The aim of this project is to study certain aspects of the interaction of Case and agreement morphology with phrasal syntax in greater breadth and depth than has been done so far. In relation to Case, we propose to focus on certain differences in behaviour between structural and oblique Case, specifically, on the fact that it is cross-linguistically harder to place items that cannot or do not exhibit overt Case morphology in oblique Case contexts than it is to place them in non-oblique Case contexts. In relation to agreement, we propose to focus on the role of agreement in the licensing of pre-nominal adjectival modifiers of various sorts. One aspect of these phenomena to which we pay special attention is the fact that their domain of operation seems to be sometimes extended beyond what can reasonably be considered to be its 'core' range. For example, oblique Case contexts can sometimes be satisfied by independently licensed Case morphology, Case assigners sometimes appear to derive their status from homophony with other items, and adjacency conditions that normally need to be satisfied by agreeing adjectival heads can sometimes be satisfied by agreeing adjectives that are not the head of the modifying adjectival phrase. The cross-linguistic variation of such extension phenomena has not been studied systematically and carefully enough, and we propose to undertake its investigation in a wider variety of languages than has been done so far. We propose to pursue this goal by using both the reference literature and native informants. Each of us has studied certain phenomena of this type in a small number of languages, primarily, in his own. We propose to study such phenomena in a significantly greater number of languages and in more detail than we have done so far, and to put our minds together with a view to reaching deeper and more far-reaching conclusions concerning the options made available by Universal Grammar. We expect this research to yield novel insights into the interaction of inflectional morphology with phrasal syntax, and thus to make a significant contribution both with respect to individual languages and with respect to linguistic theory.The aim of this project is to study certain aspects of the interaction of Case and agreement morphology with phrasal syntax in greater breadth and depth than has been done so far. In relation to Case, we propose to focus on certain differences in behaviour between structural and oblique Case, specifically, on the fact that it is cross-linguistically harder to place items that cannot or do not exhibit overt Case morphology in oblique Case contexts than it is to place them in non-oblique Case contexts. In relation to agreement, we propose to focus on the role of agreement in the licensing of pre-nominal adjectival modifiers of various sorts. One aspect of these phenomena to which we pay special attention is the fact that their domain of operation seems to be sometimes extended beyond what can reasonably be considered to be its 'core' range. For example, oblique Case contexts can sometimes be satisfied by independently licensed Case morphology, Case assigners sometimes appear to derive their status from homophony with other items, and adjacency conditions that normally need to be satisfied by agreeing adjectival heads can sometimes be satisfied by agreeing adjectives that are not the head of the modifying adjectival phrase. The cross-linguistic variation of such extension phenomena has not been studied systematically and carefully enough, and we propose to undertake its investigation in a wider variety of languages than has been done so far. We propose to pursue this goal by using both the reference literature and native informants. Each of us has studied certain phenomena of this type in a small number of languages, primarily, in his own. We propose to study such phenomena in a significantly greater number of languages and in more detail than we have done so far, and to put our minds together with a view to reaching deeper and more far-reaching conclusions concerning the options made available by Universal Grammar. We expect this research to yield novel insights into the interaction of inflectional morphology with phrasal syntax, and thus to make a significant contribution both with respect to individual languages and with respect to linguistic theory.
