Category: Syntax

We are happy to announce a talk by Philipp Weisser (University of Potsdam) in the Syntax Colloquium. The talk will take place on campus in IG 4.301. Title: The Limits of Umlaut in Sinhala: Matching domains across the syntax, morphology, and phonology (joint work with Paula Fenger, Leipzig University) Date: May 16 Time: 4 pm – 6 pm ct Abstract: In this talk we study the patterns of verbal umlaut in the Indo-Aryan language Sinhala (spoken in Sri Lanka), which seems to be constrained by an intricate combination of (i) lexical, (ii) morphosyntactic, and (iii) phonological factors. We study this phenomenon and show that it can be used as a window into the morphological makeup of complex words. In particular, we defend  the following claims: 1. Contrary to some claims in the literature (see e.g. Garland 2005), we argue that the limits of umlaut show that Sinhala verb morphology is, underlyingly, concatenative and in order to describe where umlaut appears and where it doesn’t, we need to refer to the notion of the morpheme. 2....

Dear all, We are happy to announce a joint syntax and phonology colloquium with two WOCAL talks (http://2021.wocal.net/): Date: Monday,  31.05.2021 Time: 16-18 Location: Zoom:  Please register beforehand (k.hartmann@lingua.uni-frankfurt.de) to receive the access data to zoom. Daniel Aremu & Frank Kügler: On the suspension of downstep – the case of Yoruba polar question intonation Abstract: In this talk, we present an analysis of tonal downstep in Yoruba declaratives and polar questions. Polar questions are formed in two different ways, either with sentence-initial question particles, or string-identical to statements. We show that downstep is not suspended in question intonation, which holds for all polar question formation strategies. This finding is contrary to claims made on downstep in questions (Hyman 2001).  Johannes Mursell & Katharina Hartmann: Selecting Alternatives in Eton Abstract: In this talk,  we provide a novel analysis of the augment in the Bantu language Eton, based on original fieldwork. We argue that in contrast to previous analyses, the augmentin Eton not only marks local modification of the noun but does...