160206 SE Seminar in Theory of Grammar (2009W)

Many languages distinguish several syntactic and/or semantic roles of noun phrases within single clauses by means of different morphological markings on those phrases, called "case". However, the actual morphology of widely varying case systems, in particular many Indo-European system(s), is rife with systemic asymmetries and unexplained subregularities, often called syncretisms. This study argues that Indo-European case syncretisms are almost entirely explained by a theory of syntax that is justified independently of bound morphology. These explanations need no concepts particular to morphology beyond minimally specified, uniformly formatted lexical entries for the case morphemes themselves. Topics to be covered:
Introduction: Four approaches to morphological case

1 Government and Binding Case Theory
o 1.1 The advent of Abstract Case and its relation to morphological case
o 1.2 The elegance of Government and Binding Case assignment
o 1.3 The structural, non-semantic basis of Cases

2 Super Case: GB's unexpected dividend
o 2.1 Romanian case is (only) Super Case
o 2.2 Super Case in Czech morphology

3 Updating Case Theory
o 3.1 Redundancy of Abstract Case
o 3.2 Lack of Abstract Case as a motor for NP movement
o 3.3 Obligaroty Abstract Case vs. the economy of optional case
o 3.4 Case as Alternative Realization

4 German case and Super Case
o 4.1 Lexical mechanisms for expressing case as AR
o 4.2 The lexical entries of German case inflections
o 4.3 The pervasive role of Super Case throughout German

5 The underlying forms of Latin nouns
o 5.1 The syntactic sources of Latin cases
o 5.2 The phonological basis of Latin declensions
o 5.3 Relations between declension classes and Latin gender

6 Explanations provided by Super Case in Latin
o 6.1 Three allomorphs for Super Case plurals and their psychological reality
o 6.2 A lexical Parantheses Convention
o 6.3 Phonology-based alternations for singular Super Case