Word Order, Agreement and Pronominalization in Standard and Palestinian Arabic

215 Pages·2000·0.97 MB·English

by  Mohammad A. Mohammad

WORD ORDER, AGREEMENT AND PRONOMINALIZATION
IN STANDARD AND PALESTINIAN ARABIC
AMSTERDAM STUDIES IN THE THEORY AND
HISTORY OF LINGUISTIC SCIENCE
General Editor
E.F. KONRAD KOERNER
(University of Ottawa)
Series IV – CURRENT ISSUES IN LINGUISTIC THEORY
Advisory Editorial Board
Raimo Anttila (Los Angeles); Lyle Campbell (Christchurch, N.Z.)
Sheila Embleton (Toronto); John E. Joseph (Edinburgh)
Manfred Krifka (Austin, Tex.); Hans-Heinrich Lieb (Berlin)
E. Wyn Roberts (Vancouver, B.C.); Hans-Jürgen Sasse (Köln)
Volume 181
Mohammad A. Mohammad
Word Order, Agreement and Pronominalization
in Standard and Palestinian Arabic
WORD ORDER, AGREEMENT AND
PRONOMINALIZATION IN
STANDARD AND PALESTINIAN ARABIC
MOHAMMAD A. MOHAMMAD
University of Florida, Gainesville
JOHN BENJAMINS PUBLISHING COMPANY
AMSTERDAM/PHILADELPHIA
TM The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American
8 National Standard for Information Sciences — Permanence of Paper for Printed
Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1984.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Mohammad, Mohammad A.
Word order, agreement, and pronominalization in standard and Palestinian Arabic /
Mohammad A. Mohammad.
p. cm. -- (Amsterdam studies in the theory and history of linguistic science. Series IV,
Current issues in linguistic theory, ISSN 0304-0763 ; v. 181)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Arabic language--Word order. 2. Arabic language--Agreement. 3. Arabic language--Pronoun.
4. Arabic language--Palestine--Dialects--Syntax. I. Title. II. Series.
PJ6381.M64 1999
492.7'5--dc21 99-33595
ISBN 90 272 3687 9 (Eur.) / 1 55619 958 9 (US) (Hb; alk. paper) CIP
© 2000 – John Benjamins B.V.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, by print, photoprint, microfilm, or any other
means, without written permission from the publisher.
John Benjamins Publishing Co. • P.O.Box 75577 • 1070 AN Amsterdam • The Netherlands
John Benjamins North America • P.O.Box 27519 • Philadelphia PA 19118-0519 • USA
ToLaura,
GeorgeAbdellatif,
andByronAhmed

Table of Contents
AbbreviationandTranscriptionConventions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xi
Abbreviations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xi
Transcription Conventions (adapted from Saad 1975, p.10) . . . . . . . . . . . xi
Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xiii
Chapter 1
VariationinWordOrder . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
1.1 Word Order in Simple Declarative Sentences in PA and MSA . . . . . 1
1.1.1 Word Order in Verbal Sentences with Definite Subjects . . . . . 2
1.1.2 Word Order in Verbal Sentences with Indefinite Subjects . . . . 9
1.1.3 Word Order in Equative Sentences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
1.2 Word Order in Embedded Clauses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
1.3 Word Order in Embedded Clauses in PA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
1.4 Word Order in Non-aYrmative Clauses in MSA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
1.4.1 Word Order in Negative Sentences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
1.4.2 Negation in Equative Sentences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
1.4.3 Negation in Equative Sentences in the Past . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
1.4.4 Word Order in Yes-or-no Questions in MSA . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
1.5 Word Order in Negative Sentences in PA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
1.6 Word Order in Yes-or-no Questions in PA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
1.7 Word Order in Wh-Questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
1.8 Summary and Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
viii TABLEOFCONTENTS
Chapter 2
TheCategorialStatusofVPinArabic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
2.1 Word Orders and Their Predictions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
2.2 Empty Category Principle (ECP) EVects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
2.3 Topicalization, Left-dislocation, and Verbal Agreement . . . . . . . . . . 63
2.4 Condition C of the Binding Theory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72
2.5 Superiority EVects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
2.6 Idiomatic Expressions in PA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74
2.7 Weak Crossover EVects and VSO . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
2.8 Pronominal Coreference and VSO . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
2.9 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80
Chapter 3
WordOrderandtheExpletivePronoun . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
Introduction and Background . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
3.1 The Derivation of the Surface Word Orders . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
3.2 The Status of AgrS in Arabic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
3.3 The Content of SpecTP in VSO Sentences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
3.4 The Expletive Pronoun in the Nominative . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
3.5 Non-nominative Expletive . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92
3.6 NP-Raising with Seem-type Verbs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94
3.7 On the Status of Raising Verbs in Arabic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
3.7.1 Seem Type Verbs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
3.7.2 Modal Verbs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100
3.7.3 Tough Movement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102
3.7.4 Subjectless Passives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
3.7.5 The Structural Position of the Expletive pronoun in the
Above Constructions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107
3.8 The Nature of SpecTP in VSO Sentences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107
3.9 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108
TABLEOFCONTENTS ix
C 4
TheExpletiveHypothesis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109
4.1 The Expletive Hypothesis (EH) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
4.1.1 Fassi Fehri (1993) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
4.1.2 Bahloul and Harbert (1992) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
4.1.3 Aoun, Benmamoun, and Sportiche (1994) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124
4.2 The Facts of PA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135
4.3 Summary of the Agreement Facts and the Expletive Pronoun . . . . . . 136
4.3.1 ABS’s Proposal for Coordination Structures . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138
4.3.2 The Yes-or-no Question Particle ‘a . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139
4.4 An Account . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142
4.5 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145
C 5
AsymmetriesinBinding . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147
5.1 A Subject/Object Asymmetry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151
5.2 Previous Accounts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153
5.2.1 Arab Grammarians’ Account . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153
5.2.2 Fassi Fehri’s (1993) Account . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 158
5.3 Coreference in Complex Clauses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159
5.3.1 Relative Clauses and Coreference . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159
5.3.2 Pronouns as Embedded Subjects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 164
5.4 Towards an Account . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165
5.5 Subject Antecedents and Chains . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172
5.6 Pronominal Coreference in Palestinian Arabic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 174
5.7 Pronominal Coreference in Prepositional Phrases . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 176
5.8 Two Residual Issues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 180
5.9 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 180
Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 181
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187