LE 123: Cartography and Antisymmetry

Référence: ISBN 9783862889808
92,00


Cartography and Antisymmetry
Evidence from Bantu and Chadic
 
Edmond Biloa
University of Yaoundé  I
 
 
Cartography and Antisymmetry: Evidence from Bantu and Chadic provides a syntactic analysis of five Bantu languages (Akoose, Basaá, Lamnso, Mbəlɨgi and Tuki) and five Chadic languages (Giziga, Masa, Musgum, Muyang and Wandala) from a cartographic and antisymmetric perspective. The Complementizer Domain as well as the Inflectional Domain are meticulously explored. The book argues that CP, as proposed by Chomsky (1986), cannot account for the Bantu and Chadic empirical materials described and analyzed herein. Adopting Aboh’s (2010) and Rizzi’s (2013a-b) idea that discourse particles should be syntacticized and be part of computation, the book supports Rizzi’s (1997, 2001, 2004, 2013a-b, 2016a-b, 2017) Split-CP hypothesis that elegantly accommodates question, focus, and topic markers in these languages. Moreover, it argues that in Bantu languages in which the question particle occurs after the verb stem (and as part of the verb morphology) such as Mbəlɨgi, it is hosted under M°, the head of Mood Phrase. Assuming the Kayne’s (1994) Linear Correspondence Axiom (LCA)-based approach, complements are always to the right of their selecting heads while all specifiers are to the left of their heads. Further syntactic consequence for adopting the LCA includes the impossibility of rightward movement. Any apparent rightward movement of any constituent is treated as leftward movement with subsequent remnant movement around that constituent. Thus, in the Chadic languages (Muyang and Masa) wherein rightward movement operations seem to take place in apparent violation of the LCA, it is clearly demonstrated that the data of these languages can be accounted for by using the antisymmetric and cartographic frameworks. Overall, the book proposes and argues for a more detailed and structured Complementizer  and Inflectional domains and the author provides unequivocal and convincing proof, from Bantu and Chadic languages, that syntax is, without alternative, cartographic and antisymmetric.
 
Edmond BILOA is Professor of linguistics at the University of Yaounde I in Cameroon and Vice-Rector in charge of Internal Control and Evaluation at the University of Yaounde II-Soa in Cameroon (Africa).
 
ISBN   9783862889808. Linguistics Edition 123. 307pp. 2020.
Parcourir cette catégorie : Linguistics Edition (LE)