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Monica Alexandrina IRIMIA

Professore Associato
Dipartimento di Comunicazione ed Economia

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Pubblicazioni

2024 - DOM IN RAGUSA AND ITS CO-OCCURRENCE RESTRICTIONS [Capitolo/Saggio]
Guardiano, Cristina; Irimia, Monica
abstract

Recent formal research has shown that important insights into the nature of direct objects which are differentially marked come from their co- occurrence restrictions. This paper focuses on co-occurrence restrictions involving differential object marking (DOM) in the dialect of Ragusa (southeastern Sicily), in its interaction with datives and clitic doubling. It is shown that such restrictions do not have a morphological source, but a syntactic one, and are best explained by taking into account the positions in which DOM, datives and clitic doubles are licensed.

2022 - DOM beyond Case: some notes from Uzbek [Capitolo/Saggio]
Irimia, Monica Alexandrina
abstract

This paper addresses discusses various aspects of the syntax of objects in Uzbek, a Turkic language. The main proposal is that differential object marking in the language is best analysed as signalling an additional licensing operation beyond [uC]. This hypothesis immediately explains the similarities between certain types of unmarked nominals, namely those that do not undergo incorporation with V at the head level, and the differentially marked ones. For example, both classes give evidence of the presence of an [uC] feature which is active for case competition at the sentential level, and adjacency to V is not required in either case. Analyses that link differential marking to an obligatory [uC] licensing operation, with unmarked nominals staying unlicensed as they lack [uC], are problematic for the Uzbek data.

2022 - Sicilian DOM in a Romance perspective [Capitolo/Saggio]
Guardiano, Cristina; Irimia, Monica
abstract

The main goal of this study is an examination of differential object marking (DOM) in the Sicilian dialect of Ragusa, focusing on data from Guardiano (1999, 2000, 2010, 2022), as well as novel data. The contribution is two-fold; on the empirical side, this research is interested in mapping the Ragusa DOM contexts, given that this is a rather uncharted territory and given the wide variation with DOM in the dialects of Sicily.1A comparison with better studied Romance languages such as Spanish or Romanian will serve as a guideline, revealing the presence of various DOM contexts previously unexplored in the Ragusa dialect. On the theoretical side, the Ragusa dialect raises important questions which have been at the center of debate in the domain of DOM: is Ragusa DOM a syntactic or a purely morphological mechanism, and more generally, what type of analysis is best suited? This paper will focus on various syntactic effects induced by DOM, illustrating differences between clitic doubled DOM and DOM with no clitic doubling. This indicates that Ragusa DOM has a syntactic nature.

2021 - At the boundaries of syntactic prehistory [Articolo su rivista]
Ceolin, Andrea; Guardiano, Cristina; Longobardi, Giuseppe; Irimia, Monica Alexandrina; Bortolussi, Luca; Sgarro, Andrea
abstract

Can language relatedness be established without cognate words? This question has remained unresolved since the nineteenth century, leaving language prehistory beyond etymologically established families largely undefined. We address this problem through a theory of universal syntactic characters. We show that not only does syntax allow for comparison across distinct traditional language families, but that the probability of deeper historical relatedness between such families can be statistically tested through a dedicated algorithm which implements the concept of 'possible languages' suggested by a formal syntactic theory. Controversial clusters such as e.g. Altaic and Uralo-Altaic are significantly supported by our test, while other possible macro-groupings, e.g. Indo-Uralic or Basque-(Northeast) Caucasian, prove to be indistinguishable from a randomly generated distribution of language distances. These results suggest that syntactic diversity, modelled through a generative biolinguistic framework, can be used to provide a proof of historical relationship between different families irrespectively of the presence of a common lexicon from which regular sound correspondences can be determined; therefore, we argue that syntax may expand the time limits imposed by the classical comparative method. This article is part of the theme issue 'Reconstructing prehistoric languages'.

