Spelling out of scope taking arguments in (de-)verbal constructions in Hungarian

The paper systematically investigates operators in post-head positions within the three constructions referring to states of affairs in Hungarian, that is, within verbal, deverbal nominal and infinitival phrases. Hungarian is well-known to be a language in which all types of operator can be, and ar...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Judit Farkas, Gábor Alberti
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin 2022-12-01
Series:LingBaW
Subjects:
Online Access:https://czasopisma.kul.pl/index.php/LingBaW/article/view/14957
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:The paper systematically investigates operators in post-head positions within the three constructions referring to states of affairs in Hungarian, that is, within verbal, deverbal nominal and infinitival phrases. Hungarian is well-known to be a language in which all types of operator can be, and are usually, spelt out in the pre-head zone. However, it has not been discussed in a systematic and comprehensive way earlier whether operators can appear in post-head positions. The paper points out that this is partially possible via a systematic overview of six basic operator types. It also illustrates that while spelling out operators in the pre-head zone results in unambiguous constructions, placing them in post-head positions yields different types of ambiguity. As for the acceptability of scope taking arguments, finite verbal constructions show a black-and-white picture while infinitival and deverbal nominal constructions can be characterized by gray zones in respect of the readiness of arguments to take scope from post-head position. In these “gray zones”, a somewhat speaker-dependent variation can be observed, presumably with underlying microvariation. To represent and interpret our findings, we use Grohmann’s (2000, 2003) phase-theoretic approach with its pragmasemantics-based three Spell-Out domains per cycle.
ISSN:2450-5188