What is Autonomous Syntax and what are its Limitations?I. What is the autonomy thesis in syntax?A. The idea that syntactic principles can be stated in exclusively syntactic terms.B. The idea that there is profound isomorphism between syntax and semantics, such that one module need not ‘consult’ the other to ensure fit between two independently derived representations.C. Autonomy is distinct from modularity. Modularity does not require syntax-semantics isomorphism. For example, as argued by Jackendoff (1997: 31-38), there is no one-to-one relationship between principles of syntactic and semantic combination.II. Some problems that autonomist accounts faceA. In the GB version of autonomy, thematic roles are projected to syntactic positions. This type of autonomy is called ‘semantic smuggling’ by Croft (1994). It has an unfortunate consequence: extreme abstractness.B. The semantic property of being a head must be represented as a syntactic property. But syntactic and semantic properties attributable to heads are separable. The head is:C. Since the only semantic features that ‘percolate’ to the phrase level are those which come from heads (the ‘head feature condition), what do we do with semantic features that come from complements, e.g., aspectual features like telicity?D. Projection level, in particular ‘phrasehood’, is used to capture functional facts, i.e., that a single lexical item, e.g., N, can ‘act like’ a phrase, e.g., NP. What does it actually mean to say that a single word can be a phrase?E. Mismatches are difficult to describe:F. The Problem of ‘Niece’ Licensing: Comparative ConstructionsG. Some coercion effects, e.g., the ‘universal grinder’, appear to the products of construction-word semantic conflict rather than conflict between operator and argument:H. Without constructions, the semantic productivity of argument-structure patterns can only be described through the creation of nonce lexical entries.III. Can functionalist explanations replace autonomous syntactic explanations?A. Replacing a syntactic label with a semantic label doesn’t accomplish much unless we can also show that, e.g., semantic gradience entails distinct syntactic behaviors at the various points of the scale.B. But some putative syntactic constraints are better described as construal-based, probabilistic constraints.C. Certain patterns exist solely to do work in discourse:IV. Autonomous syntax is nondynamicA. Syntactic description does not explain how a given form got to have the meaning it has.B. By the same token, syntactic description does not explain why speakers’ productions may vary. An example: the anaphoric degree-word construction:Question: What is happening in the dialect shift represented by the ‘long of a drive’ group?V. Autonomous syntax vs. autonomous functionalismA. ‘Radical functionalism’. The form of the linguistic production can be ‘explained’ on the basis of universals of human conversational practice. (E.g., new information comes last, topics need not be mentioned, agents tend to be topics.) What about WO differences, differences in subject requirement? Tao and Healy (1998) on decoding differences in Mandarin versus English speakers.B. Meaning is radically situated. Many of the examples used here are really examples of the strong role of grammatical form in the process of interpretation. (E.g., conflict resolution)C. The hammer analogy. To describe the form of a hammer would be pointless without reference to the use of the hammer. But the form of the hammer also constrains what one can do with it.D. The phonotactic analogy. Phonotactic generalizations often make sense in a post hoc way, but are not predictive.What is Autonomous Syntax and what are itsLimitations?Linguistics 7430Spring 2004I. What is the autonomy thesis in syntax? A. The idea that syntactic principles can be stated in exclusively syntactic terms. B. The idea that there is profound isomorphism between syntax and semantics, suchthat one module need not ‘consult’ the other to ensure fit between two independentlyderived representations. C. Autonomy is distinct from modularity. Modularity does not require syntax-semantics isomorphism. For example, as argued by Jackendoff (1997: 31-38), there isno one-to-one relationship between principles of syntactic and semantic combination. (1) Nouns need not be things.(2) “Other than argument structure, most of the conceptual material bundled up insidea lexical item is invisible to syntax” (p. 34).(3) Grammatical gender is related only ‘sporadically’ to conceptual distinctions.(4) Grammatical roles like direct object do not correlate directly with thematic roleslike patient.(5) Aspectual distinctions like the telic-atelic distinction can be expressed by verbchoice, choice of undergoer argument, choice of adverbial. (6) The syntax may not reflect the semantics:An occasional sailor walked by. I buried it and dug it up again.I don’t believe he’s going to show up. She put the wine in the freezer for a minute. II. Some problems that autonomist accounts faceA. In the GB version of autonomy, thematic roles are projected to syntacticpositions. This type of autonomy is called ‘semantic smuggling’ by Croft (1994). Ithas an unfortunate consequence: EXTREME ABSTRACTNESS. - Movement rules are required if thematic roles are grammatical roles in d-structure.(E.g., passive, unaccusative movement, raising)- Empty categories (like PRO) are required because every thematic role must berepresented as a syntactic role. The status of shared arguments. ontrol vs.Raising/ECM:I expected [her to object]. (I expected it to rain.)I persuaded her[PRO to object]. (*I persuaded it to rain.)One verb does not select for a direct object. The other does. This is a semanticfact. It is represented as a syntactic one. Result: A shared argument has twodifferent syntactic analyses, as required by the Theta Criterion. B. The semantic property of being a head must be represented as a syntactic property.But syntactic and semantic properties attributable to heads are separable. The head is:(a) The word that determines the syntactic co-occurrence properties of the phrasein which it occurs. (b) The word whose semantic requirements influence what can occur around itAre determiners heads? Maybe your answer to this question depends on how you feelabout functional categories (Hudson 1999). C.