2021 - Differential marking in Kinande [Capitolo/Saggio]
Irimia, Monica Alexandrina; Schneider Zioga, Patricia
abstract

2021 - Differential object marking and scale reversals [Capitolo/Saggio]
Irimia, Monica Alexandrina; Pineda, Anna
abstract

2021 - Differential object marking. What type of licensing? [Capitolo/Saggio]
Irimia, Monica Alexandrina
abstract

2021 - Oblique differential object marking and types of nominals [Articolo su rivista]
Irimia, Monica Alexandrina
abstract

2021 - On the setting of scales in the diachrony of differential object marking. [Articolo su rivista]
Irimia, Monica Alexandrina; Pineda, Anna
abstract

2021 - Variation in differential object marking: On some differences between Spanish and Romanian [Articolo su rivista]
Irimia, M. A.
abstract

Although differential object marking (DOM) has been studied from a multitude of perspectives, research into the types of variation it allows in closely related languages is still needed. This article examines DOM from the point of view of (micro)variation, focusing on two genetically related languages, namely, standard Spanish and Romanian. Both identities and points of divergence are discussed in detail and argued to result from a morphosyntactic parameter in the realm of differential marking. Following López [López, Luis. 2012. Indefinite Objects Scrambling, Choice Functions and Differential Marking. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press], the Spanish special marker signals certain types of nominals which undergo short scrambling in order to have Case licensed. In Romanian, however, DOM is equated with an additional operation beyond the valuation of Case.

2020 - Epistemic comparatives and other expressions of speaker’s uncertainty [Capitolo/Saggio]
Goncharov, Julie; Irimia, Monica Alexandrina
abstract

Our study endeavors to further our understanding of the ways the speaker’s perspective is expressed in natural language. We analyze a rarely discussed construction, namely epistemic comparatives (ECs) and their interaction with inferential indirect evidentials (IIEs) and epistemic modals. We show that ECs are incompatible with IIEs, but are well-formed with epistemic modals. We base our discussion on data from Bulgarian and we also show that similar facts hold in Romanian, thus strengthening the empirical coverage. On the theoretical side, we claim that IIEs are structurally distinguished from epistemic modals. This accounts for their different behavior with ECs, thus providing further support to accounts which take indirect evidentials and epistemic modals to be separate categories.

2020 - Formal syntax and deep history. [Articolo su rivista]
Ceolin, Andrea; Guardiano, Cristina; Irimia, Monica Alexandrina; Longobardi, Giuseppe
abstract

We show that, contrary to long-standing assumptions, syntactic traits, modeled here within the generative biolinguistic framework, provide insights into deep-time language history. To support this claim, we have encoded the diversity of nominal structures using 94 universally definable binary parameters, set in 69 languages spanning across up to 13 traditionally irreducible Eurasian families. We found a phylogenetic signal that distinguishes all such families and matches the family-internal tree topologies that are safely established through classical etymological methods and datasets. We have retrieved “near-perfect” phylogenies, which are essentially immune to homoplastic disruption and only moderately influenced by horizontal convergence, two factors that instead severely affect more externalized linguistic features. This result allowed us to draw some preliminary inferences about plausible/implausible cross-family classifications; it also provides a new source of evidence for testing the representation of diversity in syntactic theories.

2020 - Language in collaborative spaces: Advantages and barriers [Capitolo/Saggio]
Leone, Ludovica; Guardiano, Cristina; Irimia, Monica Alexandrina; Mattarelli, Elisa; Montanari, Fabrizio
abstract

An indispensable desideratum in collaborative spaces is to foster dynamic, barrier-free environments where professionals from different backgrounds can find common ground for collaborative projects. However, although such goals cannot be met without proficient and effective communication, research on the use of language as the most important means of information exchange in collaborative spaces is still needed. Our contribution in this paper consists of an exploration of the linguistic interactions among coworkers of such spaces. We propose a multi-disciplinary approach integrating insights from the organizational literature on communication and research methods in theoretical linguistics. The sociolinguistic analysis of two coworking spaces reveals essential traits such as language diversity, the use of different formal and informal linguistic registers, as well as the appeal to various media and communication modalities. This type of versatility can foster information exchange, knowledge sharing, and, ultimately, effective collaboration. However, it might also act as a barrier to communication, suggesting the need for collaborative spaces to establish common linguistic ground as the basis for promoting collaboration.

