Symmetry Breaking in Syntax: 136 (Cambridge Studies in Linguistics, Series Number 136)
Cambridge University Press, 12/13/2012
EAN 9781107017757, ISBN10: 1107017750
Hardcover, 284 pages, 22.9 x 15.2 x 1.8 cm
Language: English
Originally published in English
In this illuminating new theory of grammar, Hubert Haider demonstrates that there is a basic asymmetry in the phrase structure of any language, whatever sentence structure it takes. Moreover, he argues that understanding this asymmetry is the key to understanding the grammatical causality underlying a broad range of core syntactic phenomena. Until now, Germanic languages have been seen to fall into two distinct classes: those which take an object-verb sentence structure (OV) or a verb-object one (VO). However, by examining the nature of this universal underlying asymmetry, Hubert Haider reveals a third syntactic type: 'Type III'. In particular, he employs the third type to explore the cognitive evolution of grammar which gave rise to the structural asymmetry and its typological implications. Symmetry Breaking in Syntax will appeal to academic researchers and graduate students involved in comparative and theoretical syntax and the cognitive evolution of grammar.
1. What breaks the symmetry in syntactic structures
2. Linearizations are public, structures are private
3. BBC - asymmetry in phrase structuring
4. The cross-linguistic impact of the BBC
5. The Germanic OV/VO split
6. Adverbial positions in VO and in OV
7. Elements of the third kind - resultative predicates and particles - in OV and VO
8. Asymmetry in nominal structures - word and phrase structure
9. BBC or LCA? - fact finding and evaluation.
'Professor Haider's Basic Branching Constraint is a bold solution to the problem of word order and word order correlations in language ... should be read and taken seriously by grammarians of all stripes.' Frederick J. Newmeyer, Professor Emeritus, University of Washington