Omnivorous third person agreement in Algonquian

Bibliographic Data

ID5791239
AuthorsPeter Grishin (0000-0002-8187-1742, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, corresponding author)
Year2022
Volume8
Issue1
Publication date2022-12-16
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueGlossa a journal of general linguistics (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 2397-1835 • E-ISSN: 2397-1835
PublisherUbiquity Press (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.16995/glossa.8874
OpenAlexW4311894259
LanguageEN
Citations received4
References cited42

I argue that third person is not underspecified: there must be a distinct third person feature. I add to the existing body of morphological arguments for this conclusion (Nevins 2007; Trommer 2008, a.o.) a syntactic argument: I show that there is omnivorous third person agreement in Algonquian languages. I focus here on two, Blackfoot (Plains Algonquian) and Plains Cree (Central Algonquian), demonstrating that they have an agreement suffix (the peripheral suffix, analyzed as a probe in C) that indexes the number, animacy, and obviation of the structurally-highest third person argument, skipping over first and second person if it has to. I argue that alternative analyses of this agreement pattern in terms of animacy, obviation, and the categorial feature [D] do not work; thus, third person must be specified even in the syntax (contra Preminger 2019

Agreement · Animacy · Argument (complex analysis · Evidentiality · Feature (linguistics · Third person · Categorization, perception, and language · Linguistics and Discourse Analysis · Syntax, Semantics, Linguistic Variation

Tools

Open DOIOpen Access