A usage-based view takes grammar to be the cognitive organization of one's experience with language. Aspects of that experience, for instance, the frequency of use of certain constructions or particular instances of constructions, have an impact on representation that is evidenced in speaker knowledge of conventionalized phrases and in language variation and change. It is shown that particular instances of constructions can acquire their own pragmatic, semantic, and phonological characteristics. In addition, it is argued that high-frequency instances of constructions undergo grammaticization processes (which produce further change), function as the central members of categories formed by constructions, and retain their old forms longer than lower-frequency instances under the pressure of newer formations. An exemplar model that accommodates both phonological and semantic representation is elaborated to describe the data considered.

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From Usage to Grammar: The Mind's Response to Repetition

Extensively revised and updated, this second edition provides, in an A-Z format, an analysis of the most important generalizations that have been made on the unidirectional change of grammatical forms and constructions. Based on the analysis of more than 1,000 languages, it reconstructs over 500 processes of grammatical change in the languages of the world, including East Asian languages such as Chinese, Korean and Japanese. Readers are provided with the tools to discover how lexical and grammatical meanings can be related to one another in a principled way, how such issues as polysemy, heterosemy, and transcategoriality are dealt with, and why certain linguistic forms have simultaneous lexical and grammatical functions. Definitions of lexical concepts are provided with examples from a broad variety of languages, and references to key relevant research literature. Linguists and other scholars will gain a better understanding of languages on a worldwide scale.

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World Lexicon of grammaticalization

Language demonstrates structure while also showing considerable variation at all levels: languages differ from one another while still being shaped by the same principles; utterances within a language differ from one another while exhibiting the same structural patterns; languages change over time, but in fairly regular ways. This book focuses on the dynamic processes that create languages and give them their structure and variance. It outlines a theory of language that addresses the nature of grammar, taking into account its variance and gradience, and seeks explanation in terms of the recurrent processes that operate in language use. The evidence is based on the study of large corpora of spoken and written language, what we know about how languages change, as well as the results of experiments with language users. The result is an integrated theory of language use and language change which has implications for cognitive processing and language evolution.

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Language, Usage and Cognition

Since the earliest days of generative grammar, control has been distinguished from raising: the latter the product of movement operations, the former the result of construal processes relating a PRO to an antecedent. This article argues that obligatory control structures are also formed by movement. Minimalism makes this approach viable by removing D-Structure as a grammatical level. Implementing the suggestion, however, requires eliminating the last vestiges of D-Structure still extant in Chomsky's (1995) version of the Minimalist Program. In particular, it requires dispensing with the θ-Criterion and adopting the view that θ-roles are featurelike in being able to license movement.

Movement and Control

Preface i1 Core Concepts 11.1 What is a sentence? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11.1.1 Utterances, propositions and sentences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11.1.2 Acceptability, grammaticality and stars . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21.1.3 Form and order . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51.2 Tacit Knowledge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61.3 Syntactic theories . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101.4 Back to Sentences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131.5 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152 Morphosyntactic features 172.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172.2 Introducing Features . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172.3 What are features? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 202.3.1 Feature Systems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 212.3.2 Interface Rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 242.4 Motivating Features . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 252.4.1 Major Category Features . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 262.4.2 More on the content of words . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 282.4.3 Some more minor features . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 332.5 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 413 Constituency and Theta Roles 483.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 483.2 Constituents . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 483.3 Fundamental notions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 533.4 Determining the head . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 573.5 Predicting the head - θ-roles and selectional features . . . . . . . . . . . . . 603.5.1 θ Roles and the θ-Criterion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 613.5.2 Unassigned θ-roles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 643.5.3 Selectional Features and Lexical Representation . . . . . . . . . . . . 653.5.4 S-selectional Features . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 683.6 Triggering Merge by feature checking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 711

http://roozbehhormozi.persiangig.com/document/core%20syntax%20a%20minimalist%20approach.pdf

Core Syntax: A Minimalist Approach

The phenomenon of grammaticalization - the historical process whereby new grammatical material is created - has attracted a great deal of attention within linguistics. This is an attempt to provide a general account of this phenomenon in terms of a formal theory of syntax. Using Chomsky's Minimalist Program for linguistic theory, Roberts and Roussou show how this approach gives rise to a number of important conceptual and theoretical issues concerning the nature of functional categories and the form of parameters, as well as the relation of both of these to language change. Drawing on examples from a wide range of languages, they construct a general account of grammaticalization with implications for linguistic theory and language acquisition.

Syntactic Change: A Minimalist Approach to Grammaticalization

Syntactic Change: Index of names

A minimalist theory of A-movement and control

The purpose of this paper is twofold: first, to provide a unified account of the particles þa, na and as in Greek, and second, to refine the articulated CP structure of Rizzi (1997). To this end, it is argued that þa, na, and as occupy the lower C head, which is specified for modality. The particles na and as further raise to a higher C head (partly similar to Rizzi’s Force), thus differing from þa. The distribution of topic and focus in relation to the particles and the typical complementisers oti and an is used as evidence for the postulation of an additional C head characterised as a subordinator/connector, typically occupied by the complementiser pu and optionally by oti and an. The resulting structure differs from Rizzi’s (1997) in that it provides a tripartite C structure and places FocusP/TopicP between the two higher C heads. In the light of this analysis we also consider the position of negation, as well as the position of the verb in imperatives and gerunds.

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On the left periphery: Modal particles and complementisers

This paper presents an approach to the well-known diachronic phenomenon of grammaticalization in terms of a modified version of Chomsky's (1995; chapter 4) minimalist approach to syntax, combined with the general approach to language change outlined in Clark and Roberts (1993). The central idea that we follow is that grammaticalization involves the reanalysis of lexical material as functional material. We argue that the reason this kind of change is so common is that the reanalysis involves structural simplification, a kind of change that is preferred by the parameter-setting device, according to Clark and Roberts (1993). A number of well-known cases of grammaticalization are discussed: the development of English modal auxiliaries, the development of agreement markers from pronouns, the development of negation and N-words, and the development of wh-pronouns. In the last two cases a different kind of simplification is involved: the lexical subset principle, which requires lexical items to be interpreted in the smallest set of contexts consistent with the input. Both the lexical subset principle and the tendency toward structural simplification stem from the same property of computational conservativity that characterizes the parameter-setting device

Anna Roussou

Papers

Syntactic Change: A Minimalist Approach to Grammaticalization

Syntactic Change: Index of names

A minimalist theory of A-movement and control

On the left periphery: Modal particles and complementisers

A formal approach to “grammaticalization”