TY - JOUR
T1 - Variationist typology
T2 - Shared probabilistic constraints across (non-)null subject languages
AU - Torres Cacoullos, Rena
AU - Travis, Catherine E.
N1 - Funding Information:
Acknowledgements: We thank Harald Baayen and the anonymous Linguistics reviewers, as well as colleagues who responded to presentations at the International Conference on Language Variation in Europe (ICLaVE) 8, Universität Leipzig, May 2015; New Ways of Analyzing Variation (NWAV) 44, University of Toronto, October 2015; and Australian Linguistic Society (ALS), Western Sydney University, December 2015. We also thank Danielle Barth and Simón González for running the mixed effects models. This work was made possible by funding from the National Science Foundation (1019112/1019122) and the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2019 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston.
PY - 2019/5/1
Y1 - 2019/5/1
N2 - A key parameter in received classifications of language types is the expression of pronominal subjects. Here we compare variation patterns in conversational data of English-considered a non-null-subject language-and Spanish-a well-studied null-subject language. English has a patently lower rate of expression (approximately 3% unexpressed 1sg and 3sg human subjects vs. 60% in Spanish). Despite the stark difference in rate of expression, the same probabilistic constraints are at work in the two languages. Contrary to popular belief, VP coordination is neither a discrete nor a distinguishing category of English. Instead, a shared constraint is linking with the preceding subject, a refinement of accessibility to include, alongside coreferentiality, measures of structural connectedness-both prosodic and syntactic. Other shared constraints on unexpressed subjects are coreferential subject priming (a tendency to repeat the form of the previous mention) and lexical aspect (reflecting the contribution of a temporal relationship to subject expression). Where the languages most differ is in the envelope of variation. In English, besides coreferential-subject verbs conjoined with a coordinating conjunction, unexpressed subjects are limited to prosodic initial-position in declarative main clauses, a restriction that is absent in Spanish. We propose that the locus of cross-language comparisons is the variable structure of each language, defined by the set of probabilistic constraints but also the delimitation of the variable context within which these are operative.
AB - A key parameter in received classifications of language types is the expression of pronominal subjects. Here we compare variation patterns in conversational data of English-considered a non-null-subject language-and Spanish-a well-studied null-subject language. English has a patently lower rate of expression (approximately 3% unexpressed 1sg and 3sg human subjects vs. 60% in Spanish). Despite the stark difference in rate of expression, the same probabilistic constraints are at work in the two languages. Contrary to popular belief, VP coordination is neither a discrete nor a distinguishing category of English. Instead, a shared constraint is linking with the preceding subject, a refinement of accessibility to include, alongside coreferentiality, measures of structural connectedness-both prosodic and syntactic. Other shared constraints on unexpressed subjects are coreferential subject priming (a tendency to repeat the form of the previous mention) and lexical aspect (reflecting the contribution of a temporal relationship to subject expression). Where the languages most differ is in the envelope of variation. In English, besides coreferential-subject verbs conjoined with a coordinating conjunction, unexpressed subjects are limited to prosodic initial-position in declarative main clauses, a restriction that is absent in Spanish. We propose that the locus of cross-language comparisons is the variable structure of each language, defined by the set of probabilistic constraints but also the delimitation of the variable context within which these are operative.
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U2 - 10.1515/ling-2019-0011
DO - 10.1515/ling-2019-0011
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85067107695
SN - 0024-3949
VL - 57
SP - 653
EP - 692
JO - Linguistics
JF - Linguistics
IS - 3
ER -