This introductory chapter provides some background to the rest of the book. It first outlines some major topics of the grammar of the languages of Asturias. After that, some prior approximations to these languages from a generative perspective are reviewed. Finally, the specific issues dealt within each chapter are advanced.
A number of movement-related phenomena from Asturian as well as from the Spanish spoken in the Principality of Asturias are amenable to accounts where the Pronounce-Highest-Copy requirement in Phonetic Form can be overridden if convergence so demands. Therefore, the evidence adduced here supports the view that the requirements imposed by the Phonetic Form component may take precedence over purely syntactic requirements. In this connection, we argue for a novel analysis of the enclitic-proclitic contrast in Asturian and Asturian Spanish in finite and non-finite contexts, alongside extensions to other constructions, which add to the ample stock of phenomena supporting the rather successful Copy Theory of Movement.
In Asturian, and differently from its western Iberian neighbors (i.e., Galician and European Portuguese), enclisis (or postverbal clitics) is also attested in embedded contexts. This syntactic structure is shown to give rise to a [+epistemic] reading of the content in the embedded clause, an interpretation that may be anchored either to the speaker, to the matrix subject, or to an intermediate subject. Following previous work, I show that both the different clitic patterns attested and the [±epistemic] anchoring these patterns give rise to can receive a principled account under the analysis entertained. In turn, this chapter contributes to further our understanding of how syntax works in parallel with semantics to derive these syntactic structures and their interpretation.
This chapter is focused on an idiosyncratic feature of Asturian in the context of other neighboring Romance languages. In all these languages, the regular clitic forms for the third person dative and the third person accusative cannot cluster together; as a consequence, one or the other must be replaced by another item or they must fuse into a single form. In Asturian, however, clitics remain the same in that context. This chapter explores the thesis that such a state of affairs is due to the fact that the Asturian dative clitics incorporate the properties of a locative and justifies it historically.
This chapter is devoted to the pervasive use in Asturian Galician of a clitic token formally identical to the second person singular dative, albeit with different conditions of use and subject to very different placement restrictions. We claim that such item incorporates a ‘clusivity’ feature as an extension of the second person, compatible with its modal meaning, and that it benefits from the underspecification of the vocabulary item that also materializes the dative. We also claim that it belongs to a class different to ‘determiner-type’ clitics and ‘agreement-type’ clitics, which we deem ‘other-type.’ Despite its specificities, the chapter shows that it is not, however, a peripheric unit, inasmuch as its behavior is fully consistent with UG dictums.
This chapter deals with two periphrastic constructions that consist of a perfect participle and an inflected form of the verb tener ‘have’ or llevar ‘carry’ in Eonavian Spanish (EoS), which are used to convey perfect meanings and they require a form of iteration or plurality on the event described. These constructions are monoclausal and behave like fully grammaticalized auxiliary constructions, but they are restricted in unexpected ways. The description is complemented by a cross-linguistic comparison of superficially similar constructions in neighbouring Romance varieties. The final part of the chapter considers the extent to which similar constructions in the Galician dialect might explain the properties observed in EoS, concluding that they are independent systems.
Asturian middle-passive contexts containing activity verbs, such as lleer (to read), as well as a relational or body-part noun as their grammatical subject allow for the insertion of a non-selected dative argument interpreted as the inalienable possessor of such noun. Two configurations can yield these structures: one where the dative phrase raises to preverbal subject position, and another where the dative DP is left-dislocated and the theme in subject position. Interestingly, an analysis relying on the notion of low applicative heads relating the possessor and the possessee cannot successfully account for these configurations. An approach whereby the inalienable possession construal arises inside the DP-theme and subsequently spreads to the applicative head that introduces the dative possessor successfully overcomes this shortcoming.
The discourse markers in modern Asturian non and nun are not just two variants of the same unit of negation, as has been traditionally thought. Rather, they are lexical items that codify different types of polarity and express different types of negation. The present analysis will show that non is a peripheral independent C-unit that expresses relative polarity and is used to refute a previous utterance (metalinguistic negation). Nun, on the other hand, is an ambiguous negative marker: not only does it codifies negative polarity in ΣP and legitimises negative polarity items (sentential negation); it is also linked to ascending intonation, can activate the objection> value of relative polarity in C, and refutes a previous statement.
Speakers can use distinct intonation contours in polar questions to convey information about ‘degree of commitment.’ The present study analyzes the intonational variation in Mieres Asturian polar questions and explores whether speakers encode information about their belief states intonationally. A production experiment was designed to elicit polar questions, and the results uncovered three main intonational patterns, namely H+L* L%, H* L%, and L* L%. The data show that, while H+L* L% is used as a canonical or ‘default’ PQ-marking tune and does not encode any information about speaker belief states, H* L% and L* L% are epistemically specified, expressing a positive epistemic bias towards the proposition, and a state of disbelief on the part of the speaker, respectively.
This chapter focuses on the interplay between working memory, lexical capacity, and (self-rated) proficiency in three groups of speakers: monolingual (Spanish), bilingual (Spanish and English), and trilingual (Spanish, English, and Asturian). There is ample debate on the cognitive and lexical (dis)advantages that bilingualism can grant, and on its impact on third language learning. In this chapter, we argue for a cognitive advantage of any type of bilingualism in accuracy in a Luck and Vogel task, and an advantage of simultaneous bilingualism in reaction times. Additionally, we find no evidence for a disadvantage in lexical retrieval for simultaneous bilinguals.
