Describing and Modeling Variation in Grammar PDF
Preview Describing and Modeling Variation in Grammar
Describing and Modeling Variation in Grammar ≥ Trends in Linguistics Studies and Monographs 204 Editors Walter Bisang Hans Henrich Hock Werner Winter Mouton de Gruyter Berlin · New York Describing and Modeling Variation in Grammar edited by Andreas Dufter Jürg Fleischer Guido Seiler Mouton de Gruyter Berlin · New York MoutondeGruyter(formerlyMouton,TheHague) isaDivisionofWalterdeGruyterGmbH&Co.KG,Berlin. (cid:2)(cid:2) Printedonacid-freepaperwhichfallswithintheguidelines oftheANSItoensurepermanenceanddurability. LibraryofCongressCataloging-in-PublicationData Describing and modeling variation in grammar / edited by Andreas Dufter,JürgFleischer,GuidoSeiler. p.cm.(cid:2)(Trendsinlinguistics.Studiesandmonographs;204) Includesbibliographicalreferencesandindex. ISBN978-3-11-020590-9(hardcover:alk.paper) 1.Languageandlanguages(cid:2)Variation. 2.Grammar,Compara- tiveandgeneral. 3.Sociolinguistics. I.Dufter,Andreas. II.Flei- scher,Jürg. III.Seiler,Guido. P120.V37D44 2009 4171.2(cid:2)dc22 2009003855 ISBN 978-3-11-020590-9 ISSN 1861-4302 BibliographicinformationpublishedbytheDeutscheNationalbibliothek TheDeutscheNationalbibliothekliststhispublicationintheDeutscheNationalbibliografie; detailedbibliographicdataareavailableintheInternetathttp://dnb.d-nb.de. ”Copyright2009byWalterdeGruyterGmbH&Co.KG,D-10785Berlin All rights reserved, including those of translation into foreign languages. No part of this bookmaybereproducedortransmittedinanyformorbyanymeans,electronicormechan- ical,includingphotocopy,recordingoranyinformationstorageandretrievalsystem,with- outpermissioninwritingfromthepublisher. Coverdesign:ChristopherSchneider,Laufen. PrintedinGermany. Editors’Preface Thepresentvolumeoriginatesfromaworkshop on“DescribingandModeling Variation in Grammar” that we convened at the 28th Annual Meeting of the German Linguistics Society (DGfS) in Bielefeld, Germany, February 22–24, 2006.Thisworkshophadapredecessor,entitled“VariationundihreErkla¨rung”, which was organized by Ju¨rg Fleischer and Guido Seiler at the 3rd Biannual Meeting of the Swiss Linguistic Society (SSG / SSL) in Berne, Switzerland, October1,2004.Bothworkshopsstimulatedlivelydiscussionsbetweenlinguists ofdifferenttheoreticalpersuasions andareasofexpertise.Thepresentvolume offersaselectionofthepaperspresentedattheBielefeldworkshopaswellasa numberofinvited additional contributions. We would like to take this opportunity to acknowledge our debt of grati- tudetoanumberofpeople:First aheartfeltthanks to allcontributors fortheir commitment,dedication andunfailing patience.Specialthanksarealso dueto our anonymous reviewers, who readily agreed to furnish their expert advice despitenumerousotherobligations.Ourimpression,whichhasbeenconfirmed byexplicit feedbackfromseveralofourcontributors, isthattheircriticalcom- mentswereofgreathelpinimprovingandrefiningtheargumentationputforth in the papers. Finally, we wish to thank the managing editors of theTrends in Linguistics. Studies and Monographs series foraccepting the volumefor pub- lication as well as the editorial staff at Mouton de Gruyter, especially Birgit Sievert,fortheircooperationandsupport. Munich,MarburgandManchester AndreasDufter, September2008 Ju¨rgFleischer, Guido Seiler Table of contents Editors’Preface v Introduction AndreasDufter, JürgFleischerandGuidoSeiler 1 Parameter-basedandMinimalistapproaches Methodological considerations ongrammarvariation. TherightperipheryasanOV/VOdecidingparametermore sothantheleftperiphery:Gradienceintheverbcluster WernerAbraham 21 Variationaslexicalchoice: have,got