2020 - Types of structural objects. Some remarks on differential object marking in Romanian [Capitolo/Saggio]
Irimia, Monica Alexandrina
abstract

2019 - Differential object marking, datives and types of licensing [Articolo su rivista]
Irimia, Monica Alexandrina
abstract

The presence of dative morphology on differential objects raises non-trivial puzzles under a variety of theoretical approaches. Using data from genetically unrelated languages, this paper puts forward a comprehensive account under which differential objects are equated with multiple Case configurations. The latter are flagged by the presence of more than one licensing operation on the same nominal. The oblique dative morphology is correlated with an additional licensing operation connected to a discourse linking strategy; thus, it can co-occur with other grammatical (uninterpretable Case) licensing operations. The analysis can also reconcile other recalcitrant aspects of differential objects, such as their syntactic differences from both accusatives and datives. These differences are problematic under both purely morphological accounts and under analyses which take differential objects and datives to have the same syntax.

2019 - Differential objects and datives. A homogeneous class? [Articolo su rivista]
Irimia, Monica Alexandrina; Pineda, Anna
abstract

This special issue aims at disentangling an intriguing fact regarding datives, which is cross-linguistically robust but yet extremely puzzling. We are referring to the use of dative morphology to signal certain classes of structural (direct) objects, normally including animates, specifics, definites, or a combination thereof (Givón 1984, Bossong 1991, Lazard 2001, de Swart 2007, Glushan 2010, Manzini and Franco 2016, a.o).

2018 - Differential objects and other structural objects [Relazione in Atti di Convegno]
Irimia, Monica Alexandrina
abstract

Several recent accounts take adpositional differential marking to indicate those classes of DPs that require obligatory licensing (Case). Here, we examine data from Gujarati and Romanian where this analysis is harder to implement. The two languages exhibit structural DPs that are signaled via a preposition. But they also contain other structural objects which must be equally analyzed in terms of licensing, leaving the difference from the adpositional objects unexplained. The solution proposed builds on the idea of secondary licensing on the same DP, going back to Kayne’s Generalization. The conclusion is that, at least in some languages, differential objects are classes that undergo an additional licensing operation.

2018 - Epistemic comparatives: a cross-linguistic investigation [Relazione in Atti di Convegno]
Goncharov, Julie; Irimia, Monica Alexandrina
abstract

This paper contains a cross-linguistic investigation of epistemic comparatives that reveals two novel observations: i) some languages allow these constructions with the indicative present, while others require overt modal morphology; ii) the split seems to correlate with the presence of indexical present, as detected by Sequence Of Tense phenomena (SOT). More specifically, epistemic comparatives with indicative present tend to occur in non-SOT languages. We account for these observations by combining recent formalizations of anchoring to the Speaker's Perspective (e.g., Wiltschko 2014) with Giorgi's 2010 analysis of SOT phenomena. The findings reported in the paper contribute to uncovering a deeper connection between two apparently distinct phenomena: SOT and epistemic comparatives.

2018 - Parametric comparison and dialect variation. Insights from Southern Italy [Capitolo/Saggio]
Guardiano, Cristina; Michelioudakis, Dimitris; Cordoni, Guido; Irimia, Monica Alexandrina; Radkevich, Nina; Sitaridou, Ioanna
abstract

This paper applies the Parametric Comparison Method (PCM) to the description of syntactic variation in the nominal domain in a representative subset of Romance dialects of Southern Italy. We observe that, in order to perform successfully at the level of micro-comparison, the method must be supplemented by parameters specifically targeting this level of resolution. We sketch some such (micro-)parameters, investigate their interaction with the observed surface patterns, and show that their distribution broadly matches the received wisdom about the dialectal structure of Italo-Romance.

2018 - Pragmatics or morpho-syntax? The encoding of indirect evidentiality in Romanian [Articolo su rivista]
Irimia, Monica Alexandrina
abstract

A central question about the encoding of evidential notions in human languages is whether they result from pragmatics or can be read off morpho-syntax. This paper addresses some challenges posed by a particular verbal paradigm with evidential semantics in Romanian, the so-called presumptive mood. The gist of the proposed analysis is that a syntactic derivation makes better predictions for this class than a purely pragmatic explanation.

2018 - When Differential Object Marking is Obligatory: Some Remarks on the Role of Case in Ellipsis and Comparatives [Working paper]
Irimia, Monica Alexandrina
abstract

The identity condition in ellipsis has received a great deal of attention in formal studies, one of the most prominent topics of inquiry being its precise nature. This paper contributes to this debate by examining a rather ignored equative (equality comparative) context where unexpected differential object marking is obligatory irrespective of its canonical features. The data come from Romance (taking Romanian as a representative sample) and one Indo-Aryan variety, namely Nepali. We show that such marking poses a challenge to most theories examining the precise nature of the identity condition in ellipsis and comparatives. The answer we propose follows mixed theories (Mártin González 2016); crucially, we also show that (some types of) Case identity can be reduced to the requirement of certain structures to manipulate arguments instead of predicates (of <e, t> type). Our remarks are relevant to licensing of arguments and identity conditions that go beyond ellipsis.