This introductory chapter provides some background to the rest of the book. It first outlines some major topics of the grammar of the languages of Asturias. After that, some prior approximations to these languages from a generative perspective are reviewed. Finally, the specific issues dealt within each chapter are advanced.
A number of movement-related phenomena from Asturian as well as from the Spanish spoken in the Principality of Asturias are amenable to accounts where the Pronounce-Highest-Copy requirement in Phonetic Form can be overridden if convergence so demands. Therefore, the evidence adduced here supports the view that the requirements imposed by the Phonetic Form component may take precedence over purely syntactic requirements. In this connection, we argue for a novel analysis of the enclitic-proclitic contrast in Asturian and Asturian Spanish in finite and non-finite contexts, alongside extensions to other constructions, which add to the ample stock of phenomena supporting the rather successful Copy Theory of Movement.
In Asturian, and differently from its western Iberian neighbors (i.e., Galician and European Portuguese), enclisis (or postverbal clitics) is also attested in embedded contexts. This syntactic structure is shown to give rise to a [+epistemic] reading of the content in the embedded clause, an interpretation that may be anchored either to the speaker, to the matrix subject, or to an intermediate subject. Following previous work, I show that both the different clitic patterns attested and the [±epistemic] anchoring these patterns give rise to can receive a principled account under the analysis entertained. In turn, this chapter contributes to further our understanding of how syntax works in parallel with semantics to derive these syntactic structures and their interpretation.
This chapter is focused on an idiosyncratic feature of Asturian in the context of other neighboring Romance languages. In all these languages, the regular clitic forms for the third person dative and the third person accusative cannot cluster together; as a consequence, one or the other must be replaced by another item or they must fuse into a single form. In Asturian, however, clitics remain the same in that context. This chapter explores the thesis that such a state of affairs is due to the fact that the Asturian dative clitics incorporate the properties of a locative and justifies it historically.
This chapter is devoted to the pervasive use in Asturian Galician of a clitic token formally identical to the second person singular dative, albeit with different conditions of use and subject to very different placement restrictions. We claim that such item incorporates a ‘clusivity’ feature as an extension of the second person, compatible with its modal meaning, and that it benefits from the underspecification of the vocabulary item that also materializes the dative. We also claim that it belongs to a class different to ‘determiner-type’ clitics and ‘agreement-type’ clitics, which we deem ‘other-type.’ Despite its specificities, the chapter shows that it is not, however, a peripheric unit, inasmuch as its behavior is fully consistent with UG dictums.
This chapter deals with two periphrastic constructions that consist of a perfect participle and an inflected form of the verb tener ‘have’ or llevar ‘carry’ in Eonavian Spanish (EoS), which are used to convey perfect meanings and they require a form of iteration or plurality on the event described. These constructions are monoclausal and behave like fully grammaticalized auxiliary constructions, but they are restricted in unexpected ways. The description is complemented by a cross-linguistic comparison of superficially similar constructions in neighbouring Romance varieties. The final part of the chapter considers the extent to which similar constructions in the Galician dialect might explain the properties observed in EoS, concluding that they are independent systems.
Asturian middle-passive contexts containing activity verbs, such as lleer (to read), as well as a relational or body-part noun as their grammatical subject allow for the insertion of a non-selected dative argument interpreted as the inalienable possessor of such noun. Two configurations can yield these structures: one where the dative phrase raises to preverbal subject position, and another where the dative DP is left-dislocated and the theme in subject position. Interestingly, an analysis relying on the notion of low applicative heads relating the possessor and the possessee cannot successfully account for these configurations. An approach whereby the inalienable possession construal arises inside the DP-theme and subsequently spreads to the applicative head that introduces the dative possessor successfully overcomes this shortcoming.
The discourse markers in modern Asturian non and nun are not just two variants of the same unit of negation, as has been traditionally thought. Rather, they are lexical items that codify different types of polarity and express different types of negation. The present analysis will show that non is a peripheral independent C-unit that expresses relative polarity and is used to refute a previous utterance (metalinguistic negation). Nun, on the other hand, is an ambiguous negative marker: not only does it codifies negative polarity in ΣP and legitimises negative polarity items (sentential negation); it is also linked to ascending intonation, can activate the objection> value of relative polarity in C, and refutes a previous statement.
Speakers can use distinct intonation contours in polar questions to convey information about ‘degree of commitment.’ The present study analyzes the intonational variation in Mieres Asturian polar questions and explores whether speakers encode information about their belief states intonationally. A production experiment was designed to elicit polar questions, and the results uncovered three main intonational patterns, namely H+L* L%, H* L%, and L* L%. The data show that, while H+L* L% is used as a canonical or ‘default’ PQ-marking tune and does not encode any information about speaker belief states, H* L% and L* L% are epistemically specified, expressing a positive epistemic bias towards the proposition, and a state of disbelief on the part of the speaker, respectively.
This chapter focuses on the interplay between working memory, lexical capacity, and (self-rated) proficiency in three groups of speakers: monolingual (Spanish), bilingual (Spanish and English), and trilingual (Spanish, English, and Asturian). There is ample debate on the cognitive and lexical (dis)advantages that bilingualism can grant, and on its impact on third language learning. In this chapter, we argue for a cognitive advantage of any type of bilingualism in accuracy in a Luck and Vogel task, and an advantage of simultaneous bilingualism in reaction times. Additionally, we find no evidence for a disadvantage in lexical retrieval for simultaneous bilinguals.