Focus Scrambling in Dutch: A Word Order Option in Decline

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Focus Scrambling in Dutch A Word Order
Option in Decline

• Jack Hoeksema
• University of Groningen

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Scrambling

• appearance of objects and predicates to the left
  of adverbials
• appearance to the left of the subject
• usually treated as leftward movement
• or in terms of base-generation

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Scrambling is found in

• German
• Dutch
• Japanese
• Korean
• Hindi
• SOV-languages in general?

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Scrambling is semantically relevant

• Hans hat oft ein Buch mitgenommen
• hans has often a book along-taken
• Hans often took a book along
• Hans hat ein Buch oft mitgenommen
• hans has a book often along-taken
• Hans often took a particular book along

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Scrambling of indefinites

• specific (a certain)
• partitive (some of the)
• de re
• generic
• Cf. inter alia
• Helen de Hoop, 1992, Case Configuration and Noun
  Phrase Interpretation

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No Scrambling of Indefinites

• when they are predicates
• or occur in light-verb constructions
• De Hoop scrambling only possible for
  generalized quantifiers (type ltltetgttgt)
• not for predicates (type ltetgt)

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Examples

• Ik ben niet een held
• I am not a hero
• Ik ben een held niet
• I am a hero not
• Ik moet nog een plas doen
• I must still a pee do
• I still have to take a leak
• Ik moet een plas nog doen
• I must a pee still do

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Definite DPs in light-verb structures

• We moeten nog de was doen
• we must still the wash do
• We still have to do the laundry
• We moeten de was nog doen
• id
• De Hoop (2003) definites take type ltegt, and may
  optionally scramble, without semantic
  consequences

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Focus Scrambling (Neeleman 1994)

• Jan is nog nooit snel geweest
• Jan is yet never fast been
• Jan has never been fast yet
• Jan is snel nog nooit geweest
• Jan is nog nooit zo snel geweest
• Jan is yet never so fast been
• Jan has never been so fast yet
• Jan is zo snel nog nooit geweest
• Jan is so fast yet never been
• Jan has never been so fast yet

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F-Scrambling across subjects

• omdat zo snel alleen een catamaran is
• because so fast only a catamaran is
• because only a catamaran is that fast
• omdat zulke ogen zelfs Audrey niet had
• because such eyes even Audrey not had
• because not even Audrey had such eyes

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Term Focus Scrambling A Misnomer

• Focus is not a sufficient condition
• omdat de koningin alleen biefstuk at
• because the queen only beefsteak ate
• because the queen only ate steak
• omdat alleen biefstuk de koningin at

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• In fact, Neeleman only gives examples
• involving the deictic items zo so
• and zulk such
• Delimitation problem What is the set of items
• which may undergo F-scrambling?
• (To be partially answered in the remainder
• of this talk)

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Contrastive Pitch Accent

• Bayer and Kornfilt 1994, Choi 2001
• F-scrambled items bear pitch, but are not new to
  the discourse (contrastive topics)
• Items that scramble are deictic/definite
• Possibilities in Dutch more restricted than in
• German

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German vs Dutch

• weil seine Mutter jeder mag (German)
• because his mother everyone likes
• because everyone likes his mother
• omdat zijn moeder iedereen mag (Dutch)
• because his mother everyone likes

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Some properties of F-scrambling

• syntactically less restrictive than ordinary
  scrambling (incl scrambling across subjects,
  scrambling of predicates, etc.)
• semantically inert (reconstruction effects)
• scrambled order is equivalent to nonscrambled
  order

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Reconstruction

• Anaphora (backward binding)
• Dat we zon foto van zichzelf zelfs deze
• that we s/a photo of himself even this
• acteur niet tonen
• actor not show
• That we are not even going to show this actor
  such a picture of himself

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More reconstruction effects

• Reverse variable-binding
• Wen glaubst du mag jeder?
• who believe you likes everyone
• Who do you believe everyone likes?
• Ich glaube dass seine Mutter jederNOM mag
• I believe that his mother everyone
  likes
• I believe that everyone likes his mother

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Negative polarity triggering

• zon vaart lopen walk that quickly
• Dat loopt niet zon vaart
• that walks not such a speed
• That wont happen in a hurry
• Dat loopt zon vaart niet
• that walks such speed not
• That wont happen in a hurry

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een-twee-drie

• Het schip zinkt niet zo een-twee-drie
• the ship sinks not so one-two-three
• The ship wont sink all that quickly
• Het schip zinkt zo een-twee-drie niet
• Het schip zinkt een-twee-drie niet

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in het minst

• Helga was niet in het minst tevreden
• Helga was not in the least content
• Helga was in het minst niet tevreden
• (NB absence of zo/zulk)

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de minste

• Mij kost het niet de minste inspanning
• me cost it not the slightest effort
• It wont cost me the slightest effort
• Mij kost het de minste inspanning niet
• me cost it the slightest effort not

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No focus scrambling for all NPIs
a. Ik heb niet met ook maar iemand gepraat.
I have not with even anyone
talked I have not talked with anyone at
all a. Ik heb met ook maar iemand niet
gepraat. b. Het is daar niet pluis. It
is there not OK/safe Things are not safe
there b. Het is daar pluis niet. c. Men
sprak niet over enige mededinger. One spoke
not about any competitor One did not speak
about any competitor c. Men sprak over
enige mededinger niet.
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im geringsten nicht

• daher sah man oft die Müllerflöhe auf seinen
  Kleidern herumwandern, deren er sich im
  geringsten nicht schämet (H.J.C. von
  Grimmelshausen, Der abentheuerliche
  Simplicissimus Theutsch - 1667)
• Man hat auch im geringsten nicht zu befürchten,
  dass die Erlernung der Arithmetik auf diese Art
  schwerer fallen und mehr Zeit erfordern werde (L.
  Euler, Vorbericht, Einleitung zur Rechenkunst,
  St. Petersburg, 1732)

