Re: THEORY nouns and cases (was: Verbs derived from noun cases)

Hi!

First of all, thanks for all you patience. :-)

I still need a bit more. :-)

"Thomas R. Wier" <trwier@...> writes:
> Henrik Theiling wrote:
>...
> > syntactical operation: noun phrase --is-assigned-to--> verbal argument slot
> >
> > Possible implementations: - word order - adpositions - case ...
> >
> > semantical operation: verbal argument slot --is-assigned-to--> thematic role
> >
> > Implementation: - lexicon lookup for the verb ...?
> >
> > Now, would we agree up to here?
>
> No, we wouldn't.  I favor an architecture of grammar in which the
> separate modules are quite autonomous (though not entirely so).
And I thought I viewed them to be quite autonomous.

> What you have suggested here is that the syntactic and morphological
> modules are not distinct:
Hmm?  No.

> case and adpositions are lumped together as "implementations" of
> syntactic processes.
Ah, yes, I say that.  I don't lump them together, though.  In the case
of case, morphology implements it.  You could say that morphology
marks case on words and communicates the implemented value to syntax,
which decides what to do with a phrase in XY case (the communication
may be viewed to be the other way around, too: the value of case is an
agreement between syntax module and morphology module which morphology
implements and syntax uses to assign the argument to a specific verbal
argument slot).

The syntax module does not need to know the morphological
representation of that XY case on words, but it does need to know the
value XY as such, otherwise, how should it assign the argument to a
slot?  What would the nice morphological case marking be good for if
syntax does not see what value it implements?

> To use LFG terminology, you are conflating lexicocentricity with
> endocentricity: properties that are inherent properties of words and
> word-structure, and those that arise as a result of phrase structure
> rules.
Aha.  No, by saying case implements a syntactic function
morphologically, I don't think I mix these levels up.  There needs to
be communication between the modules, otherwise the whole circuit
would not work.

I don't understand where I lump together case and adpositions.  I say
they both implement the syntactic mapping of NPs into verbal argument
slots.  Case does it morphologically, adpositions syntactically.  They
are not in the same modules, but the modules, of course, communicate
with each other.  You seem to disagree.  Unfortunately, I fail to see
how.

**Henrik