Acta Linguistica Hungarica
Volume/Issue:
Volume 53: Issue 4
Word order in Hungarian exclamatives
Author:
Anikó Lipták Hungarian Academy of Sciences Research Institute for Linguistics Benczúr utca 33. H--1068 Budapest Hungary

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Pages:
393–432
Online Publication Date:
16 Jan 2007
Publication Date:
01 Dec 2006
Article Category:
Research Article
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1556/aling.53.2006.4.2
Keywords:
focus; wh-pharse; variable; speech act; exclamatives
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This article revisits the (non)configurationality debate of the 80s and early 90s concerning Hungarian, a `free word order' language, which was shown during that period to be characterized by an articulate and, crucially, hierarchical preverbal domain, with A-bar positions dedicated to discourse functions such as topic and focus. What this debate did not conclusively settle, however, is the question whether or not the structure of A-positions in Hungarian is also configurational. The most prevalent, and indeed empirically most well-argued and elaborated analysis that has emerged is that of É. Kiss's (1987a, b; 1991, 1994a, 2002, 2003), according to which the answer is negative: arguments are base-generated in the verb phrase in a free order in a flat structure. The present paper challenges this view by demonstrating systematically that the arguments put forward to back it up are inconclusive, and in fact it fails descriptively as well. The alternative proposed here is based on a hierarchical verb phrase (vacated by the raised verb) and a Japanese-type local scrambling movement that operates in the post-verbal domain of the clause. The scrambling movement analysis, besides being theoretically more desirable than the nonconfigurational verb phrase approach, makes available a superior descriptive coverage by accounting for a varied set of structural symmetries and asymmetries holding between subject and object. Modulo scrambling, Hungarian is configurational all the way down.

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Cover Acta Linguistica Hungarica
Acta Linguistica Hungarica
Print ISSN:
1216-8076
Online ISSN:
1588-2624

Editors

Editor(s)-in-Chief: Katalin É. Kiss,
Ferenc Kiefer

Editor: Éva Dékány

Technical Editor: Zoltán G. Kiss

Review Editor: Beáta Gyuris

Editorial Board

  • Anne Abeillé
  • Željko Bošković
  • Marcel den Dikken
  • Hans-Martin Gärtner
  • Elly van Gelderen
  • Anders Holmberg
  • Katarzyna Jaszczolt
  • István Kenesei
  • Anikó Lipták
  • Katalin Mády
  • Gereon Müller
  • Csaba Pléh
  • Giampaolo Salvi
  • Irina Sekerina
  • Péter Siptár
  • Gregory Stump
  • Peter Svenonius
  • Anne Tamm
  • Akira Watanabe
  • Jeroen van de Weijer

Acta Linguistica Academica
Address: Benczúr u. 33. HU–1068 Budapest, Hungary
Phone: (+36 1) 351 0413; (+36 1) 321 4830 ext. 154
Fax: (36 1) 322 9297
E-mail: ala@nytud.mta.hu

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Acta Linguistica Hungarica
Language English
Size  
Year of
Foundation		 1951
Publication
Programme		 changed title
Volumes
per Year		  
Issues
per Year		  
Founder Magyar Tudományos Akadémia  
Founder's
Address		 H-1051 Budapest, Hungary, Széchenyi István tér 9.
Publisher Akadémiai Kiadó
Publisher's
Address		 H-1117 Budapest, Hungary 1516 Budapest, PO Box 245.
Responsible
Publisher		 Chief Executive Officer, Akadémiai Kiadó
ISSN 1216-8076 (Print)
ISSN 1588-2624 (Online)

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