Sjef Barbiers

Syntactic doubling and the structure of wh-chains

This paper discusses cases of syntactic doubling in wh-dependencies attested in dialects of Dutch, where more than one member of the same chain is spelled out. We focus on cases of non-identical doubling, in which the chain links spelled out have different forms. We demonstrate that the order of elements in a chain is fixed: the first (or syntactically higher) one is less specific that the second one. We argue that this generalization follows from partial copying, a process that copies a proper subconstituent and remerges it higher in the structure. This naturally excludes the ungrammatical orders, as these would involve full copying plus the addition of features, in violation of the inclusiveness condition. The proposal requires pronouns to be spell-outs of phrases, and it is in combination with this hypothesis that the full set of data is accounted for in a uniform way. Advantages over alternative accounts of syntactic doubling are discussed.

The Syntactic Atlas of the Dutch Dialects

This paper discusses some of the advantages and disadvantages of the various choices we had to make in order to realize the Syntactic Atlas of the Dutch Dialects (SAND) in a relatively short period. The idea is that by presenting the SAND in this way, we enable the ScanDiaSyn project and other new dialect syntax projects to profit from our experience in a similar enterprise. The presentation and explicitation of the choices we had to make, the problems we had to face and the mistakes we have made will not necessarily be the same choices, problems, and mistakes that will arise in the Scandinavian project, but it might give an indication of where problems may be expected and how mistakes may be prevented.

Syntactische atlas van de Nederlandse dialecten : Deel II

De Syntactische Atlas van de Nederlandse Dialecten (SAND) geeft een gedetailleerd overzicht van e verrassend rijke syntactische variatie in 267 dialecten van het Nederlands aan het begin van de 21ste eeuw. Op meer dan 200 kleurenkaarten wordt de geografische distributie van ruim 100 syntactische variabelen getoond. Veel van deze variabelen zijn afwezig in de standaardtaal en daarom van groot descriptief en theoretisch belang. Bij elke kaart wordt een state-of-the-art taalkundige bechrijving gegeven van de afgebeelde variabele tegen de achtergrond van historische ontwikkelingen en de resultaten van modern syntactisch onderzoek. Deel I (2005) gaat over voegwoorden en voegwoordvervoeging, subjectpronomina, subjectverdubbeling en subjectclitisering na ja/nee, reflexieve en reciproke voornaamwoorden, relatiefzinnen, vraagwoordverdubbeling en topicalisatie. Deel II gaat over twee- en drieledige werkwoordsclusters, doorbreking van werkwoordclusters, extrapositie en te in verbale clusters, hulpwerkwoordselectie, doen-insertie, en negatie en kwantificatie.

Ordinals are not as easy as one, two, three: The acquisition of cardinals and ordinals in Dutch

ABSTRACT This study argues that the pattern and timing of ordinal acquisition differs substantially from that of cardinals and is influenced by different language-specific factors, such as (ir)regular ordinal morphology, superlative morphology, and the singular-plural distinction. We discuss data from a Give X task (Wynn 1992) administered to 77 Dutch monolinguals (2;11–6;04) that support a so-called knower-level acquisition pattern (e.g., Le Corre & Carey 2007) for Dutch cardinals but show a more complex picture for ordinals, which are acquired around the time a child masters the necessary counting principles and becomes a CP (cardinal principle) knower. Not only is the tiered pattern absent in regular low ordinals, we also see that it takes time for children to link drie ‘three’ to irregular derde ‘third.’ We take this as evidence that ordinals are acquired via rules, rather than being stored lexically one by one.

Kwantitatief er en ze

Quantitative er and ze This paper reconsiders the syntax of indefinite quantitative er and its definite counterpart ze. Quantitative er ‘there’ is obligatory in Dutch when the only visible element in a nominal group is a numeral. I argue that quantitative er is the pronominalization of a lower projection of the nominal group (DP-low) that contains directly modifying adjectives and complements of N but not relative clauses and PP-adjuncts. Quantitative ze is the pronominalization of a higher projection of the nominal group (DP-high) that contains DP-low and the layers to which PP-adjuncts and relative clauses attach. Both quantitative er and ze are weak pronouns that, like all weak pronouns, move to the lefthand part of the middle field. This analysis explains the parallel syntactic distribution of quantitative er and ze and the differences inmodifiability of the two pronouns. New evidence for the claim that quantitative er involves pronominalization, not ellipsis, comes from the obligatory lack of gender agreement between the nominal group and the relative pronoun in an associated relative clause. New evidence for the parallel analysis of er and ze comes from optional haplology when there are two instances of quantitative ze in one clause.

Locating people with their language : An Applied Linguistics Course using linguistic microvariation databases and tools.

Recent years have seen an increase in the online availability of dialect corpora, databases and search, analysis and visualization tools (cf. www.dialectsyntax.org). Although primarily intended for linguistic research, this infrastructure provides rich resources for courses on sociolinguistics, dialectology, formal linguistics and linguistic methodology. This chapter demonstrates the usefulness of the Dutch linguistic microvariation research tool MIMORE (www.meertens.knaw.nl/mimore) for a course in applied linguistics, more specifically on Language Analysis for the Determination of Origin (LADO). LADO is used in asylum procedures as a means to determine whether an asylum seeker originates from the country or area that s/he claims to originate from. It is a task of linguists to make clear if and how LADO can be a valid method, and what kind of linguistic expertise is needed. MIMORE contains three databases with (morpho-)syntactic and (morpho-)phonological data from a large number of locations in the Dutch language area. The chapter describes how the MIMORE data and tools have been used in the course as training material, to introduce students to the different levels of language variation, to teach them how to recognize linguistic differences and make these explicit and to show them the complications involved in using linguistic properties to locate speakers.

Vragen aan de linkerperiferie

In this paper we look at how, in different dialects of Dutch, questions are formed in which a question word crosses a clause boundary. Many dialects allow doubling constructions in which two question words appear, rather than one. Some dialects have identical doubling (with two identical question words) whereas other dialects have non-identical doubling (with two distinct-looking question words). We argue that the variation basically follows from the copy theory of movement, in which both full and partial copying are allowed. If correct, the proposal has consequences for the nature and structure of pronouns. Question pronouns, we argue, spell out different phrasal projections that can be independently motivated. The advantages of our approach to alternative proposals are made explicit.