Chapter 10
Forty years in the search of a/the subject
The present short discussion piece presents my personal view of the studies of the topics related to the notion of subject, oblique subject and non-canonical subject marking over the last years. The presentation is of course subjective insofar as it reflects my range of interests in this field. Equally subjective is the selected timeframe mentioned in the title (“forty years”) which is meant to refer to the time when the notion of subject has been in the spotlight of typological interest.
Article outline
- The quest for the subject
- Diachronic issues and their theoretical consequences
- Subject properties, biases and competing motivations
- A note on the oblique subject controversy
-
Acknowledgements
-
Notes
-
References
References
Aikhenvald, Alexandra Y., Dixon, Robert M. W. & Onishi, Masayuki
Allen, Cynthia L.
1995 Case Marking and Reanalysis: Grammatical Relations from Old to Early Modern English. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Anderson, Stephen
1976 On the notion of subject in ergative languages. In
Subject and Topic,
Charles N. Li (ed.), 1–24. New York NY: Academic Press.

Baker, Mark C.
1988 Incorporation: A Theory of Grammatical Function Changing. Chicago IL: University of Chicago Press.

Barðdal, Jóhanna
2006 Construction-specific properties of syntactic subjects in Icelandic and German.
Cognitive Linguistics 17(1): 39–106.


Barðdal, Jóhanna
2015 Valency classes in Icelandic: Oblique subjects, oblique ambitransitives and the actional passive. In
Valency Classes in the World’s Languages, Vol. 1,
Andrej Malchukov &
Bernard Comrie (eds), 367–416. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton.

Barðdal, Jóhanna & Eythórsson, Thórhallur
2003 The change that never happened: The story of oblique subjects.
Journal of Linguistics 39(3): 439–472.


Barðdal, Jóhanna & Eythórsson, Thórhallur
Barðdal, Jóhanna & Eythórsson, Tórhallur
2012 ‘Hungering and lusting for women and fleshly delicacies’: Reconstructing grammatical relations for Proto-Germanic.
Transactions of the Philological Society 110(3): 363–393.


Bhaskararao, Peri & Subbarao, Karumuri Venkata
(eds) 2004 Non-nominative Subjects, Vols. 1–2 [
Typological Studies in Language 60–61]. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Bickel, Balthasar
2011 Grammatical relations typology. In
The Oxford Handbook of Linguistic Typology Jae Jung Song (ed.), 399–444. Oxford: OUP.

Brown, Dunstan, Chumakina, Marina & Corbett, Greville G.
(eds) 2013 Canonical Morphology and Syntax. Oxford: OUP.

Cennamo, Michela, Eythórsson, Thórhallur & Barðdal, Jóhanna
2015 The rise and fall of anticausative constructions in Indo-European: The context of Latin and Germanic.
Linguistics 53 (4): 677–729.

Cole, Peter, Harbert, Wayne, Hermon, Gabriella & Sridhar, S. N.
1980 The acquisition of subjecthood.
Language 56: 719–43.


Comrie, Bernard
1981[1989] Language Universals and Linguistic Typology: Syntax and Morphology. Chicago IL: University of Chicago Press.

Comrie, Bernard
1978 Ergativity. In
Syntactic Typology: Studies in the Phenomenology of Language,
Winfred P. Lehmann (ed.), 329–394. Austin TX: University of Texas Press.

Croft, William
1991 Syntactic Categories and Grammatical Relations: The Cognitive Organization of Information. Chicago IL: The University of Chicago Press.

Croft, William
2001 Radical Construction Grammar. Oxford: OUP.


Dixon, Robert M. W.
1977 A Grammar of Yidiny. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.


Dixon, Robert Malcolm Ward
1979 Ergativity.
Language 55: 59–138.


Donohue, Mark
2008 Semantic alignment systems: What’s what, and what’s not. In
Typology of Languages with Semantic Alignment,
Mark Donohue &
Søren Wichmann (eds), 24–75. Oxford: OUP.


Du Bois, John
1985 Competing motivations. In
Iconicity in Syntax [
Typological Studies in Language 6],
John Haiman (ed.), 343–366. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.


Eythórsson, Thórhallur & Jóhanna Barðdal
2005 Oblique Subjects: A Common Germanic Inheritance.
Language 81–4: 824–881.

Farrell, Patrick
2005 Grammatical Relations. Oxford: OUP.

Haspelmath, Martin
2001 Non-canonical marking of core arguments in European languages. In
Aikhenvald, Dixon &
Onishi (eds.), 53–85.

