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Information structure and OV word order in Old and Middle English. A phase-based approach
- Source :
- The Journal of Comparative Germanic Linguistics
- Publication Year :
- 2022
-
Abstract
- Contains fulltext : 252767.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Open Access) This article re-examines the evidence for OV and VO variation and the loss of OV order in historical English, and presents a novel and unified analysis of Old and Middle English word order based on a uniform VO grammar, with leftward scrambling of specific types of objects. This analysis provides an insightful framework for a precise analysis of how OV word orders differ from VO word orders. We show in detail (following up Struik & van Kemenade 2020) that OV with referential objects involves discourse-given objects. We then present a phase-based analysis from a VO base in which objects undergo feature-driven movement to spec,vP triggered by the information structure of the object. We propose that this analysis also yields a syntactic framework for analysing the derivation of preverbal quantified and negated objects, as well as a natural explanation for the stepwise loss of OV word order. 09 maart 2022
Details
- ISSN :
- 13834924
- Database :
- OpenAIRE
- Journal :
- The Journal of Comparative Germanic Linguistics
- Accession number :
- edsair.doi.dedup.....be66b07eaf6ddcd03167067b839506fc