draft of November 2011

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So how does Greek fit into this typology? Unlike Italian, Greek bare nouns are much more productive. 14 However, unlike English, Greek bare nouns exclude kind interpretations, since, as pointed out by Roussou and Tsimpli (1994), established kinds as in (38) are necessarily definite. (38) a. i/*∅ dinosavri ehun eksafanisti the-nom/*∅ dinosaurs-nom have-3pl disappeared Dinosaurs are extinct. (bare nominal ungrammatical under the kind reading) b. ta/*∅ skilia ine katikidhia zoa the/*∅ dogs are domestic animals Dogs are domestic animals. c. ?dinosavri ehun eksafanisti dinosaurs-nom have-3pl disappeared Dinosaurs have disappeared (bare nominal possible only under the existential reading). In addition, bare nominals in Greek may be singular as well as plural. In sum, we need a three-way distinction between Italian, Greek and English. We propose that Italian and Greek nouns are both [+pred], [-arg]. The difference lies in the element that turns the predicative noun into an argument, i.e. on the ”nominalisor”; we propose that it is D in Italian but Number in Greek. The first consequence of this difference is the wider availability of bare nouns in Greek. If number is enough to turn a predicative noun into an argument in the absence of D, bare nouns are expected to be more widespread. In addition, if number is the nominalisor, both singular and plural bare nouns are also expected. Finally, since Greek nouns are not [+arg] they cannot freely shift to kinds and, thus, established kinds cannot be bare nouns (38), in contrast to English. The strength of this view lies in the fact that it allows us to give a three way variation relying on existing analytical tools: Chierchia’s semantic parameter and the possibility that different individuating heads (D or Num) may act as nominalisors crosslinguistically. Of course, it raises a host of questions: why number in Greek but D in Italian? What is the 14 To give a quantitative perspective, according to Marinis (2003), around 45% of target like child Greek involves bare nouns. 24
semantics of Greek Number? We will provide some speculative answers to these questions in our concluding section. The crosslinguistic variation provides our second counter argument to the hypoethesis that Greek bare nouns involve a null D. Quite apart from the Greek internal facts reviewed in section 4.1.1, it is hard to see how the variation between Italian and Greek is to be accounted for if in both languages bare nouns are DPs with a null D. At this point, it is worth considering one argument presented in favor of the null D hypothesis in Greek. Sioupi (2001) notes that bare nominals are excluded from subject positions as in (39). She takes such examples to indicate that there are special structural conditions licensing bare nominals, namely that the bare nominal be governed. Such structural restrictions are evidence for a null D, which, as in Italian, is not freely available, but needs to be structurally licensed. (39) *pedia efagan to psari children ate the fish Children ate the fish. (From Sioupi 2001, ex.4a) However, as we have seen already, bare nouns can appear in subject (non-governed) positions; this is further illustrated by the examples below. (40) a. itan enas hamos; yinekes epsahnan ta pedia tus mes ta was a disaster; women were-looking-for the children their in the halasmata; pedia kitazan yiro tus sastismena ruins; children were-looking around them startled It was a mess; women were looking for their children in the ruins; children were looking around startled. b. ton gratzunisan gates tu dromu him.cl scratched-3pl cats the-gen street-gen Street cats scratched him.(Kolliakou 2003) c. ta hronia ta palia, varia fortia fevgan ya tin America the years the old, heavy loads were-leaving for the America In old times heavy loads (of immigrants) were leaving for Americal (popular song by D.Papakonstantinou). d. alepudes irthan ke perisi foxes came-3pl and last-year Foxes appeared last year as well. 25
Page 1 and 2: Topic-strategies and the internal s
Page 3 and 4: 1 Introduction Clitic Left Dislocat
Page 5 and 6: (5) a. Fetos i moda ine apesia; idi
Page 7 and 8: evidence of reconstruction, and, th
Page 9 and 10: 3.1 Greek manipulates structure whi
Page 11 and 12: 3.2 Indefinite pronominal anteceden
Page 13 and 14: 3.3 Bare nouns As has become eviden
Page 15 and 16: systematically employs articles and
Page 17 and 18: Syntax They can be left dislocated
Page 19 and 20: Further, Greek bare nouns have atom
Page 21 and 22: You will need a skirt sewn in India
Page 23: 4.1.2 Towards a crosslinguistic typ
Page 27 and 28: e felicitous subjects, even under r
Page 29 and 30: However, the data below indicate th
Page 31 and 32: generalisation is that only languag
Page 33 and 34: that the definite is a noun phrase.
Page 35 and 36: excellent one (so the time we took
Page 37 and 38: (66) *den prokite na vri ti yineka
Page 39 and 40: . o Napoleodas epline (ta) piatai k
Page 41 and 42: (75) a. o Yanis psahni idravliko al
Page 43 and 44: Let us now turn to subnominal ellip
Page 45 and 46: Beautiful she is. b. belle lo sono?
Page 47 and 48: just semantically definite elements
Page 49 and 50: topic-strategies between the two la
Page 51 and 52: Alexopoulou, T. and C. Heycock (200
Page 53 and 54: Giusti, G. (1997). The categorial s
Page 55 and 56: Sells, P. (1984). Syntax and Semant

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