Practical Information - Generative Linguistics in the Old World
Practical Information - Generative Linguistics in the Old World
Practical Information - Generative Linguistics in the Old World
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sults summarized <strong>in</strong> (2) suggest that <strong>the</strong> two possible applications of extraposition – with<strong>in</strong><strong>the</strong> superord<strong>in</strong>ate clause and with<strong>in</strong> <strong>the</strong> higher relative clause – are <strong>in</strong>dependent of each o<strong>the</strong>r.(2) Bader (subm.: Table 14)Degree of CE RC high External properties RC low Internal propertiessentence type (1a) 2 + CE long post-NP region + CE long post-NP regionSubj antecedentsentence type (1c) 1 + CE long post-NP region – CE short post-NP regionSubj antecedentsentence type (1b) 1 – CE short post-NP region + CE long post-NP regionObj antecedentsentence type (1d) 0 – CE short post-NP region – CE short post-NP regionObj antecedentIt is for this reason that doubly center-embedded RCs have no unique properties. Instead, <strong>the</strong>yshare properties with sentences conta<strong>in</strong><strong>in</strong>g <strong>the</strong> same k<strong>in</strong>d of disrupted dependency: sentenceswith center-embedded RCs of type (1c) as far as <strong>the</strong> properties of <strong>the</strong> superord<strong>in</strong>ate clause areconcerned, and sentences with extraposed RCs of type (1b) as far as <strong>the</strong> properties of <strong>the</strong>higher RC are concerned. The corpus evidence was corroborated by an experiment that <strong>in</strong>vestigated<strong>the</strong> acceptability of <strong>the</strong> very same sentence structures that were <strong>the</strong> topic of <strong>the</strong> corpusstudy. Thus, <strong>in</strong> contrast to <strong>the</strong> predictions of Christiansen & MacDonald’s (2009) SRN, ourdata support <strong>the</strong> Disrupted-Dependency Hypo<strong>the</strong>sis that all constra<strong>in</strong>ts on center-embedd<strong>in</strong>gfollow from <strong>the</strong> fact that center-embedd<strong>in</strong>g disrupts syntactic dependencies.In a biol<strong>in</strong>guistic context, it has been claimed that approaches such as Christiansen &MacDonald’s (2009) model “speak to how process<strong>in</strong>g and knowledge of language are fundamentally<strong>in</strong>tertw<strong>in</strong>ed <strong>in</strong> a way not well-captured by traditional approaches <strong>in</strong> formal language<strong>the</strong>ory” (de Vries et al. 2011: 29). Recently, however, it has been shown for <strong>the</strong> doma<strong>in</strong> oflanguage acquisition that data from frequency-oriented l<strong>in</strong>guistics can fruitfully be connectedto current conceptions of UG (cf. Yang 2010). In <strong>the</strong> second part of our paper, build<strong>in</strong>g on ourarguments aga<strong>in</strong>st usage-based approaches to recursion, we will argue that systematic propertiesof performance systems can play an important role with<strong>in</strong> <strong>the</strong> biol<strong>in</strong>guistic perspective onlanguage by provid<strong>in</strong>g third-factor explanations for crucial design features of human language.In particular, we will propose a typology of explanatory strategies that address propertiesof <strong>the</strong> performance <strong>in</strong>terface and, as we will argue, show po<strong>in</strong>ts of convergence withChomsky’s (2005) three-factor parcellation (cf. Trotzke et al. <strong>in</strong> press).ReferencesBader, Markus. submitted. Complex center-embedded relative clauses <strong>in</strong> German.Chomsky, Noam. 2005. Three factors <strong>in</strong> language design. L<strong>in</strong>guistic Inquiry 36, 1-22.Chomsky, Noam & George A. Miller. 1963. Introduction to <strong>the</strong> formal analysis of naturallanguages. In R. Duncan Luce, Robert R. Bush & Eugene Galanter (eds.), Handbook ofMa<strong>the</strong>matical Psychology: Vol. 2, 269–321. New York: Wiley.Christiansen, Morton H. & Nick Chater. 2008. Language as shaped by <strong>the</strong> bra<strong>in</strong>. Behavioraland Bra<strong>in</strong> Sciences 31, 489-558.Christiansen, Morten H. & Maryellen C. MacDonald. 2009. A usage-based approach to recursion<strong>in</strong> sentence process<strong>in</strong>g. Language Learn<strong>in</strong>g 59, 126-161.Trotzke, Andreas, Markus Bader & Lyn Frazier. <strong>in</strong> press. Three factors and <strong>the</strong> performance<strong>in</strong>terface <strong>in</strong> language design. To appear <strong>in</strong> Biol<strong>in</strong>guistics 7.de Vries, Me<strong>in</strong>ou H., Morten H. Christiansen & Karl Magnus Petersson. 2011. Learn<strong>in</strong>g recursion:Multiple nested and crossed dependencies. Biol<strong>in</strong>guistics 5, 10-35.Yang, Charles. 2010. Three factors <strong>in</strong> language variation. L<strong>in</strong>gua 120, 1160-1177.2