Séminaire SynSem avec Mitcho Erlewine (LLing)

Lieu: Grand labo C228

Title: Atayalic subjects and the nature of nominative

Abstract:
This talk investigates the nature of subjecthood properties in the Atayalic group of Austronesian languages of Taiwan. Subjects in these languages are associated with nominative case, clause-final position, and discourse topic status, and there is verbal morphology that reflects the choice of subject argument. I highlight two underappreciated facts about nominative case in Atayalic: first, nominative case is structurally smaller than non-nominatives, and can be properly contained within them; and second, some non-subjects can appear in nominative case, under certain limited circumstances. These facts motivate a new proposal for voice alternations in these and related Austronesian languages, where subject promotion involves removal of the subject’s original case. So-called nominative case marking, then, reflects the determiner of a case-less nominal, which must then instead be hosted in a clause-peripheral topic position.