Chapter published in:
Syntactic Variation in Insular Scandinavian
Edited by Höskuldur Thráinsson, Caroline Heycock, Hjalmar P. Petersen and Zakaris Svabo Hansen
[Studies in Germanic Linguistics 1] 2017
► pp. 234–275

Variation in copular agreement in Insular Scandinavian

| IDS Mannheim
| University of Edinburgh
This paper explores the syntax of agreement in Insular Scandinavian in copular clauses with two potential goals for agreement. Data from three production experiments – one in Faroese and two in Icelandic – establish several new facts. First, in both languages agreement with the second nominal (DP2) is possible/preferred. Second, there is considerable variation (both within and between languages, and indeed speakers) in the patterns observed. Third, Icelandic shows a surprising pattern of "partial" agreement with DP2 – agreement in number but not person. We discuss the implications for current theorising about agreement, proposing that in these languages, at least, agreement is downwards, and that the available agreement options depend in part on the syntactic position of DP1 when agreement is established.
Keywords: Icelandic, Faroese, copular clauses, agreement, phi-features, inversion
Published online: 18 July 2017
https://doi.org/10.1075/sigl.1.09har
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