The chapters in this volume address current topics in the morphology, syntax, and semantics of nominalizations, drawing on a range of typologically and geographically diverse languages. Nominalizations represent a long-standing puzzle to linguists: How is a noun, such as destruction, related to the… read more
Edited by Jila Ghomeshi, Ileana Paul and Martina Wiltschko
This volume brings together recent work on the formal and interpretational properties of determiners across a variety of typologically and geographically unrelated languages. It seeks to answer the core question of modern linguistic theory: Which properties of languages are universal and which are… read more
This paper examines the register associated with headlines in Malagasy. While in many languages headlines appear to have reduced structure as evidenced by the absence of certain grammatical markers (determiners, copulas, tense), Malagasy headlines show a change in word order from VOS to SVO. It… read more
This paper analyzes specificational sentences in Malagasy and shows that such sentences involve obligatory inversion, marked by the topic particle dia. I argue that the topicalized element is a small clause predicate that inverts with its subject. Two competing analyses of this inversion are… read more
This article explores definiteness as expressed by the determiner system of Malagasy. In particular, noun phrases with and without an overt determiner are compared in terms of familiarity, uniqueness, and other semantic notions commonly associated with definiteness. It is shown that the determiner… read more
