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The syntax of adjectives :a comparative study

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In The Syntax of Adjectives, Guglielmo Cinque offers cross-linguistic evidence that adjectives have two sources. Arguing against the standard view, and reconsidering his own earlier analysis, Cinque proposes that adjectives enter the nominal phase either as “adverbial” modifiers to the noun or as predicates of reduced relative clauses. Some of his evidence comes from a systematic comparison between Romance and Germanic languages. These two language families differ with respect to the canonical position taken by adjectives, which is prenominal in Germanic and both pre- and postnominal in Romance. Cinque shows that a simple N(oun)-raising analysis encounters a number of problems, the primary one of which is its inability to express a fundamental generalization governing the interpretation of pre- and postnominal adjectives in the two language families. Cinque argues that N-raising as such should be abandoned in favor of XP-raising—a conclusion also supported by evidence from other language families. After developing this framework for analyzing the syntax of adjectives, Cinque applies it to the syntax of English and Italian adjectives. An appendix offers a brief discussion of other languages that appear to distinguish overtly between the two sources of adjectives.

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Series Title

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Call Number

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Publisher

Cambridge, Massachusetts : MIT Press,., 2010

Collation

1 online resource (xv, 202 pages) :illustrations.

Language

English

ISBN/ISSN

9780262289306

Classification

NONE

Content Type

text

Media Type

computer

Carrier Type

online resource

Edition

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Subject(s)

Grammar, Comparative and general

Specific Detail Info

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Statement of Responsibility

Guglielmo Cinque

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Cataloger

umi

Source

https://direct.mit.edu/books/book/2157/The-Syntax-of-AdjectivesA-Comparative-Study

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Digital Object Identifier (DOI)

https://doi.org/10.7551/mitpress/9780262014168.001.0001

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