2017 - Anchoring in grammar: puzzles with epistemic comparatives [Relazione in Atti di Convegno]
Goncharov, Julie; Irimia, Monica Alexandrina
abstract

This paper discusses two puzzles with epistemic comparatives (ECs) that provide new insights into the interaction between modals, tense, and aspect. We show that, cross- linguistically, ECs pose restrictions on the featural specifications in T(ense). Additionally, we observe that interactions of ECs with modals seem to be non-uniform; while epistemic modals can co-occur with ECs, some modal interpretations of the Romance imperfect ap- pear to be deviant. The analysis we propose sheds light on how anchoring to the Speaker’s Deictic Center in the highest left periphery is manipulated by T and modals (Speas and Tenny 2003, Giorgi 2010, Wiltschko 2014). We argue that interactions between ECs and modals are in fact uniform, as predicted by our analysis. The deviance of the modal imper- fect with ECs is due to an independent reason

2017 - Indirect evidentials: more arguments for the Sentience Domain Projection [Relazione in Atti di Convegno]
Irimia, Monica Alexandrina
abstract

Speas and Tenny (2003) have argued for the existence of a special syntactic layer above the CP node (see also Hill 2014), labelled the Sentience Domain. This paper provides further arguments for the syntactic projection of the Sentience Domain. More specifically, it shows that it can derive in a straightforward manner some otherwise puzzling properties of indirect evidentiality (IEv) in Romanian (Romance languages) where this class establishes morphological syncretism with other T(ense) A(spect) M(ood) categories (Coşeriu 1977, Squartini 2001, Ippolito 2002, 2013, Giorgi and Pianesi 2004, Delfitto 2004, Hill 2011, Irimia 2010, etc.)

2017 - Manifestations of differential object marking: from Brazilian Portuguese to prepositional accusatives [Articolo su rivista]
Irimia, Monica Alexandrina; Cyrino, Sonia
abstract

The null object/overt pronoun split in Brazilian Portuguese has been assimilated to differential object marking in some functionalist accounts (Schwenter and Silva 2002, Schwenter 2006). This paper examines further arguments for this connection; we evaluate a battery of more formal diagnostics under which the Brazilian Portuguese data pattern similarly to canonical instances of prepositional marking across Romance (Romanian, Spanish, etc.). The application of other tests weakens the assumption of a unique licensing position for differentially marked objects in Romance languages.

2016 - Correlated Evolution Or Not? Phylogenetic Linguistics With Syntactic, Cognacy, And Phonetic Data [Relazione in Atti di Convegno]
Longobardi, Giuseppe; Buch, Armin; Ceolin, Andrea; Ecay, Aaron; Guardiano, Cristina; Irimia, Monica Alexandrina; Michelioudakis, Dimitris; Radkevich, Nina; Jaeger, Gerhard
abstract

In this work we compare, on the well explored domain of Indo-European languages, the phylogenetic outputs of three different sets of linguistic characters: traditional etymological judgments, a system for phonetic alignment of lists of cognates, and a set of values for generative syntactic parameters. The correlation and relative informativeness of distances and phylogenies generated by the three types of char- acters can thus be for the first time accurately evaluated, and the degree of success of the last two, innovative, alternatives to the classical comparative method can be so assessed.

