Jens Fleischhauer - Böcker

The volume is a collection of papers which apply Role & Reference Grammar (RRG) to African languages. RRG is a functional theory of syntax which has been developed on the basis of two leading questions: First, how would a syntactic theory look like which starts from ‘exotic’ languages rather than English? Second, how can the interaction between syntax, semantics and pragmatics in different grammatical systems best modelled and explained? Although RRG took linguistic diversity serious from its very beginning, African languages have been underrepresented in the development of the theory. Given the sheer number African languages deserve a wider coverage in a syntactic theory which takes linguistic diversity seriously. The volume is intended to fill this gap and comprises a selection of papers which investigate different aspects related to the syntax-semantics-pragmatics interface of different African languages. This includes: argument doubling and dislocation in iziZulu, complex referential phrases in Gĩkũyũ, serial verb constructions in Igbo, locative complements in Hausa and Zarma Chiine and focus constructions in Emai. The papers will extent the current RRG approach to new languages and phenomena.

Gĩkũyũ is a Bantu language (< Niger-Congo) spoken by approx. 8 million people in central Kenya. Like other Bantu languages, Gĩkũyũ is head-marking at the sentence level but dependent-marking at the level of the phrase (e.g. reference phrase, modifier phrase). Concerning the head-marking vs. dependent-marking division, the volume addresses major topics. First, it explores the exact conditions of head-marking in Gĩkũyũ, addressing issues like argument linking as well as voice operations affecting argument realization. Second, it investigates the so-called associative construction. This is a dependent-marking strategy used for the expression of possessive relations, spatial locations, as well as adnominal modification. Although the use of the same morphosyntactic strategy for the expression of possession and adnominal modification is frequently attested among the world’s languages, this issue has not been addressed from an RRG perspective yet. Although Gĩkũyũ already received some attention within the RRG framework, the above-mentioned topics have not been in their main focus. Thus, the volume extends the previous analysis of Gĩkũyũ and presents a coherent account on the language’s morphosyntax along the lines of head- and dependent-marking. The analysis builds on the latest theoretical developments within RRG and combines a detailed analysis of a single language within a broader cross-Bantu perspective.

Light verbs are semantically reduced verbs that simultaneously exhibit a heavy verb usage. The papers collected in this volume examine light verbs from different perspectives in various languages, including several Romance and Germanic languages such as Italian, Spanish, Catalan, German, and English, as well as Mandarin Chinese and Japanese. The questions addressed in this volume include: What meaning does a light verb contribute to a light verb construction? What restrictions regarding nominal elements do light verbs exhibit? What influence do light verbs have on the argument structure of light verb constructions? The analyses draw on different frameworks, including Generative Syntax and Construction Grammar, and combine corpus linguistic investigations with theoretical modeling.

This inaugural edited volume of the series Studies in Role and Reference Grammar brings together papers that showcase recent advancements in various aspects of the field. The individual chapters explore phenomena such as Aktionsart, operators, discourse and information structure, argument coding, alignment, voice, and clause linkage. Among other topics, the volume includes a revision of discourse representation, a new analysis of passive constructions, and a new RRG analysis of case syncretisms. The papers in this volume encompass analyses of a wide range of genetically and typologically diverse languages, such as Lakota, Yaqui, Japanese, Irish, Spanish, and several Indo-Aryan languages.The book is targeted at the RRG community but will also appeal to researchers interested in syntax, semantics, morphology, discourse structure, and the interfaces of these linguistic domains.

Light verb constructions are complex predicates consisting of a semantically reduced verb and an additional often phrasal element contributing the main predicational content. Although light verb constructions have been identified for various (genetically unrelated) languages, a comparative concept which allows identifying light verb constructions across languages is still missing. The present volume approaches this issue from the perspective of the analysis of individual languages. The basic research question underlying the formation of the volume is: Which properties manifest light verb constructions cross linguistically?The papers collected in the volume investigate a large range of languages from different languages families which includes Indo-European languages like Aheli, Italian, Scottish Gaelic and Old West Norse but also non-Indo-European languages such as Tibetan (Sino-Tibetan), Kina Rutul (Nakh-Dagestanian) and Gĩkũyũ (Bantu).The present volume fills a gap in the cross-linguistics discussion of light verb constructions and seeks to provide novel insights concerning a widely recognized type of complex predicate construction.