The syntax of possessor prominence in Maithili

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Main author: Yadava, Yogendra
Other authors: Bond, Oliver
Nikolaeva, Irina
Ritchie, Thomas Alexander France
Format: Book Chapters           
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id eprints-30332
recordtype eprints
institution SOAS, University of London
collection SOAS Research Online
language English
language_search English
description Maithili (Indo-Aryan; India; Nepal) has a complex agreement system in which many terms and non-terms, including subjects, objects, obliques, extra-clausal ‘deictic referents’, and, crucially, possessors within any of these can potentially control agreement on the verb. Agreement is partly determined by grammatical function and argument structure, but in many instances the functional prominence of the agreement controller—determined by focus and referential features, including respect—overrides syntactic prominence. This is particularly clear when possessors internal to an argument or adjunct can control agreement, even though viable alternatives appear to be available. The functional prominence of the internal possessor also appears to have a syntactic correlate: the possessor that controls agreement may be in a more prominent position within the phrase headed by the possessed nominal, and this is what enables it to participate in clause-level syntactic processes.
author_additional Barany, Andras
author_additionalStr Barany, Andras
format Book Chapters
author Yadava, Yogendra
author_facet Yadava, Yogendra
Bond, Oliver
Nikolaeva, Irina
Ritchie, Thomas Alexander France
authorStr Yadava, Yogendra
author_letter Yadava, Yogendra
author2 Bond, Oliver
Nikolaeva, Irina
Ritchie, Thomas Alexander France
author2Str Bond, Oliver
Nikolaeva, Irina
Ritchie, Thomas Alexander France
title The syntax of possessor prominence in Maithili
publisher Oxford University Press
publishDate 2019
url https://eprints.soas.ac.uk/30332/

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