2016 - Formal linguistics as a cue to demographic history [Articolo su rivista]
Longobardi, Giuseppe; Ceolin, Andrea; Ecay, Aaron; Ghirotto, Silvia; Guardiano, Cristina; Irimia, Monica Alexandrina; Michelioudakis, Dimitris; Radkevich, Nina; Pettener, Davide; Luiselli, Donata; Barbujani, Guido
abstract

Beyond its theoretical success, the development of molecular genetics has brought about the possibility of extraordinary progress in the study of classification and in the inference of the evolutionary history of many species and populations. A major step forward was represented by the availability of extremely large sets of molecular data suited to quantitative and computational treatments. In this paper, we argue that even in cognitive sciences, purely theoretical progress in a discipline such as linguistics may have analogous impact. Thus, exactly on the model of molecular biology, we propose to unify two traditionally unrelated lines of linguistic investigation: 1) the formal study of syntactic variation (parameter theory) in the biolinguistic program 2) the reconstruction of relatedness among languages (phylogenetic taxonomy) The results of our linguistic analysis have thus been plotted against data from population genetics and the correlations have turned out to be largely significant: given a non-trivial set of languages/populations, the description of their variation provided by the comparison of systematic parametric analysis and molecular anthropology informatively recapitulates their history and relationships. As a result, we can claim that the reality of some parametric model of the language faculty and language acquisition/transmission (more broadly of generative grammar) receives strong and original support from its historical heuristic power. Then, on these grounds, we can begin testing Darwin's prediction that, when properly generated, the trees of human populations and of their languages should eventually turn out to be significantly parallel.

2016 - How small are small clauses? Embedded Adjectives and Restructuring [Relazione in Atti di Convegno]
Irimia, Monica Alexandrina
abstract

Recent contributions to the debate on the structural architecture of small clauses (SCs) have provided new insights into (what will be called here) Williams’s (1983) puzzle – a dilemma arising when SCs are compared to embedded infinitives. Williams (1983) attributed the lack of narrow scope readings with SCs to the inexistence of a subject position inside the small clause. More recently, Sportiche (2005), as well as Moulton (2013) have challenged this conclusion. Under the assumption that the quantificational force of noun phrases is dependent on heads situated in the extended projection of the clause (Beghelli and Stowell 1997, etc.), the two accounts solve the puzzle by assuming that adjectival (Adj) SCs are too small to contain the heads relevant for nominal quantification licensing, while still housing a subject position (clausal analysis - CA). This paper addresses further data which appear to require refinements of the quantification picture. The preliminary conclusion is that once the CA is enriched with a restructuring account (developing on Stowell 1991) as well as domain-based locality conditions (similar to Bobaljik and Wurmbrand’s 2005 Domain Impenetrability Condition) yet more aspects related to the nature of embedded adjective configurations become less puzzling.

2016 - Mathematical modeling of grammatical diversity supports the historical reality of formal syntax [Relazione in Atti di Convegno]
Longobardi, Giuseppe; Ceolin, Andrea; Bortolussi, Luca; Guardiano, Cristina; Irimia, Monica Alexandrina; Michelioudakis, Dimitris; Radkevich, Nina; Sgarro, Andrea
abstract

Recent studies have taken advantage of computational techniques to investigate the evolution of Indo-European languages [1-3]. However, these methods are not able to overcome the time constraints on lexical evolution, which limit a broader application of the Classical Comparative Method, and therefore cannot be used above the family level. For this reason, evidence from cross-family relationships must come from other domains (e.g. phonetics, [4, 5]). Reference [6] shows that another domain, syntax, is a potential source for cross-family comparison. In this paper, we evaluate the method proposed in [6], the PCM, and argue through a random generation of possible grammars that syntactic distances can be useful to detect signals of historical relatedness above the Indo-European level, within some confidence probabilistic intervals.

2016 - South by Southeast. A syntactic approach to Greek and Romance microvariation [Articolo su rivista]
Guardiano, Cristina; Michelioudakis, Dimitris; Ceolin, Andrea; Irimia, Monica Alexandrina; Longobardi, Giuseppe; Radkevich, Nina; Silvestri, Giuseppina; Sitaridou, Ioanna
abstract

This article argues for the relevance of parametric syntax in the contrastive analysis and historical classification of varieties that are closely intertwined geographically, genealogically and sociolinguistically. We show that Longobardi and Guardiano’s (2009) Parametric Comparison Method, already successfully applied to the macroclassification of a number of scattered Indo-European languages (Longobardi et al 2013), can analyze microvariation equally successfully. Just by departing from the nominal syntactic database used for the core Indo-European languages and improving on it, the nominal syntax of several contemporary Romance and Greek varieties could be revealingly analyzed. On this basis, we are able to move towards sketching a reliable picture of the history and the geocultural factors that shaped linguistic diversity in the South-Central and East Mediterranean up to the Black Sea. The analysis attempts to lay down some grounding problems, tools, and hypotheses for a novel quantitative framework in the study of syntactic dialectology.