andtheexpressionofpossession FayeChalcraft 59 VariationinIcelandicmorphosyntax Thórhallur EythórssonandJóhannesGísli Jónsson 81 Constraint-basedapproaches Thepredicativeasasourceofgrammaticalvariation JudithBerman 99 Morphological variation:Adeclarativeapproach MartinNeef 117 Differentnotions ofvariationandtheirreflexes inSwissGermanrelativization MartinSalzmann 135 Fromdocumentationtogrammaticaldescription: PrepositionalphrasesinRuhrdeutsch RenéSchiering 163 viii Tableofcontents Usage-based,construction-basedandstatisticalapproaches Canwefactoroutfreechoice? BertCappelle 183 Empiricalsyntax: Idiolectalvariabilityintwo-andthree-verbclusters inregionalstandardDutchandDutchdialects LeonieCornips 203 Towardsamultivariatemodelofgrammar: ThecaseofwordordervariationinDutchclausefinalverbclusters GertdeSutter 225 Transplanteddialectsandlanguagechange: Question formationinQuébec Martin ElsigandShanaPoplack 255 AgreementinEnglishdialects VerenaHaserandBerndKortmann 271 Semi-modalvariation Katarina Klein 297 VariationinKomiobjectmarking GersonKlumpp 325 Howlexicalizationreflectedinhyphenation affectsvariation andword-formation Britta Mondorf 361 VariationinGermanadjectiveinflection:Acorpusstudy SaidSahel 389 Index 407 ∗ Introduction Andreas Dufter, Ju¨rg Fleischer and Guido Seiler 1. Thediscoveryof variation Forthosewhoarewillingtothinkaboutgrammarasanalgorithmicdevicethat relates mental representations to well-formed linguistic expressions, variation might appear as a rather unwelcome facet of parole, impeding the discovery ofinteresting generalizationsaboutindividual languagesand,ultimately, about languageaspartofourbiologicalandcognitiveendowment.Infact,ithasbeen statedthat“thegeneralprogramofalllinguistsbeginswiththesearchforinvari- ance” (Labov 1975: 7). This research program seems to imply that variation, ratherthanitsabsence,issomethingtobeexpectedinlinguistic behavior.Con- versely,it suggests that identifying invariant aspectsbehind surfacevariability oflinguisticformwillnotalwaysbeatrivialtask.Rough-and-readydefinitions of variation as “different ways of saying the same thing” or as “differences thatdon’tmakeadifference”aregroundedindenotationalortruth-conditional equivalence relations and have been put to much use in structuralist theoriz- ingaboutallo-relationsinphonologyandmorphologyandaboutthedichotomy betweenemicandeticlevelsofanalysis.Inearliergenerativeterms,thisdistinc- tion has been recast in terms of input-output correspondences, with variation manifestingitselfasdifferentoutputs generatedfromasingleinput. Insyntax, notalllinguistswouldagreethatvariationcaninsightfullybeanalyzedasarising fromnon-deterministic input-output mappings, all themoresosince theexact natureofthesyntacticinputcontinuestobeunderheavydebate.Lexicalistand feature-drivenapproachessetouttorestoredeterminismbyenrichingsyntactic inputswithspecificationsrelated,amongotherthings,tothestructuringofinfor- mationanddiscourse.Atthesametime,syntacticvariationhasbeendescribed inmoresurface-orientedways,byappealingtounderspecifiedconstructionsor constructionhierarchies,or“re-arrangements”of‘canonical’constituentorders andargumentstructures. Whatever strategy one chooses to adopt, variation in syntax, but also in other components of grammar, might appear at first sight to constitute just anotheraspect of linguistic diversity. Indeed, in muchrecent theorizing, it has become customary to treat “macro-variation” – i.e., differences across lan- guages – and “micro-variation” – i.e., linguistic variation observed within an individual language – on a par, subject to the same universal principles and,
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