Arhonto Terzi

Clitic combinations, their hosts and their ordering

In this work we investigate the implications of Kaynes (1994) antisymmetry proposals for the position to which clitics adjoin in the sentence and the manner in which two (or more) clitics may combine. It is demonstrated that adjunction of clitics to Agr0 is excluded by antisymmetry, leading to results in the spirit of Chomsky (1995), who dispenses with the notion of agreement as a functional head, hence as a potential adjunction site for clitics. Assuming that the Linear Correspondence Axiom does not apply after spell-out, we argue that T0 serves as a host of clitics when Tense features are weak; as for the remaining contexts, we propose that clitics adjoin to heads that are placeholders, departing from the idea that there is a designated functional head and that clitics adjoin to it in all syntactic environments. We present evidence from Greek dialects which supports these claims and instantiates the different manner in which clitics combine in clusters. We extend our proposals to explain similar issues pertaining to the clitic system of the Standard Romance languages.

Grammatical Abilities of Greek-Speaking Children with Autism

This study investigates pronoun reference and verbs with nonactive morphology in high-functioning Greek-speaking children with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD). It is motivated by problems with reflexive pronouns demonstrated by English-speaking children with ASD and the fact that reflexivity is also expressed via nonactive (reflexive) verbs in Greek. Twenty 5- to 8-year-old children with ASD and 20 vocabulary-matched typically developing controls of the same age range completed a sentence-picture matching, an elicitation, and a judgment task. Children with ASD did not differ from controls in interpreting reflexive and strong pronouns but were less accurate in the comprehension of clitics and omitted clitics in their production. The findings render clitics a vulnerable domain for autism in Greek, and potentially for other languages with clitics, and suggest that this could be a consequence of difficulties in the syntax-pragmatics or the syntax-phonology interface. The two groups did not differ in the comprehension of nonactive morphology but were less accurate in passive than reflexive verbs. We argue that this is likely to stem from the linguistic representation associated with each type of verb, rather than their input frequency.

Clitic Misplacement Among Normally Developing Children and Children With Specific Language Impairment and the Status of Infl Heads

In this article, we focus on an exceptional instance of nonadult positioning of clitics in early Cypriot Greek and Cypriot Greek with specific language impairment (SLI). We attribute misplaced clitics to childrens incomplete knowledge concerning properties of the inflectional (Infl) particles, which interact in crucial ways with finite V(erb) movement to M(ood). We claim that children perceive Infl particles as phrasal specifiers or adjuncts, unable to check the V-features of M, hence perform V-to-M movement even in their presence, and clitics emerge in (nonadult) postverbal position, giving the impression that they have been misplaced. We point out that functional heads seem to be perceived as phrasal in other early languages and possibly also in domains other than Infl, and we explain why clitics are not found misplaced in standard Greek and standard Romance, with the exception of Portuguese. Finally, the absence of qualitative differences between the early populations and populations with SLI we studied corroborates with views that consider SLI a language delay, but the degree to which quantitative differences were attested raises questions.

Cypriot Greek Clitics and Their Positioning Restrictions

This paper is a study of clitic placement in Cypriot Greek (CGr) fmite clauses.2 Its primary purpose is to provide a systematic description of the positions in which pronominal clitics surface in CGr, compare them with the counterpart structures of Standard Greek (SGr), and attempt to offer a formal account of the differences in clitic positioning between the two varieties. It will be shown that the ban on first position clitics that CGr demonstrates is unlike that manifested by the Slavic (the sometimes-called Wackernagel) languages. Rather, the environments from which CGr pronominal clitics are excluded are similar, although not identical, to those of Portuguese and Galician.3 A central claim that will be advanced is that clitics adjoin to a functional head that occupies the same position in the clausal structure in both CGr and SGr; the fact that they often surface in a different position in each variety is seen as the result of the overt movement which the fmite verb undergoes in CGr. I consider M0 (the head of M(ood) P(hrase)) as the landing site of fmite verb movement and conjecture that V-to-M movement is related to the licensing requirements of CGr clitics which, unlike those of their SGr counterparts, have to be satisfied before spell-out.

The Interface of Syntax with Pragmatics and Prosody in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorders

In order to study problems of individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) with morphosyntax, we investigated twenty high-functioning Greek-speaking children (mean age: 6;11) and twenty age- and language-matched typically developing children on environments that allow or forbid object clitics or their corresponding noun phrase. Children with ASD fell behind typically developing children in comprehending and producing simple clitics and producing noun phrases in focus structures. The two groups performed similarly in comprehending and producing clitics in clitic left dislocation and in producing noun phrases in non-focus structures. We argue that children with ASD have difficulties at the interface of (morpho)syntax with pragmatics and prosody, namely, distinguishing a discourse prominent element, and considering intonation relevant for a particular interpretation that excludes clitics.