2015 - DPs in adjectival small clauses in Romanian: a diachronic perspective [Capitolo/Saggio]
Irimia, Monica Alexandrina
abstract

This paper focuses on some diachronic data from Romanian concerning adjectival predicates under intensional verbs (consider-Adj. types). The interest in these constructions resides not only in their contribution to the investigation of one of the most versatile structures in human language, namely small clauses, but also in their relevance for understanding the Romanian DPs and DOM strategies, due to the salient diachronic stability of important structural properties of these configurations. It is proposed that a complex predicate analysis employing a Multiple Agreement Mechanism is able to derive the strong/specific readings of the shared arguments under discussion; the variation in the DOM marking of pronouns is correlated to a plausibly more recent development of the definiteness scale for differential marking in Romanian, complementary to the animacy scale.

2013 - How to turn into a resultative [Relazione in Atti di Convegno]
Irimia, Monica Alexandrina
abstract

The presence of resultative secondary predicates (RESSP) is taken to be a robust correlate of ‘satellite-framed’ languages (Talmy 1975, 1985, 2000, a.o.). However, it also appears that languages which might be classified as ‘verb-framed’ under other diagnostics do tolerate some restricted types of resultativity. In order to better understand the sources and limits of the ‘resultative parameter’ (Kratzer 2005), this paper investigates the nature of a largely ignored construction with resultative semantics in Romanian (Romance), the BARE NOUN RESULT (BNRES). These data indicate that cross-linguistic variation in the construction of RESSP is dependent on (at least) two factors: a) distinctions in the featural composition of the functional projections constructing resultativity; b) whether resultativity is dependent on telicity/syntactic directed motion or not (see also Folli and Harley 2006). The paper proposes that the BNRES contains a functional projection specified as TURN-INTO, which introduces a resultative NP, in the absence of syntactic composition of manner and directed motion.

2013 - Indirect evidentiality and related domains: some observations from the current evolution of the Romanian presumptive. [Capitolo/Saggio]
Irimia, Monica Alexandrina
abstract

One distinguishing feature of the Romanian tense-aspect-mood (hence- forth, TAM) domain is the presence of a morpho-syntactic paradigm tradi- tionally labelled the presumptive mood. As noticed several times (Slave 1957, Goudet 1977, Dimitriu 1979, Irimia 1983, Friedman 1986, 2004, Av- ram and Hill 2007, Squartini 2001, 2005, Irimia 2010) this class poses par- ticular theoretical challenges regarding its composition and morphology. Its highly idiosyncratic character is manifested by the presence of unique mor- phological patterns which nevertheless make use of morphological pieces (auxiliaries, participials) which can also be mapped to slightly distinct se- mantics when combined with distinct building blocks. Nevertheless, in the perfect forms, the indirect evidential semantics of the presumptive illus- trates formal syncretism with interpretations corresponding to other modals, like the conditional, or the future, which are normally considered to create individual paradigms (as they are morphologically individuated in the non-perfect uses). And yet another important observation is that in modern Romanian some non-perfect (present) sub-paradigms of the pre- sumptive are morphologically decaying, while their semantics is transferred to the non-perfect forms of the related TAM paradigms. The Romanian presumptive constitutes therefore an excellent testing ground for at least two directions in languages: i) the structure and the development of indirect evidentiality; ii) the morphological distribution of TAM notions, and their interactions. This paper proposes a morpho-semantic analysis of the struc- ture of indirect evidentiality in Romanian,...

2010 - How to disambiguate an evidential construct? Taxonomy and compitionality of Romanian verbal complexes with evidential semantics [Articolo su rivista]
Irimia, Monica Alexandrina
abstract

This paper examines a specific verbal paradigm with evidential interpretations in Romanian; it also addresses intriguing questions about compositionality in the evidential domain and the precise delimita- tion of this notion from other (modal) categories. The discussion is centered around a typical characteristic of evidentials about the past, namely that they are homophonous with the perfect counterfactuals and future perfects. A battery of tests is examined in detail, and it is demonstrated that evidentials are not pragmatic extensions of homophonous forms; they rather have to be considered independent entries in the database.

