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Professor D S p o r t i c h e
Department
of Linguistics |
Research Interests
Dominique Sportiche works on formal syntax. He has focused on the theory
of constituent structure, and properties of the syntax/semantics interface
(especially in French and the Romance languages) as they bear on the
architecture of syntactic or grammatical theory and on cognition in general. He
has published work on phrase structure, agreement, clitics, and reconstruction
phenomena. His current theoretical interests and ongoing works include phrase
structure and the functional sequence, the internal structure of VPs,
reconstruction phenomena and the binding theory. From an empirical standpoint
his work focalizes primarily on various aspects of the syntax systems of
English, and of French and the Romance languages (complementizers, relative
pronouns, reflexive constructions, binding theory). In recent years his work
has extended to the relation between linguistic theory and (i) linguistic
impairment (in Huntington's disease patients), (ii) very early acquisition of
syntax and (iii) grounding theoretical choices in more systematic methods of
data collection and control (particularly regarding the binding theory, and the
French complementizer system).
Publications, Articles To Appear or (Downloadable) Manuscripts
·
(2009) Language in the striatum: syntax or working memory constraints.
Sambin S., Teichmann M., Sportiche D., Schlenker P. & Bachoud-Levy A.C.
·
(2008) Re Re again (or
what French re shows about VP
structures, have and be raising and the syntax/phonology
interface). To appear in Festschrift for G. Cinque (OUP).
·
(2008) The que/qui Alternation: New Analytical Directions (with Hilda
Koopman). to appear, Oxford
University Press.
·
(2008) Inward Bound: splitting the wh-paradigm and French relative qui
·
(2006) NP Movement: 
How to Merge and Move
in Tough-Constructions (Tough-constructions.pdf)
·
(2005) Division of Labor between Merge and Move: Strict Locality of
Selection and Apparent Reconstruction Paradoxes, in Proceedings of the Workshop
Divisions of Linguistic Labor, The La Bretesche Workshop (Sportiche_05_Division-of-.pdf)
·
(2005) "Cyclic NP Structure and the Interpretation of Traces"
in Hans Broekhuis, Norbert Corver, Jan Koster, Riny Huybregts and Ursula
Kleinhenz (eds.), Organizing Grammar: Linguistic Studies in Honor of Henk van
Riemsdijk, Berlin/New York, Mouton de Gruyter.
·
(2003) Reconstruction, Binding and Scope, ms. UCLA ( rbs.pdf ). Prepublication
version. Appeared in Everaert, M., H, van Riemsdijk The Blackwell Companion
to Syntax, Volume I-V,
·
(1998) Partitions and Atoms
of Clause Structure, Routledge,
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(1998) “Pronominal Clitic Dependencies”, in Language
Typology: Clitics in the European Languages, Henk van Riemsdijk, ed., Mouton
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(1997) “Subject Clitics in French and Romance, Complex Inversion
and Clitic Doubling”, in Studies in Comparative Syntax,
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(1995) “Sketch of a Reductionist Approach to Syntactic Variation
and Dependencies “, in Evolution and Revolution in Linguistic Theory, H.
Campos and P. Kempchinsky, eds., 356 - 398, Georgetown University Press
·
(1995) "French Predicate le and Clausal Structure", in
Small Clauses, A. Cardinaletti and M.T. Guasti, eds., Syntax and Semantics,
volume 28, Academic Press, NY.
·
(1995) "Clitic Constructions", Phrase Structure and the
Lexicon, L. Zaring and J. Rooryck, 213-276, Kluwer Academic Publishers,
Dordrecht .
·
(1995) Subject clitics in French and Romance: Complex inversion and
clitic doubling. To appear in Studies in
Comparative Romance Syntax,
·
(1995) Pronominal clitic dependencies. To appear in Henk van Riemsdijk,
ed., Language typology: Clitics in the
European Languages (
·
(1995) French predicate clitics and clause structure. To appear in Syntax and Semantics, vol. 28,
·
(1994) with J. Aoun and E. Benmamoun "Agreement, Word Order and
Conjunction in Several Varieties of Arabic", Linguistic Inquiry 25.2,
195-221.
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(1993) Sketch of a
Reductionist Approach to Syntactic Variation and Dependencies, to appear in Evolution and Revolution in Linguistic
Theory: Essays in Honor of
·
(1992) "Clitic Constructions", to appear in Phrase Structure
and the Lexicon, L. Zaring and J. Rooryck, eds. (
·
(1991) with H. Koopman "The Position of Subjects", in Lingua
85.2/3, The Syntax of VSO Languages, J. Mc Closkey, ed., 211-259
·
(1990) Movement, Case and Agreement, ms., UCLA, 201 pages ( mac.pdf ) appeared in D.
Sportiche (1998)
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(1989) with H. Koopman "Pronouns, Logical Variables and
Logophoricity in Abe", in Linguistic Inquiry 20.4, 555-589.
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(1989)
"Le Mouvement Syntaxique: Constraintes et Parametres", in Langages
95, p. 35-80.
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(1988) "A Theory of Floating Quantifiers and its Corollaries for
Constituent Structure" in Linguistic Inquiry 19.2, 425-451.
Overview of some of the papers, and some
hand outs of things which have not yet (fully) made it in article form:
·
This the handout of a talk given at MIT in 1998 presenting material
taught at UCLA around 96-97. It builds on the previous but the basic idea that
there is no process of head movement at all is explored a bit further: mittalk98.pdf
·
A number of talks between 1996 and the present were given on
reconstruction under A-movement. The content of these talks is now part of the
2005 paper: Division of Labor between Merge and Move. Here is a description of
the general ideas: SplitDPsSplitVPs.pdf
. Here are a couple of representative handouts and an abstract which people
request from time to time:
mittalk97.pdf , glow99abs.pdf
, glow99ho.pdf
·
French predicate clitics and clause structure (1995) & Subject
clitics in French and Romance (1995): aboutclitics.pdf
·
lsrl94.pdf
: This is the hand out of a talk given at the LSRL94 conference (Linguistic
Symposium on Romance Linguistics) ( it was also presented at Cornell in 93):
the basic idea is that there is no adjuncts or adjunction in syntax, only
subjects and complements. It examines several different cases of putative
adjunction, e.g. adverbs ( argues to be predicates of events, etc..),
adjectives (ditto..), successive cyclic adjunction a la Barriers ( clausal
structure has many more COMP positions than previously believed - based on
agreement phenomena found in Kilega)...
·
Movement Agreement and Case (1990):
aboutmac.pdf
Regularly Taught Courses
·
Undergraduate:
§ Introductory Syntax (
Ling. 120B )
§ Introduction to
French Syntax. (
Ling. 128A and Ling.
128B crosslisted as RLL 204A and 204B)
§ Advanced Syntax (
Ling. 165B )
·
Graduate
§ Graduate Introduction
to Syntax I (
Ling. 200B ), II (
Ling. 206 ) or III (
Ling. 216 ),
§ Advanced Courses:
Comparative Romance Syntax (RLL 211)
§ Advanced Courses: Topics
in Romance Syntax (RLL 255)
§ Syntax Seminars on
Current Topics (Ling 252)
§ Syntax and Semantics
(Ling 262): a discussion group meeting weekly usually on Fridays 2-4pm.
Last updated: 01/2009