Radical Non‐Configurationality

Abstract

Originally conceived of as a large‐scale macroparameter, non‐configurationality was thought to delimit languages lacking in hierarchical phrase structure (Chomsky 1981). However, non‐configurationality can be defined instead as a cover term for languages in which there is hierarchical phrase structure, but the evidence for such structure is obscured. In the narrow sense, non‐configurational languages are those that meet three criteria: (i) free word order, (ii) extensive null anaphora, and (iii) discontinuous expressions (Hale 1983). In the broad sense, non‐configurational languages are those that fail a variety of tests for asymmetric c‐command between the subject and the object, and/or tests for VP constituency. These languages are genetically, geographically, and typologically diverse, and they cannot be classified as a single language type. There have been various attempts to reduce non‐configurational properties to a single grammatical source or macroparameter: the Dual Structure approach (e.g., Austin and Bresnan 1996), the Pronominal Argument approach (e.g., Baker 1996), and the Computational Relevancy approach (Pensalfini 2004) All of these approaches focus on the paradoxical nature of non‐configurational languages: they exhibit subject/object asymmetries in some domains, but not others. However, these approaches, which treat non‐configurationality as a macroparameter, are neither theoretically nor empirically motivated. Other work on non‐configurational languages such as Warlpiri, Mohawk, the Salish languages, and the Algonquian languages have paved the way for a microparametric view of non‐configurationality, in which various diverse and independently motivated grammatical principles can conspire to yield a non‐configurational profile.