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Several studies on L3 lexicon, and recently also some on L3 syntax, have convincingly shown a qualitative difference between the acquisition of a true L2 and the subsequent acquisition of an L3. Some studies even indicate that L2 takes on a stronger role than L1 in the initial state of L3 syntax (e.g. Bardel and Falk, 2007; Rothman and Cabrelli Amaro, 2010). In this article we further investigate syntactic transfer from L1/L2 to L3 in learners at an intermediate level of proficiency in the target language. Data have been obtained from 44 learners of German as L3, testing the placement of object pronouns in both main and subordinate clauses in a grammaticality judgement/correction task (GJCT). The learners constitute two groups (both n = 22): One group has English as L1 and French as L2 and the other group has French as L1 and English as L2. This particular combination of background languages allows us to pinpoint the source of transfer, since object placement is pre-verbal in French and post-verbal in English, this being applied in both main and subordinate clauses. In target language (TL) German, however, the object placement varies between pre-verbal in the sub clause and post-verbal in the main clause. The two groups behave differently as to both acceptance and rejection of the test items (60 grammatical and ungrammatical main and sub clauses with object pronouns). This difference is significant and can be ascribed to their L2s, respectively. Our results thus show that the L2 transfers into the L3 even at an intermediate level, and on the basis of this we claim a strong role for the L2 status factor.

The reported study presents data from an experiment on the interpretation of intrasentential anaphora in Italian by native Italian speakers and by English speakers who have learned Italian as adults and have reached a near-native level of proficiency in this language. The two groups of speakers were presented with complex sentences consisting of a main clause and a subordinate clause, in which the subordinate clause had either an overt pronoun or a null subject pronoun. In half of the sentences the main clause preceded the subordinate clause (forward anaphora) and in the other half the subordinate clause preceded the main clause (backward anaphora). Participants performed in a picture verification task in which they had to indicate the picture(s) that corresponded to the meaning of the subordinate clause, thus identifying the possible antecedents of the null or overt subject pronouns. The patterns of responses of the two groups were very similar with respect to the null subject pronouns in both the forward and backward anaphora conditions. Compared to native monolingual speakers, however, the near-natives had a significantly higher preference for the subject of the matrix clause as a possible antecedent of overt subject pronouns, particularly in the backward anaphora condition. The results indicate that near-native speakers have acquired the syntactic constraints on pronominal subjects in Italian, but may have residual indeterminacy in the interface processing strategies they employ in interpreting pronominal forms. (Verlag, adapt.).

This article examines several grammatical developments that have received relatively little attention, but that may be more pervasive than previously recognized. They involve the functional extension of markers of grammatical dependency from sentence-level syntax into larger discourse and pragmatic domains. Such developments are first illustrated with material from Navajo and Central Alaskan Yup'ik, then surveyed more briefly in several other unrelated languages. In some cases, secondary effects of such changes can reshape basic clause structure. An awareness of these processes can accordingly aid in understanding certain recurring but hitherto unexplained arrays of basic morphological and syntactic patterns, exemplified here with cases of homophonous grammatical markers and of ergative/accusative splits. Like developments described by Gildea (1997, 1998) and Evans (2007), they involve the use of dependent clauses as independent sentences, but the processes described here differ from those in both the mechanisms at work and their results.

Levinson 2013 (L13) argues against the idea that 'recursion, and especially recursive center-embedding, might be the core domain-specific property of language' (p. 159), citing crosslinguistic grammatical data and specific corpus studies. L13 offers an alternative: language inherits its recursive properties 'from the action domain' (p. 159). We argue that L13's claims are at best unwarranted and can in many instances be shown to be false. L13's reasoning is similarly flawed—in particular, the presumption that center-embedding can stand proxy for embedding (and clausal embedding can stand proxy for recursion). Thus, no support remains for its conclusions. Furthermore, though these conclusions are pitched as relevant to specific claims that have been published about the role of syntactic recursion, L13 misrepresents these claims. Consequently, even an empirically supported, better-reasoned version of L13 would not bear on the questions it claims to address.

This paper contributes data from Paraguayan Guaraní (Tupí-Guaraní) to the discussion of how temporal reference is determined in tenseless languages. The empirical focus of this study is on finite clauses headed by verbs inflected only for person/number information, which are compatible only with non-future temporal reference in most matrix clause contexts. The paper first explores the possibility of accounting for the temporal reference of such clauses with a phonologically empty non-future tense morpheme, along the lines of Matthewson's (Linguist Philos 29: 673-713, 2006) analysis of a similar phenomenon in St'át'imcets (Salish). This analysis is then contrasted with one according to which temporal reference is not constrained by tense in Paraguayan Guaraní, but only by context and temporal adverbials. A comparison of the two analyses, both of which are couched in a dynamic semantic framework, suggests empirical and theoretical advantages of the tenseless analysis over the tensed one. The paper concludes with a discussion of cross-linguistic variation of temporal reference in tensed and tenseless languages.

