Date of Award
5-12-2024
Degree Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Arts (MA)
Department
Languages, Literatures, and Linguistics
Advisor(s)
Adam Singerman
Keywords
contrastive focus;information structure-syntax interface;Palestinian Arabic;phase theory;spell-out;topic
Subject Categories
Linguistics | Social and Behavioral Sciences
Abstract
This thesis analyzes how the information-structural constituents topic and contrastive focus are syntactically encoded in Rural Palestinian Arabic. In doing so, two original proposals are argued for. First, the syntactic encodement of information-structure is recursive and domain-bound. That is, the same information-structural movements are repeatedly available within multiple domains that differ incrementally from one another in terms of locality: they are available at DP, PP, vP, AspectP, FinP, and ForceP. Second, I argue that, at least in Rural Palestinian Arabic, the information structure literature and the phase theory literature essentially describe the same phenomena, with the central argument being that an information-structural periphery is what a phase escape hatch looks like when it is occupied rather than only used as a point of escape.
Access
Open Access
Recommended Citation
Alawneh, Mahmoud, "Information Structure by Phase: an analysis of Rural Palestinian Arabic" (2024). Theses - ALL. 861.
https://surface.syr.edu/thesis/861
