Lexical Functional Grammar

In defense of COMP: Complementation in Moksha Mordvin

In this paper, we argue that an adequate description of Moksha Mordvin complement clauses requires preserving the traditional LFG distinction between OBJ and COMP grammatical functions. Most clausal complements in Moksha belong to one of the two …

Information structure conditions on the agreement controller in Dargwa

Much of the current debate on the syntax of Dargwa is centered around the problem of gender agreement on auxiliaries. This type of agreement is exceptional in that it is not exclusively controlled by the absolutive argument, but can be alternatively …

A multilevel theory of clause combining: Ossetic and Russian revisited [In Russian]

In this chapter, several constructions in Ossetic and Russian are analyzed with respect to coordination and subordination: in Ossetic, two clause combining constructions utilizing the coordinating conjunction æmæ; in Russian, causal clauses. It is …

Person agreement in Dargwa: An OT-LFG analysis [In Russian]

The rules of person agreement in Dargwa (East Caucasian) are quite complex and are based on the relative positions of core arguments on the person hierarchy and the grammatical relations hierarchy. These rules also vary across languages of the group. …

Ergative gender agreement in Dargwa ``backward control'' or feature sharing?

Dargwa languages have two types of agreement at clause level: gender and person agreement. In the general case, person agreement is hierarchical (speech act participants prefered to 3rd persons), while gender agreement is with the absolutive (S/P) …

Clitic positioning in Ossetic

We present data regarding the positioning of clitics in the Iron dialect of Ossetic, which is in some respects similar to data for ‘second-position’ clitics in more familiar languages, but in other respects is considerably more complicated. We …

Number mismatches in coordination

In some languages, including Russian and Italian, it is possible for a plural noun to be modified by two or more coordinated singular adjectives. At the same time, it is possible for a singular noun to be modified by two or more coordinated singular …

Cause in Russian and the formal typology of coordination and subordination

I apply the theoretical account of clause combining developed earlier based on Ossetic data to Russian causal clauses. Three Russian subordinating conjunctions are analyzed: *potomu čto* 'because', *poskolʼku* 'since' and *tak kak* 'for'. I show that …

Systematic mismatches

In this paper, I analyze two clause combining strategies in Ossetic that exhibit mixed properties between coordination and subordination. I argue that the `mismatch approach' proposed by Culicover & Jackendoff (1997) and Yuasa & Sadock (2002) is best …

Pronominal coreference in Ossetic correlatives and the syntax-semantics interface

Correlatives are a subtype of relative constructions where the subordinate clause precedes the main clause, contains a relative pronoun or DP, and is resumed in the main clause by a full DP containing a personal or demonstrative pronoun (the …