Most of the discussions of the loss of verb movement in the history of English have focused on data related to the rise of do-support. In this paper, we extend the empirical basis to evidence from adverb placement. Our analysis of the distribution of finite main verbs with respect to adverbs in a range of prose texts in the history of English shows that the decline of V-movement in English starts in the middle of the 15ᵗʰ century and that verb movement past adverbs is lost to a large extent around the middle of the 16ᵗʰ century. These observations differ considerably from what data involving the sentential negator not indicate. According to that evidence, the loss of verb movement is a rather long process starting in the 16ᵗʰ century and coming to completion over 200 years later. In order to reconcile the conflicting diachronic evidence from adverb placement and the syntax of negation, we propose that the loss of verb movement in English is not a single event but occurs sequentially. In a first phase, verb movement to T is lost while movement to a lower inflectional head is maintained. In a second phase, verb movement starts being lost completely. We show that the Rich Agreement Hypothesis, which has been very prominent in accounts of variation with respect to verb movement, cannot capture these developments in a satisfactory way. Instead, it is verbal morphology more generally that will be argued to play a role in connection with the occurrence of verb movement. However, we do not postulate a strong correlation between morphology and syntax and propose that the loss of verb movement in English is the result of a combination of factors: changes in the verbal morphosyntax (loss of subjunctive, rise of periphrastic forms), an acquisitional bias towards simpler structures, the decline of the subject-verb inversion grammar found in early English, and effects of dialect contact.

Recent arguments for relativist semantic theories have centered on the phenomenon of \"faultless disagreement.\" This paper offers independent motivation for such theories, based on the interpretation of predicates of personal taste in certain attitude contexts and presuppositional constructions. It is argued that the correct interpretation falls out naturally from a relativist theory, but requires special stipulation in a theory which appeals instead to the use of hidden indexicals; and that a hidden indexical analysis presents problems for contemporary syntactic theory.

The current study tests the Interface Hypothesis through forward and backward anaphora in complex sentences with temporal subordinate clauses in highly proficient English-speaking learners' second-language (L2) Chinese. Forward anaphora is involved when the overt pronoun ta 'he/she' or a null element appears in the subject position of the main clause, whereas backward anaphora is involved when it is in the subject position of the temporal clause, because the main clause always follows the temporal clause in Chinese. Specifically, the article tests the syntactic and discourse constraints in the interpretation and representation of to and the null element in complex sentences. Ta is constrained by the syntactic cyclic-c-command condition. Thus it is possible for ta to refer to the other sentential subject in forward anaphora, but not in backward anaphora in Chinese. Unlike English, Chinese allows a null element in subject positions of finite subordinate and main clauses. It is proposed in the article that the null element in these positions is a Øtopic, a syntax-discourse interface category. Results from an acceptability judgement task and a picture judgment task indicate that Øtopic at the external interface has been acquired, whereas the cyclic-c-command condition within narrow syntax is fossilized in L2 Chinese.

While all of the Scandinavian languages have verb-second order in main clauses, they vary in the word order in subordinate clauses: in Icelandic the finite verb appears in a high position, to the left of negation and sentence-medial adverbs, while in all of the standard Mainland Scandinavian languages it remains in a low position, to the right of these elements. This order in Mainland Scandinavian is known to be the result of a historical change, and has frequently been tied to the loss of agreement morphology. Faroese has been argued to be currently undergoing a change of the same type, but it has proved difficult to establish a sound empirical footing for the various claims about the syntax of this language. In this article we present data from three experimental investigations of acceptability, supplemented with a study of available texts, that show that the language is very close to completing the change in the loss of the high position for the verb, but that its syntax is still distinct in this respect from that of Danish, the mainland Scandinavian language with which it is in most contact. In addition to establishing a firmer empirical basis for theories of verb movement, our study also makes the methodological point that grammaticality-judgment tasks can yield extremely fine-grained results even in cases where variability is at issue.

This study investigates extraposition, i.e., the occurrence of a non-clausal constituent to the right of the clause-final verbal position, from medieval to modern German. Using a database of subordinate clauses from medieval and early-modern texts, several linguistic and sociolinguistic factors are identified that have a favoring effect on extraposition. These include a tendency for prepositional phrases, focused constituents, and heavy constituents to extrapose. Although extraposition is much less frequent in Modern Standard German, it is subject to largely the same restrictions as in earlier stages of the language. This evidence suggests that the German VP has remained head-final since at least the year 1150. Based on a comparison of similar constructions in English, I argue that extraposition results from rightward adjunction of heavy and focused constituents to VP or IP.