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nicht im geringsten

• Bulgakow leugnet das gefährliche ausländische
  Echo nicht im geringsten, sondern bestätigt
  dessen Wahrheit. (Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung,
  11-1-1997, SB5)
• Keine Panik, ich mag die Mädels auch, aber die
  können Erykah Badu nicht im geringsten das Wasser
  reichen (www.soulsite.de, 22-6-2003)

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in het minst niet

• Niemant kan u gheschut, o Cupido, verdraghen,
• Ons borsten zijn te weeck, het is met ons
  ghedaen
• Al waarmen heel in t staal bekloncken en
  beslaghen,
• Zo kan men doch u kracht in t minst niet
  wederstaen.
• (G.A. Bredero, Emblemata Amatoria, 1618)
• Nobody can endure thy arrows, o Cupid,
• Our breasts are too soft, we are undone
• Even were one completely covered by steel
• One cannot in the least withstand thy force

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Decline of F-Scrambling in het minst
Period beginning F-scrambling No F-scrambling F-scrambling
1600 43 1 98
1650 49 1 98
1700 43 5 90
1750 32 8 80
1800 36 23 62
1850 90 44 67
1900 65 81 45
1950 30 194 14
2000 2 60 3
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trends
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de minste niet

• In het tegenwoordig geval, sprak ik, hoeft gy
  daar omtrent de minste zwarigheid niet te maken
  (Justus van Effen, De Hollandsche Spectator,
  1730)
• In the present case, I said, need you thereabout
  the least difficulty not to make
• in the present case, I said, you need not make
  the slightest difficulty about it

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De minste
Period beginning F-scrambling No F-scrambling F-scrambling
1600 4 0 100
1650 3 6 33
1700 15 10 60
1750 5 6 45
1800 3 35 8
1850 4 72 5
1900 2 67 2
1950 0 80 0
2000 0 13 0
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het nauw nemen met

• De kracht der voorbeelden is welligt de reden,
  waarom men het gedurende langen tijd met de
  definities der rededeelen zoo naauw niet genomen
  heeft (De Taalgids, vol. 5, 1863)
• The force of the examples is perhaps the
  reason, why one did not look too closely at the
  definitions of the parts of the sentence

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zo nauw nemen (kijken)
Period F-Scrambling No F-scrambling F-Scrambling
1700 1 0 100
1750 3 0 100
1800 9 0 100
1850 17 2 89
1900 10 10 50
1950 2 66 3
2000 1 55 2
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zo dra niet

• Hij had het zoo haast niet gezien of hij wierp
  er met veel handigheid zijn zijden zakdoek over
  (Hildebrand, Camera Obscura, 1840)
• he had it so soon not seen, or he threw there
  with
• much dexterity his silk handkerchief over
• No sooner had he seen it, when he threw his
  handkerchief over it with much dexterity

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zo dra / ras / haast
Period F-Scrambling No F-Scrambling F-Scrambling
1700 21 2 91
1750 23 4 85
1800 9 5 64
1850 6 5 55
1900 3 10 23
1950 1 8 11
2000 0 3 0
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bij lange na / lang zo A
Period F-Scrambling No F-Scrambling F-scrambling
1700 6 0 100
1750 14 0 100
1800 19 3 86
1850 21 13 64
1900 11 19 37
1950 7 26 21
2000 4 19 17
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Effect of LANG on f-scrambling Google hits
lang zo goed niet 198 zo goed niet 2190
lang niet zo goed 917 niet zo goed 99,800
lang zo snel niet 56 zo snel niet 2790
lang niet zo snel 333 niet zo snel 47,200
lang zo mooi niet 96 zo mooi niet 298
lang niet zo mooi 602 niet zo mooi 13,500
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zon vaart lopen
Period F-Scrambling No F-Scrambling F-Scrambling
lt 1900 6 1 83
1900 23 4 86
1950 46 22 68
2000 36 24 60
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de enige
Period F-scrambling No F-scrambling F-scrambling
lt1800 9 0 100
1800 5 5 50
1850 12 11 52
1900 9 19 32
1950 12 73 14
2000 12 88 12
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zijn zaak

• Dat is mijn zaak niet
• that is my concern not
• That is not my concern
• Dat is niet mijn zaak
• id

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zijn zaak
Period F-scrambling No F-scrambling F-scrambling
1700 - - -
1750 8 0 100
1800 4 0 100
1850 6 1 86
1900 5 2 71
1950 39 24 62
2000 14 15 48
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Constant Rate Hypothesis

• when one grammatical option replaces another
  with which it is in competition across a set of
  linguistic contexts, the rate of replacement ..
  is the same in all of them
• (Kroch 1989 200)

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All changes
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Conclusions from the graph

• all changes are headed in the same direction
• onset of change varies (compatible with Krochs
  hypothesis)
• speed of change varies as well (incompatible)

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Previous evidence for constant rate

• DO-support in various types of clauses
• have/have got in British English
• pro-drop in Brazilian Portugese
• OV/VO in Yiddish

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what could this mean?

• the changes are not all connected, but represent
  several independent changes Constant Rate
  Hypothesis is safe
• differences among various expressions do not
  count as different contexts that is, each
  expression may have a different rate of change,
  but this rate is the same in all environments of
  the change (e.g. main vs subordinate clauses,
  negative declaratives and negative imperatives,
  etc.) weakened Constant Rate Hypothesis
• the Constant Rate Hypothesis does not hold