Seminar: Ling E: Topics in Agreement (advanced)

Part 1:  (Adam Sczegielniak, University of Gdansk)

The two meetings  discuss the mechanisms of agreement and/or concord mismatch as far as Polish profession nouns.  We examine the mechanism of First Merge of roots and how does gender agreement mismatch happen. If time permits, we will explore  diminutive/gender affixes. This work is based on joint research with Ivona Kučerova. 

Part 2: Maria Polinsky, University of Maryland

We will discuss the following puzzles in agreement:

(1) Multiple exponence: a linguistic phenomenon where a single grammatical feature of the target noun is expressed through more than one morpheme on a predicate or other associated words. Multiple exponence is observed in various language; we will discuss the analysis of this phenomenon in one language and consider the implications of this analysis for other languages.

(2) Closest conjunct agreement (CCA): the agreement determined by the closest element in a coordinate structure. For example, in "Grapes and papaya are/is on sale", plural agreement is called resolved, and singular agreement instantiates CCA. This agreement pattern varies across languages, and can be accounted for under several analyses, which we will discuss in the lecture.

(3) Long-distance agreement (LDA):  a phenomenon where a predicate agrees with an agreement target that is not contained in the same clause as the agreeing element. This type of agreement contrasts with "local agreement," where the agreeing elements are in close proximity within the sentence.