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DIRECT OBJECTS IN PERSIAN
by
Shadi Ganjavi
_________________________________________________________
A Dissertation Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
(LINGUISTICS)
May 2007
Copyright 2007 Shadi Ganjavi
Object Description
| Title | Direct objects in Persian |
| Author | Ganjavi, Shadi |
| Author email | ganjavi@usc.edu |
| Degree | Doctor of Philosophy |
| Document type | Dissertation |
| Degree program | Linguistics |
| School | College of Letters, Arts and Sciences |
| Date defended/completed | 2006-08-22 |
| Date submitted | 2007 |
| Restricted until | Unrestricted |
| Date published | 2007-04-21 |
| Advisor (committee chair) |
Hoji, Hajime Pancheva, Roumyana |
| Advisor (committee member) |
Borer, Hagit Li, Audrey Yen-Hui Ershaghi, Iraj |
| Abstract | This work challenges some prevalent claims and assumptions about Persian syntax and offers an alternative account. The standard assumption regarding the direct objects in Persian is that they form a natural class syntactically and differ from one another semantically, hence, the widespread specific/definite versus nonspecific/indefinite categorization of these elements (where only the former are marked with the morpheme râ). This dissertation argues that the perceived differences between different object types are, in fact, a result of differences in their syntactic structure, since only some of the direct objects in Persian have a full DP projection (hence, also challenging the idea that all argument nominals are DPs (e.g., Longobardi 1994)).; It is shown, furthermore, that the DP versus non-DP dichotomy is not sufficient for accounting for data pertaining to direct objects. While, superficially the non-DP direct objects appear to behave similarly, a closer inspection reveals that they do not form a natural class. Some only have an NP, while others have a NumP projection. The former are property-denoting expressions subject to Pseudo Noun Incorporation (Massam 2001) and the latter are weak determiners in the sense of Milsark 1974 and Diesing 1992.; Building on the assumption that case (and referentiality) are only associated with the DP projection, it is argued that the morpheme râ is a default case marker on DPs, which could not have their case features valued either as nominative or dative. Therefore, this morpheme not only marks direct objects that are DPs but also the DPs in the (sentential) topic position. This would account for the differences in the interpretation of the râ-marked DPs as well as their relative order.; In order to have a full picture of the direct objects in Persian, this dissertation also examines cases in which the direct object appears as a clitic. It is argued that in those instances, the nominal expression that merges with the verb is the non-overt element pro, which is identified by the clitics' phi-features. This analysis can also account for the Clitic Doubling facts as well as cases in which the clitic appears as the indirect object. |
| Keyword | syntax; Persian; direct objects; Clitics; râ; Clitic Doubling |
| Language |
English Persian |
| Part of collection | University of Southern California dissertations and theses |
| Publisher (of the original version) | University of Southern California |
| Place of publication (of the original version) | Los Angeles, California |
| Publisher (of the digital version) | University of Southern California. Libraries |
| Type | texts |
| Legacy record ID | usctheses-m390 |
| Contributing entity | University of Southern California |
| Rights | Ganjavi, Shadi |
| Repository name | Libraries, University of Southern California |
| Repository address | Los Angeles, California |
| Repository email | cisadmin@lib.usc.edu |
| Filename | etd-Ganjavi-20070421 |
| Archival file | uscthesesreloadpub_Volume14/etd-Ganjavi-20070421.pdf |
Description
| Title | Page 1 |
| Contributing entity | University of Southern California |
| Repository email | cisadmin@lib.usc.edu |
| Full text | DIRECT OBJECTS IN PERSIAN by Shadi Ganjavi _________________________________________________________ A Dissertation Presented to the FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY (LINGUISTICS) May 2007 Copyright 2007 Shadi Ganjavi |
