Abstract Mugane (1997) identifies two types of individual-denoting nominalizations in Gĩkũyũ (Bantu): the [mu… a]-type and the [mu… i]-type. He argues that the [mu… i]-type nominalizations are phrasal and that the [mu… a]-type nominalizations exhibit a puzzling nature, displaying both lexical and syntactic properties. This study examines Mugane’s characterization, revisiting the notion of a lexicon-syntax divide. Applying Wood’s (2023) Complex Head analysis, I demonstrate that we can explain the [mu… a]-type nominalizations within a syntactic framework without resorting to the lexicon. The analysis reveals that the puzzle is resolvable and that syntax can account for both types of nominalizations in Gĩkũyũ.

Abstract I discuss two colloquial Italian idioms expressing respectively emphatic negation and objection, col cavolo (lit. ‘with the cabbage’) and un cavolo (lit. ‘a cabbage’). Despite superficial similarities, they represent two very different strategies at syntactic, semantic, and pragmatic level. Col cavolo belongs to a class of non-verbal polar predicates selecting a clausal complement and expressing the speaker’s degree of strength of sincerity towards the proposition (Repp 2013). Col cavolo expresses high commitment to ¬ p : it is base-generated in the left periphery, as confirmed by its limited polarity-licensing abilities and impossibility of agreement with a TP-level negative PolP. Instead, un cavolo is a metalinguistic objector (Martins 2020), an echoic responsive move (Farkas & Bruce 2010); it originates as a vulgar minimiser and can function as an ‘utterance minimiser’, predicating minimal relevance of the associate and rejecting it globally rather than reversing its truth conditions. Finally, I compare col cavolo with similar cross-linguistic expressions, and offer a generalisation for left-peripheral negators: those participating in a movement or agreement chain with the TP-level PolP have full semantic and polarity-licensing capabilities, while base-generated ones, being non-local to the lower proposition, only license weak polarity items and yield double negation with a lower negative PolP.

Simin Karimi, Narges Nematollahi, Roya Kabiri, Jian Gang Ngui (eds.), Advances in Iranian Linguistics II (Current Issues in Linguistic Theory). Amsterdam & Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company, 2023. Pp. VI + 315.

Abstract The experimentally backed and hitherto overlooked empirical observation of the paper is a contrast among indefinite Positive Polarity Items regarding their possibility of being rescued under certain operators with different rescuing potential. If / surprise / only / don’t think can rescue some -indefinites, suspending their anti-licensing (i.e., their impossibility to occur in the scope of a clausemate negation): while some -pronouns (in English and French) and des -indefinites in French exhibit the expected rescuability, English some -NPs remain unexpectedly degraded. Our account relies on the hypothesis that ‘rescuing’ is due to sentential negation being interpreted as ‘external’ (vs. nullified as in most literature). The definition we propose for external negation is syntactic: rescuing operators allow sentential negation to raise to an illocutionary functional projection above Tense Phrase (TP). Thus at LF (Logical Form), the negation takes that higher projection (rather than TP) as complement and becomes harmless for some -indefinites. The semantic correlate of this syntactic proposal is the interpretation of external negation as a propositional operator. As it involves the illocutionary periphery, rescuing is pragmatic in nature. The different rescuing potential between some -pronouns and some -NPs arises from the interplay between their distinct LF-representations and a minimal-event pragmatic constraint on rescuing.

Abstract This paper presents and analyzes antipassive constructions in the Mayan language Kaqchikel. Through various syntactic tests, we show that antipassive constructions differ from both active transitive and Agent Focus structures in that they do not syntactically project a DP-sized object. Thus, we should think of antipassives as a type of unergative. When an object seems to disappear or become less important in an antipassive, this is not a special feature of antipassives – it is simply what happens in any intransitive structure. In other words, the ‘suppression’ or ‘demotion’ of thematic object is not an inherent characteristic of the construction but rather a byproduct of its intransitive nature. To better understand how transitive and intransitive constructions function cross-linguistically, we propose a novel framework for categorizing the functional heads v and Voice. We show that the external argument behaves differently in transitive versus intransitive clauses, appearing in different structural positions, which is backed up by evidence from causatives in Kaqchikel and scope patterns in other languages. While transitive and passive structures include a Voice projection, Agent Focus and antipassive structures do not. We compare our analysis to previous work on antipassives and explore what our findings might mean for understanding antipassives in other languages.

Abstract Inflectional systems vary along multiple dimensions (number of members, size of paradigms, word class, integrative complexity, accidents of history, etc.). This makes it difficult to find significant correlations and causality relations between different properties, as attested systems usually differ in multiple ways at the same time, thus obscuring possible relations between individual variables. Here we analyze the relation between a system’s size by number of members and its morphological complexity. We do so by exploring in detail, via quantitative methods, the cognate inflectional systems of Central Pame and Chichimec (Otomanguean, Mexico), whose inflecting nominal classes differ precisely mostly with regard to their size (i.e. number of members).