Haspelmath, Martin
2010 Comparative concepts and descriptive categories in crosslinguistic studies.
Language 86(3): 663–687.


Kazenin, Konstantin I.
1994 Split syntactic ergativity: Toward an implicational hierarchy.
Sprachtypologie und Universalienforschung 47: 78–98.

Keenan, Edward L.
1976 Towards a universal definition of subject. In
Subject and Topic,
Charles N. Li (ed.), 303–333. New York NY: Academic Press.

Keenan, Edward L.
1984 Semantic correlates of the ergative/absolutive distinction.
Linguistics 22: 197–223.


Lazard, Gilbert
1998 Actancy. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.


Lazard, Gilbert
2015 Two possible universals: The Major Biactant Construction; the twofold notion of subject.
Linguistic Typology 19(1): 111–130.


Levin, Beth & Rappaport Hovav, Malka
2005 Argument Realization. Cambridge: CUP.


Malchukov, Andrej
2008 Split intransitives, experiencer objects and ‘transimpersonal’ constructions: (re-)Establishing the connection. In
Typology of Languages with Semantic Alignment,
Mark Donohue &
Søren Wichmann (eds), 76–101. Oxford: OUP.


Malchukov, Andrej & Ogawa, Akio
Malchukov, Andrej
2014 Resolving alignment conflicts: A competing motivations approach. In
Competing Motivations in Grammar and Cognition,
Brian MacWhinney,
Andrej Malchukov &
Edith Moravcsik (eds), 17–42. Oxford: OUP.


Manning, Christopher D.
1996 Ergativity: Argument Structure and Grammatical Relations. Stanford CA: CSLI.

Moravcsik, Edith
1978 On the distribution of ergative and accusative patterns.
Lingua 45: 233–279.


Platzack, Christian
2001 Multiple interfaces. In
Conceptual Structure and its Interfaces with other Modules of Grammar,
Urpo Nikanne &
Emile van der Zee (eds), 21–53. Oxford: OUP.

Primus, Beatrice
1999 Cases and Semantic Roles. Tübingen: Niemeyer.


Sands, Kristina & Campbell, Lyle
Schachter, Paul
1976 The subject in Philippine languages: Topic, actor, actor-topic, or none of the above. In
Subject and Topic,
Charles N. Li (ed.), 491–518. New York NY: Academic Press.

Shibatani, Masayoshi
2001 Non-canonical constructions in Japanese. In
Aikhenvald, Dixon &
Onishi (eds), 307–355

Sigurðsson, Halldór Ármann
2004 Icelandic non-nominative subjects: Facts and implications. In
Bhaskararao &
Subbarao (eds), Vol. 2, 137–159.

Seržant, Ilja
2013 Rise of canonical subjecthood. In
The Diachronic Typology of Non-canonical Subjects [
Studies in Language Companion Series 140],
Ilja A. Seržant &
Leonid Kulikov (eds), 283–310. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.


Svenonius, Peter
2002 Introduction. In
Subjects, Expletives, and the EPP,
Peter Svenonius (ed.), 1–25. Oxford: OUP.

Vajda, Edward, Nefedov, Andrey & Malchukov, Andrej
2011 Impersonal constructions in Ket. In
Impersonal Constructions: A Cross-linguistic Perspective [
Studies in Language Companion Series 124],
Andrej L. Malchukov &
Anna Siewierska (eds), 439–458. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.


Van Valin Jr., Robert D. & Lapolla, Randy J.
1997 Syntax: Structure, Meaning and Function. Cambridge: CUP.


Van Valin Jr., Robert D.
2004 Semantic macroroles in Role and Reference Grammar. In
Semantische Rollen,
Rolf Kailuweit &
Martin Hummel (eds), 62–82. Tübingen: Narr.

Van Valin Jr., Robert D.
2005 Exploring the Syntax-semantics Interface. Cambridge: CUP.


Wiemer, Björn & Bjarnadóttir, Valgerður
Wierzbicka, Anna
1990 ‘Prototypes save’: On the uses and abuses of the notionof ‘prototype’ in linguistics and related fields. In
Meanings and Prototypes: Studies in Linguistic Categorization,
Savas L. Tsohatzidis (ed.), 347–367. London: Routledge.

Cited by
Cited by 1 other publications
This list is based on CrossRef data as of 16 september 2023. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers.
Any errors therein should be reported to them.