Article published in:
Towards a Derivational Syntax: Survive-minimalismEdited by Michael T. Putnam
[Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today 144] 2009
► pp. 133–168
When grammars collide
Code-switching in Survive-minimalism
Michael T. Putnam | Carson-Newman College
M. Carmen Parafita Couto | ESRC Centre for Research on Bilingualism, Bangor University
This study provides a Survive-minimalist analysis of two issues related to DP-structures in code-switching (CS) grammars: (i) the relationship between determiners and nouns in a DP where each respective lexical item originates from a separate language and (ii) the linearization of Det(erminers)-Adj(ectives)- N(ouns) in CS-grammars where each respective language contributing a surface order contrasts with the other. Violable constraints that filter the selection possibilities (i.e., the operation Select) of determiners are posited. We contend that a formal feature, definiteness [+ Def], triggers the re-configuration of lexical items to conform to structural requires of a given CS-grammar. That same feature motivates both the det-adj-n and the det-n-adj orderings. The advantages to pursuing this analysis of DP linearity in CS-grammars are that it is: (i) consistent with the desiderata of Survive-minimalism and (ii) does not require features similar to the EPP to exist in the system.
Published online: 29 July 2009
https://doi.org/10.1075/la.144.06put
https://doi.org/10.1075/la.144.06put