The theory and syntactic representation of control structures: An analysis from Amharic

Tommi Leung; Girma Halefom

doi:10.5334/gjgl.277

The theory and syntactic representation of control structures: An analysis from Amharic

Tommi Leung, Girma Halefom

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

1 Citation (Scopus)

Abstract

This paper conducts a detailed syntactic analysis of control structures in Amharic and sheds light on the current approaches to their syntactic representation and the operation thereof. Amharic control structures consist of the following components: (i) they are marked by the specific clause marker (CM) l-; (ii) the control clause always contains an imperfective verb; (iii) the control predicate is fully inflected by phi-features which are coindexical to the matrix subject; (iv) the subject of the control clause is a PRO; and (v) only exhaustive subject control is licensed. Amharic control poses a challenge to Landau (2014)’s proposal that the control possibility stems from particular combinations of tense and agreement features of the control predicate. Instead we claim that Amharic data fit better in the analysis of future infinitives (Wurmbrand 2014) and prospective aspect (Kratzer 2011; Matthewson 2012). In addition, the PRO-analysis of Amharic control also entails that the Movement Theory of Control (MTC) is disfavored.

Original language	English
Article number	97
Journal	Glossa
Volume	2
Issue number	1
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.5334/gjgl.277
Publication status	Published - 2017

Keywords

Amharic
Aspect
Clause marker
Control
Embedded clause
Movement Theory of Control
PRO-analysis

ASJC Scopus subject areas

Linguistics and Language
Language and Linguistics

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10.5334/gjgl.277

Cite this

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title = "The theory and syntactic representation of control structures: An analysis from Amharic",

abstract = "This paper conducts a detailed syntactic analysis of control structures in Amharic and sheds light on the current approaches to their syntactic representation and the operation thereof. Amharic control structures consist of the following components: (i) they are marked by the specific clause marker (CM) l-; (ii) the control clause always contains an imperfective verb; (iii) the control predicate is fully inflected by phi-features which are coindexical to the matrix subject; (iv) the subject of the control clause is a PRO; and (v) only exhaustive subject control is licensed. Amharic control poses a challenge to Landau (2014){\textquoteright}s proposal that the control possibility stems from particular combinations of tense and agreement features of the control predicate. Instead we claim that Amharic data fit better in the analysis of future infinitives (Wurmbrand 2014) and prospective aspect (Kratzer 2011; Matthewson 2012). In addition, the PRO-analysis of Amharic control also entails that the Movement Theory of Control (MTC) is disfavored.",

keywords = "Amharic, Aspect, Clause marker, Control, Embedded clause, Movement Theory of Control, PRO-analysis",

author = "Tommi Leung and Girma Halefom",

note = "Funding Information: We would like to thank Abdu Ahmed, Tom Grano, Steve Matthews, Susi Wurmbrand, the audience in the 43rd?annual?meeting?of?the?North?American?Conference?on?Afroasiatic? Linguistics (Georgetown University, February 13–15, 2015), Workshop?on?Aspect?in? Embedded? Clause (ZAS Berlin, May 11–12, 2015), and the three reviewers for comments on the earlier versions of this paper. We express our sincere thanks to Kidist HaiIu for her native language intuition and continuous support for the completion of this paper. Our research is funded by United Arab Emirates University Division of Research and Graduate Studies ?ffice, to which we are grateful. All errors are ours. Publisher Copyright: {\textcopyright} 2017 The Author(s).",

year = "2017",

doi = "10.5334/gjgl.277",

language = "English",

volume = "2",

journal = "Glossa",

issn = "2397-1835",

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N1 - Funding Information: We would like to thank Abdu Ahmed, Tom Grano, Steve Matthews, Susi Wurmbrand, the audience in the 43rd?annual?meeting?of?the?North?American?Conference?on?Afroasiatic? Linguistics (Georgetown University, February 13–15, 2015), Workshop?on?Aspect?in? Embedded? Clause (ZAS Berlin, May 11–12, 2015), and the three reviewers for comments on the earlier versions of this paper. We express our sincere thanks to Kidist HaiIu for her native language intuition and continuous support for the completion of this paper. Our research is funded by United Arab Emirates University Division of Research and Graduate Studies ?ffice, to which we are grateful. All errors are ours. Publisher Copyright: © 2017 The Author(s).

PY - 2017

Y1 - 2017

N2 - This paper conducts a detailed syntactic analysis of control structures in Amharic and sheds light on the current approaches to their syntactic representation and the operation thereof. Amharic control structures consist of the following components: (i) they are marked by the specific clause marker (CM) l-; (ii) the control clause always contains an imperfective verb; (iii) the control predicate is fully inflected by phi-features which are coindexical to the matrix subject; (iv) the subject of the control clause is a PRO; and (v) only exhaustive subject control is licensed. Amharic control poses a challenge to Landau (2014)’s proposal that the control possibility stems from particular combinations of tense and agreement features of the control predicate. Instead we claim that Amharic data fit better in the analysis of future infinitives (Wurmbrand 2014) and prospective aspect (Kratzer 2011; Matthewson 2012). In addition, the PRO-analysis of Amharic control also entails that the Movement Theory of Control (MTC) is disfavored.

AB - This paper conducts a detailed syntactic analysis of control structures in Amharic and sheds light on the current approaches to their syntactic representation and the operation thereof. Amharic control structures consist of the following components: (i) they are marked by the specific clause marker (CM) l-; (ii) the control clause always contains an imperfective verb; (iii) the control predicate is fully inflected by phi-features which are coindexical to the matrix subject; (iv) the subject of the control clause is a PRO; and (v) only exhaustive subject control is licensed. Amharic control poses a challenge to Landau (2014)’s proposal that the control possibility stems from particular combinations of tense and agreement features of the control predicate. Instead we claim that Amharic data fit better in the analysis of future infinitives (Wurmbrand 2014) and prospective aspect (Kratzer 2011; Matthewson 2012). In addition, the PRO-analysis of Amharic control also entails that the Movement Theory of Control (MTC) is disfavored.

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The theory and syntactic representation of control structures: An analysis from Amharic

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