Qiushi Chen had a very successful two months with getting two papers published in NLLT and LI respectively.
The first article “Scrambling in the nominal domain: Evidence from the Chichewa DP” has appeared online in February ahead of its print publication in Natural Language & Linguistic Theory. The online version can be found here.
Abstract: Chichewa DPs are noun-initial and the modifiers following the noun may occur in any order. Assuming that Chichewa nouns invariably undergo N-to-D movement and that a universal structural hierarchy of the modifiers maps into left-to-right linear order (e.g., Dem ≫ Num ≫ Adj), this paper argues that the order flexibility of nominal modifiers in Chichewa involves scrambling of the modifiers, whose landing site is a position that does not involve a canonical Spec-head featural relation. Two data patterns are discussed: (i) Novel ellipsis data show that while a structurally higher modifier may license the ellipsis of a lower modifier, the reverse does not hold, even though the relative linear order between the modifiers is free; (ii) an asymmetry is attested regarding hybrid concord, in that a structurally higher modifier of a hybrid noun may show semantic concord while a lower modifier shows morphological concord, whereas the reverse pattern is not possible. After a brief comparison with two alternative analyses of the order flexibility, namely Cinque 2005 and Carstens 2008, 2017, the paper concludes that the Chichewa facts are overall best captured by the scrambling account. It thus confirms that scrambling is not just a clause-level phenomenon; it also exists in the nominal domain.
The second article “Discontinuous DPs, Wh-in-Situ, and Lower Copy Pronunciation in Chichewa” appeared online in March ahead of its print publication in Linguistic Inquiry. The online version can be found here.
Abstract: This paper offers a lower copy pronunciation account of two underexplored issues in Chichewa: wh-in-situ and discontinuous DPs. First, it is shown that Chichewa wh-in-situ is island-sensitive, and thus is best analyzed as a hidden case of wh-movement in narrow syntax, with the lower, postverbal copy of the wh-element pronounced. Second, discontinuous object DPs involve total dislocation of the entire object in syntax; at PF, the phonological features of its copies are deleted in a distributed manner, resulting in surface discontinuity. The study provides novel empirical evidence that supports the conceptually desirable idea that, for reasons of modularity, lower copy pronunciation is conditioned solely by PF factors, since it is shown that lower copy pronunciation in Chichewa, which is identified in both wh-in-situ and DP splits, results from a PF requirement. The requirement in question is further suggested to be associated with the residual conjoint/disjoint alternation in Chichewa syntax, which is not easy to see since the disjoint marker got lost morphologically, as a result of a diachronic change.
Double congratulations Qiushi!
