Re: THEORY: two questions

Matt Pearson wrote:

> >From: "Matt Pearson"
> >
> >> >> Verb-initial, head-marking:     Marshallese, Chamorro (?)
> >> >> Verb-initial, dep-marking:      Tagalog, Polynesian lgs
> >> >> Verb-medial, head-marking:      Swahili, Mohawk
> >> >> Verb-medial, dep-marking:       Russian
> >> >> Verb-final, head-marking:       Lakhota, many Papuan lgs
> >> >> Verb-final, dep-marking:        Japanese, Yidiny
> >
> >What's head-marking and dependent-marking again?
>
> Depends on who you ask.  My definition:  A head-marking
> language is one which keeps track of arguments (who did
> what to whom) primarily by means of agreement on the verb,
> while a dependent-marking language keeps track of arguments
> primarily by means of case-marking on the noun phrases.
> That is, "head" = the verb, while "dependents" = the noun
> phrases.
Shouldn't that be more general, though?  What I was taught in my
syntax class was that headedness was an abstract property of certain
words within phrases, and every type of phrase has a head (unless it's
headless, of course, as we've been discussing on another thread :) ).  So, under
that system, head-marking would include both, e.g., Latin "habet" (which
would be the head of a verb phrase) and "canus" (head of a noun phrase),
as opposed to, say, German, where case marking, except in frozen phrases
and in a small class of so-called "strong nouns", is marked on dependent
determiners and adjectives:

(a) Ansichten eines           Clowns
      view:PL   a:GEN.SG  clown:GEN.SG

(b) Freude, schöner                               Götterfunken
      joy        beautiful.MASC.NOM.SG spark-of-the-gods

(c) Proletärier      aller            Länder,  vereinigt         euch!
     proletarian:PL all:GEN.PL land:PL  unify:IMP.PL yourself:ACC.PL

I realize it's just a matter of definition, but I guess my question becomes:
why restrict the extent of your terminology when a broader definition makes,
IMHO, a more "interesting" (in the Chomskyan meaning of the word)
generalization?

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Tom Wier <artabanos@...>
ICQ#: 4315704   AIM: trwier
"Cogito ergo sum, sed credo ergo ero."
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