Implicit Arguments in English and Rutooro: A Contrastive Study
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Date
2020
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
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Publisher
Linguistik online
Abstract
The present study is a contrastive analysis of the syntactic behavior of verbs that are ontologically
specified for objects but these objects may be left out without rendering sentences ungrammatical.
The study unveils asymmetries between English and Rutooro (a Bantu language
spoken in Uganda) in the (non-)omissibility of postverbal arguments, stemming from lexicosemantic
and morphological factors as well as syntactic and discoursal factors. In light of the
asymmetries arising from syntactic and discoursal factors, the study adopts a typology of indefinite
implicit arguments that categorizes them into two: general indefinite implicit arguments
and discourse-bound indefinite implicit arguments. Denotational nuances between synonyms
as well as morphological specifications are also crucial linguistic ingredients that trigger variability
in the syntactic behavior of synonymous verbs intralinguistically and cross-linguistically.
In order to formalize the syntactic behavior of the verbs involved, the study employs the analytical
tools provided by Lexical Functional Grammar (LFG). While Asudeh/Giorgolio (2012)
use a combination of LFG and Glue Semantics in order to account for the occurrence of implicit
arguments, this study proposes an alternative approach, by using only the LFG functional specifications
in the lexical entries of the verbs under consideration without having recourse to an
auxiliary framework. Using Bresnan (1978) as a point of departure and informed by proposals
advanced by Nordlinger/Sadler (2007), the study posits a non-ambiguous bistructural analysis,
with the postverbal argument instantiating the specification ± higher structure – a feature that
caters for the (non-)omissibility of the postverbal argument.
Description
Keywords
Implicit Arguments, English, Rutooro
Citation
Isingoma, B. (2020). Implicit arguments in English and Rutooro: A contrastive study. Linguistik online, 101(1), 19-47. http://dx.doi.org10.13092/lo.101.6671