypotheses we are accustomed to working with</DIV>
<DIV>in generative syntax: as far as Chamorro is concerned, not all</DIV>
<DIV>these hypotheses can be maintained in their current form.</DIV>
<DIV><BR></DIV>
<DIV><BR></DIV>
<DIV>Reference</DIV>
<DIV><BR></DIV>
<DIV>Milsark, Gary. 1977. Toward an explanation of certain peculiarities
of</DIV>
<DIV>the existential construction in English. _Linguistic Analysis_ 3:
1-29.</DIV>
<DIV><BR></DIV><BR><BR> <BR>Email inquiries to: <A
style="COLOR: rgb(0,0,204)" href="http://lingtalk@college.usc.edu"
target=_blank>lingtalk@college.usc.edu</A> <BR><A
style="COLOR: rgb(0,0,204)"
href="http://www.usc.edu/schools/college/ling/newsevents/colloquia.shtml"
target=_blank>http://www.usc.edu/schools/college/ling/newsevents/colloquia.shtml</A> <BR> </SPAN></SPAN><BR></DIV></BODY></HTML>