2010 - How to disambiguate an evidential construct? Taxonomy and compositionality of Romanian verbal complexes with evidential semantics [Articolo su rivista]
Irimia, Monica Alexandrina
abstract

This paper examines a specific verbal paradigm with evidential interpretations in Romanian; it also addresses intriguing questions about compositionality in the evidential domain and the precise delimita- tion of this notion from other (modal) categories.The discussion is centered around a typical characteris- tic of evidentials about the past, namely that they are homophonous with the perfect counterfactuals and future perfects. A battery of tests is examined in detail, and it is demonstrated that evidentials are not pragmatic extensions of homophonous forms; they rather have to be considered independent entries in the database.

2010 - Some remarks on the evidential nature of the Romanian presumptive [Capitolo/Saggio]
Irimia, Monica Alexandrina
abstract

The Romanian presumptive verbal paradigm (aux + be + present/past participle) is puzzling in several respects: (i) it is the only modal/temporal/aspectual construct which allows the present participle; (ii) it can use any of the modal auxiliaries in the language, in order to assemble verbal forms which convey indirect evidentiality; (iii) with the past participle, indirect evidential meanings and other modal meanings create syncretism. A problem these characteristics pose is to understand the nature of indirect evidentiality, and its mapping to the morphology. This paper proposes a morpho-semantics analysis of the presumptive; the essential part of the account is that aspectual heads can be interpreted modally, in the domain of worlds (Iatridou 2000, Izvorski 1997). The specific semantics of the participles, as well as the contribution of be derive indirect evidentiality, defined as speaker’s non-awareness of the eventuality itself.

2008 - Decomposing indirect evidentials [Relazione in Atti di Convegno]
Irimia, Monica Alexandrina
abstract

This paper contains an investigation of some aspects of Romanian modality constructed with auxiliaries. These forms can be combined either with the infinitive, or with overt (imperfective /perfective) aspectual morphology. In the latter case, they might give rise to interpretations which have been classified in Romanian grammars as presumptive (broadly described as referring to probability, uncertainty, guess). In these contexts, all the auxiliaries are traditionally taken to be synonymous. This paper demonstrates that this conclusion cannot hold; a more in-depth examination shows instead that each modal auxiliary encodes a specific type of indirect source of information the proposition is based upon. In other words, Romanian modal auxiliaries have an individual indirect evidential component. The application of canonical tests used in the literature supports a modal analysis of Romanian evidentials, as opposed to an alternative illocutionary operator account. Another characteristic of modal auxiliaries that is touched upon is the nature of the ambiguity relations with their perfective forms. It is assumed, following recent accounts by Condoravdi (2001), Ippolito (2002, et subseq.), Copley (2002), among others, that the ways in which temporal/aspectual heads interact with modal projections are responsible for various interpretations. For example, when temporal/aspectual heads are above the modal, counterfactual readings arise. When they are below the modal, only evidential interpretations are possible.

2006 - On the nature of adverbials [Relazione in Atti di Convegno]
Irimia, Monica Alexandrina
abstract

This paper encompasses a syntactic analysis of circumstantial prepositional phrases and argues that their attachment as the innermost complements of verbs (McConnell-Ginet 1982, Larson 1989, 2005, Kayne 1994, Chomsky 1995) can give a better account not only of their nature as constituents related to the event (Davidson 1967, Kratzer 1996) but also of other grammatical phenomena like agreement with inflected adverbials (as in Aleut, Nilsen 2000) or word order setting in V-initial languages.

2005 - Types of secondary predication [Working paper]
Irimia, Monica Alexandrina
abstract

This paper focuses on adjectival secondary predicates and argues that they are functional projections of a secondary predicate (SP) category realized as two major varieties: DEP for depictives (and other SPs associated with the depictive) and RES for resultatives. These functional heads are each semantically specified to temporally link the state denoted by the adjective to an event (Pylkkänen 2002, Kratzer 2004). The present analysis assumes that the host NP is base-generated as an argument of the adjective and ends up occupying the specifier position of the secondary predicate phrase (SP- P). Based on Hornstein’s (2001) movement analysis of Control, the specifier of the SP-P moves into a θ-position (see also Grebenyova 2005 and Marušič et al. 2003). The syntactic and semantic distribution of secondary predicates support two configurations: syntactically-dependent SP-Ps (depictives and resultatives) are merged as complements of V; syntactically-independent SP-Ps (circumstantials and absolutes) are adjoined to VP.