{"title":"On PERSON, animacy, and copular agreement in Czech","authors":"J. Bartošová, I. Kucerova","doi":"10.1093/OSO/9780198829850.003.0007","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/OSO/9780198829850.003.0007","url":null,"abstract":"This chapter provides novel empirical evidence from agreement in Czech copular clauses that the [+PERSON] feature is dependent on animacy (Adger and Harbour 2007, Nevins 2007, a.o.). The core evidence comes from agreement with φ-feature-deficient pronouns. It is argued that agreement with φ-feature-deficient pronouns yields a Multiple Agree configuration (Hiraiwa 2005). Strikingly, the interpretation of such a pronoun is restricted by all φ-features present in the Multiple Agree chain. Thus if a φ-feature-deficient pronoun with an unvalued PERSON feature enters a Multiple-Agree chain with valued φ-features, including a valued PERSON feature, then the PERSON feature restricts the interpretation of the antecedent of the pronoun. Crucially, this happens only if the pronoun gets valued as [+PERSON]. It is argued that this is because [+PERSON] pronouns have φ-feature valuation restricted by GENDER presuppositions associated with animate referents (Heim 2008, Sudo 2012, a.o.).","PeriodicalId":308902,"journal":{"name":"The Grammar of Copulas Across Languages","volume":"251 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-02-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"124152906","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Aspects of the syntax of ce in French copular sentences","authors":"Isabelle Roy, U. Shlonsky","doi":"10.1093/oso/9780198829850.003.0008","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780198829850.003.0008","url":null,"abstract":"This chapter offers a syntactic analysis of French ce in copular constructions. It is argued that the distribution of ce is best understood in terms of the conditions on the agree operation inside the copular sentence. The proform ce, an expletive, is inserted whenever an agreement relationship cannot be established between an element in the subject position and an element from the PredP (Bowers 1993). Two sources of agreement failure are considered. In one case, agreement failure results from syntactic constraints on movement (Relativized Minimality, criterial freezing) together with focalization. In the other case, agreement failure results from the absence of accessible phi-features on the subject, possibly as the result of a grammatical shift taking place at the interface. This chapter further highlights the relevance of two subject positions (Subj1 and Subj2) each with their own interpretational properties.","PeriodicalId":308902,"journal":{"name":"The Grammar of Copulas Across Languages","volume":"21 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1900-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"123648781","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}