0100492871

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Language variation and the labeling of modification structures

English (英語)

Papers from the International Workshop on the Syntax of Predication and Modification 2024

121-138

神戸大学大学院人文学研究科言語学研究室

2025-02-15

2025-01-16

Japanese is known to allow various kinds of adnominal clausal modifiers. Although this is often assumed to be just the nature of the language, this paper shows that it is explained by the labeling mechanism of the language. It is known that English, for example, employs feature-sharing extensively for the labeling of {XP, YP} structures. This paper argues that Japanese, which lacks φ-feature agreement, appeals to weak heads for the purpose. More concretely, XP provides the label for {XP, α} if α is a weak head or search into α finds a weak head, and among the weak heads in Japanese are Case markers and predicate inflection. As adnominal clauses accompany prenominal inflection, NP provides the label for {{TP, inflection}, NP}. This makes it possible for the language to label complex NPs in which the embedded clause is neither a complement of N nor a relative clause.

relative clauses

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