Word Order and Prosodic‐Structure Constraints in Tagalog

Abstract

This paper is concerned with two apparently unrelated word-order facts in Tagalog: In interrogative sentences, fronted wh-phrases follow the complementizer (Comp-WhP order), and in both interrogative and noninterrogative sentences, the subject follows the verb (verbinitial order). It is argued that neither of these word orders reflects a word order that is expected on the basis of the syntactic structure alone. Instead, a unified explanation for these word orders is proposed, according to which they arise as the result of a lowering operation that applies at Phonological Form (PF) and is prosodically driven. Specifically, lowering applies in order to satisfy a prosodic-structure constraint, Weak Start, which requires elements that are relatively high on the prosodic hierarchy to be preceded by elements that are equal to or lower than them on the prosodic hierarchy. The word orders discussed herein therefore involve a mismatch between syntax and phonology, and lowering provides a means by which syntactic principles as well as principles relating to prosodic-structure can be simultaneously upheld.

The Predictive Value of Tagalog Voice Morphology in Filler-Gap Dependency Formation

“…It is also equally unsurprising that relative clauses patterned more like ay-inverted sentences. The dependency between the filler and the gap is a direct chain in relative clauses (Law, 2016) and ay-inverted sentences (Sabbagh, 2014). On the other hand, owing to the pseudo-cleft structure of argument wh-questions, the dependency between the filler predicate and the gap inside the headless relative clause is an indirect one and is mediated by a predication relation (Kroeger, 1993).…”

“…Both wh-questions and relative clauses involve biclausal structures and thus have comparable clausal complexities. On the other hand, ay-inverted sentences only involve monoclausal structures (Kroeger, 1993;Sabbagh, 2014). Under either construals of structural similarity, the structural similarity of whquestions and relative clauses was prioritized over constructionspecific cue validities, and thus exerted a more powerful influence on the participants' response behavior.…”

V1 in Kipsigis: Head movement and discourse-based scrambling

“…Head movement has been proposed for Celtic languages like Irish, Afro-Asiatic languages, and Austronesian languages like Tongan and Tagalog (Ouhalla 1994;Richards 1996;Otsuka 2000;2005b;McCloskey 2005;a.o.). VOS word order can then be explained through postverbal scrambling (Rackowski 2002;Otsuka 2005a;Richards 2013 for Austronesian), postsyntactic prosodic re-ordering of constituents (Sabbagh 2014 Under predicate-fronting analyses, VOS word order results from raising the entire VP to a position above the subject. 12 Predicate-fronting analyses have been adopted for a variety of Austronesian and Mayan languages (Massam 2001;Pearson 2001;Aldridge 2004;Coon 2010;a.o.).…”

Lightest to the Right: An Apparently Anomalous Displacement in Irish

“…2 1 See, among many others, Zec and Inkelas 1990, Halpern 1995, Adger 1997, 2007a,b, Zubizarreta 1998, Chung 2003, Culicover and Jackendoff 2005, Gutiérrez-Bravo 2005, Vicente 2005, Göbbel 2007, Anttila 2008, Kandybowicz 2009, López 2009, Agbayani, Golston, and Henderer 2010, Anttila, Adams, and Speriosu 2010, Richards 2010, Manetta 2012, Sabbagh 2013 Here and below, we occasionally highlight the position of a postposed pronoun by placing it in a box; we also indicate the syntactically expected position of the pronoun by way of the symbol .…”