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Object fronting

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agentive & experiencer-theme verbs. Call (xAgent, yTheme) The secretary called the customer ... Strongest SI preference for agentive verbs ... – PowerPoint PPT presentation

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Title: Object fronting


1
Object fronting
  • Helen de Hoop
  • based on joint work with
  • Monique Lamers

2
Object fronting
  • Object fronting in Dutch
  • Dat weet ik zeker case
  • that know I sure
  • Het lijk heeft Jan verstopt animacy
  • the corpse has Jan hidden
  • Jan sloeg Piet word order
  • Jan hit Piet


3
Overview
  • Distinguishability
  • Incremental optimization of interpretation
  • Evidence from ERPs
  • Three types of verbs
  • Evidence from rating studies
  • Evidence from a production study
  • A bidirectional perspective
  • Conclusion


4
Distinguishability
  • Case can help to identify the first NP as the
    object
  • Latin
  • puer-um magister laudat
  • boyACC teacher praises
  • The teacher praises the boy.

5
Distinguishability
  • ACCUSATIVE part 2

Prediction There is also a part 1
6
Distinguishability
  • part 2 ? part 1
  • ACC ? subject
  • Within the domain of language comprehension, it
    is well established that syntactic dependencies
    give rise to predictive parsing (Gibson, 1998).
    For example, the processing of an unambiguously
    identifiable object will give rise to the
    prediction of a subject.

7
Distinguishability

Den Zaun habe ich zerbrochen the fenceACC have
INOM broken The fence, I broke.
8
Distinguishability
  • Den Zaun habe ich zerbrochen
  • Distinguishability of subject and object
  • Case
  • Agreement
  • Prominence (animacy)
  • Selection
  • Precedence (word order)

9
Distinguishability

Die Studentin hat die Professorin geschlagen The
student hit the professor.
10
Distinguishability
  • Die Studentin hat die Professorin geschlagen
  • Distinguishability of subject and object
  • Case
  • Agreement
  • Prominence (animacy)
  • Selection
  • Precedence (word order)

11
Distinguishability
The holiday pleased the man The man liked the
holiday

12
Distinguishability

The holiday pleased the man
  • Distinguishability of subject and object
  • Case
  • Agreement
  • Prominence (animacy)
  • Selection
  • Precedence (word order)

13
Distinguishability
  • Case the subject is in the nominative case, the
    object in the accusative
  • Agreement the subject agrees with the verb
  • Prominence (animacy) the subject outranks the
    object in animacy
  • Selection Fit the selection restrictions of the
    verb.
  • Precedence (word order) the subject linearly
    precedes the object

14
Determining the ranking
15
Determining the ranking
16
Determining the ranking
17
Determining the ranking
18
Determining the ranking
19
Determining the ranking
20
The ranking of the constraints
  • Case, Agreement
  • Selection
  • Precedence
  • Prominence

21
Incremental optimization
  • During sentence processing the optimal
    interpretation is being built up incrementally
    (word-by-word or constituent-by-constituent)
  • System of ranked constraints

22
Incremental optimization
  • Optimal interpretation at time t
  • Jumping from one interpretation to the other
  • ERP studies
  • Lamers 2001

23
Incremental optimization
24
Incremental optimization
25
Incremental optimization
26
Incremental optimization
27
Incremental optimization
28
Incremental optimization
29
Incremental optimization
30
Evidence from ERPs
31
Evidence from ERPs
32
Evidence from ERPs
33
case
animacy
De oude vrouw/Het oude park verzorgde hij
De oude vrouw in de straat verzorgde hem/hij
34
Evidence from ERPs
  • De oude vrouw verzorgde hem
  • Het oude park verzorgde hij
  • De oude vrouw verzorgde hij
  • (2) gets an OI reading at the verb (SELECTION)
  • (3) gets an OI reading at the pronoun (CASE)
  • Lamers (2001) reports similar ERP effects at the
    verb in (2) and at the pronoun in (3)


35
Evidence from ERPs
  • De oude vrouw verzorgde hem
  • Het oude park verzorgde hij
  • De oude vrouw verzorgde hij
  • Lamers (2001) reports similar ERP effects at the
    verb in (2) and at the pronoun in (3)
  • At the verb in (2) and at the pronoun in (3)
    there is a jump from an SI to an OI reading
    (thereby violating PRECEDENCE)


36
Evidence from ERPs
  • Identical ERP effects correspond to identical
    patterns of constraint violations


37
Three types of verbs
  • agentive experiencer-theme verbs
  • Call (xAgent, yTheme)
  • The secretary called the customer
  • causative psych/theme-experiencer verbs
  • Frighten (xTheme/Stim, yExp)
  • The secretary frightened us.
  • unaccusative psych verbs
  • Please (xTheme, yExp)
  • The secretary pleased us.


38
Three types of verbs
  • agentive experiencer-theme verbs
  • Dat de toerist de stad zeer bewonderde ltSIgt
  • that the tourist the city a-lot admired
  • Dat de stad de toerist zeer bewonderde ltOIgt
  • that the city the tourist a-lot admired


39
Three types of verbs
  • causative psych verbs
  • Dat de stad de toerist zeer deprimeerde ltSIgt
  • that the city the tourist a-lot depressed
  • Dat de toerist de stad zeer deprimeerde ltOIgt
  • that the tourist the city a-lot depressed


40
Three types of verbs
  • unaccusative psych verbs
  • Dat de stad de toerist zeer beviel ltSIgt
  • that the city the tourist a-lot pleased
  • Dat de toerist de stad zeer beviel ltOIgt
  • that the tourist the city a-lot pleased


41
Evidence from rating studies

Black Lamers (2001) Orange Lamers (2005)
42
Evidence from rating studies
  • General preference for subject-initial sentences
  • Strongest SI preference for agentive verbs
  • Highest rating of OI sentences for unaccusative
    psych verbs


43
Evidence from rating studies
  • Where do these differences between the three
    types of verbs come from?
  • Strongest SI preference for agentive verbs
  • Subject first
  • Animate first


44
Evidence from rating studies
  • Psych verbs have an animate object
  • Therefore, only one of the two constraints can be
    satisfied
  • Subject first ? SI
  • Animate first ? OI


45
Three types of verbs
  • But then, what is the difference between
    unaccusative and psych verbs?
  • Highest rating of OI sentences for unaccusative
    psych verbs
  • Production experiment (Hofmans Lamers 2006)


46
A production study
  • 30 normal participants (6 Broca aphasics)
  • 12 sets of three verbs with an animate
    inanimate NPs (2 combinations for each set of
    verbs)
  • three conditions for each verb
  • -no first NP given
  • -animate first
  • -inanimate first


depress student exam
47

ANIMATE FIRST
SUBJECT FIRST
48
A production study
  • Subject First
  • Animate First
  • Conflict between these two results in a higher
    occurrence of passive constructions with
    causative psych verbs satisfying both
    constraints, and a higher occurrence of OI
    constructions satisfying Animate First with
    unaccusative psych verbs.


49
A bidirectional perspective
But then, what is the difference between
unaccusative and psych verbs?
  • Difference in rating can be explained in a
    bidirectional approach in which the hearer takes
    the speakers perspective into account.

50
A bidirectional perspective
  • When a speaker wants to start with the animate
    argument, she can use a passive construction in
    case of a causative psych verb (thereby
    satisfying Subject First as well), but not in
    case of an unaccusative psych verb. Thus, for
    unaccusative psych verbs, only an OI sentence
    leads to satisfaction of Animate First.

51
Conclusions
  • Subject First is more important than Animate
    First.
  • If a speaker wants to satisfy Subject First as
    well as Animate First, then a conflict may arise
    in the case of psych verbs (that have animate
    objects).
  • To solve the conflict, a passive construction may
    be used (which implies satisfaction of both
    constraints).
  • But if passive formation is not possible
    (unaccusative psych verbs), then object fronting
    is the only way to satisfy Animate First.
  • This explains the increase of both the rating and
    the production of object-initial sentences in the
    case of unaccusative psych verbs.

52
Case cross-linguistically Animacywww.ru.nl/pion
ier/
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