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The genomic landscape of mammal domestication might be orchestrated by selected transcription factors regulating brain and craniofacial development

Development Genes and Evolution 233 (2), 123-135 Domestication transforms once wild animals into tamed animals that can be then exploited by humans. The process entails modifications in the body, cognition, and behavior that are essentially driven by differences in gene expression patterns. Although genetic and epigenetic mechanisms were shown to underlie such differences, less is […]
By Juan Uriagereka
August 8, 2023

Features, categories, and interactions within levels

Consonant and vowel categories, differing in distinctive features, interact into projected syllables. Noun and verb categories, also differing in distinctive (categorial) features, interact into projected phrases. Phrases to categorize (via featural distinctions of the A/A’, head/maxP sort) and interact into chains, thus regarded as super-projected structures. What is less obvious is whether these distinctions – […]
By Juan Uriagereka
May 10, 2023

Correlated attributes: Toward a labeling algorithm of complementary categorial features

Frontiers in Language Sciences 2, 1107584 Classical syntactic features are revisited from an algebraic perspective, recalling a traditional argument that the ±N vs. ±V distinction involves correlated, conceptually orthogonal, features, which can be represented in the algebraic format of ±1 vs. ±i complementary elements in a vectorial space. Coupled with natural assumptions about shared information (semiotic) systems, such a space, […]
By Juan Uriagereka
February 20, 2023

Categories with complements

Philosophies 7 (5), 102 Verbs and nouns gear θ-dependencies, Case, agreement, or construal relations. Building on Chomsky’s 1974 decomposition of such categories into ±N, ±V features, by translating said features into ±1, ±i scalars that allow for the construction of a vector space, this paper studies the possibility of organizing said features into 2 × 2 […]
By Juan Uriagereka
September 15, 2022

La física del lenguaje

ReGrOC. Revista de Gramática Orientada a las Competencias 4 (1), 62-71 En este artículo resumimos brevemente y de manera no técnica varios avances recientes en el estudio del lenguaje desde la perspectiva de la física. En particular, comentamos resultados referentes a la equivalencia entre MERGE y renormalización, así como de la teoría de Matrix Syntax. […]
By Román Orús, Juan Uriagereka
May 28, 2022

Structure: concepts, consequences, interactions

MIT Press
By Juan Uriagereka
January 1, 2022

Off the Chain

Minimalism has no agreed-upon approach to chains. The key problem, as noted by Collins & Groat (2018), is that an all-you-need-is-MERGE logic (Chomsky 2008, Chomsky et al. 2019) is not enough to distinguish repetitions (selected from the Lexicon) from copies (taken from the derivational workspace that carries the computation). Chomsky (1995, 2000, 2001), for instance, […]
By Ángel J. Gallego, Juan Uriagereka
October 20, 2020

Towards Matrix Syntax

Catalan Journal of Linguistics, 27-44 Matrix syntax is a model of syntactic relations in language, which grew out of a desire to understand chains. The purpose of this paper is to explain its basic ideas to a linguistics audience, without entering into too many formal details (for which cf. Orús et al. 2017). The resulting […]
By Roger Martin, Román Orús, Juan Uriagereka
December 23, 2019

The MER41 family of HERVs is uniquely involved in the immune-mediated regulation of cognition/behavior-related genes: pathophysiological implications for autism spectrum disorders

Frontiers Genetics 321, vol 10 Social behavior and neuronal connectivity in rodents have been shown to be shaped by the prototypical T lymphocyte-derived pro-inflammatory cytokine Interferon-gamma (IFNγ). It has also been demonstrated that STAT1 (Signal Transducer And Activator Of Transcription 1), a transcription factor (TF) crucially involved in the IFNγ pathway, binds consensus sequences that, […]
By Antonio Benítez-Burraco, Serge Nataf, Juan Uriagereka
April 12, 2019

Intentionality and Domestication

Workshop on Biolinguistics, University of the Balearic Islands.
By admin
January 11, 2019

Relations between the Humanities and the Sciences

In The Language Sciences, Consecuencias para la educación, Gramática Orientada a las Competencias (GrOC) workshop, University Pompeu Fabra
By admin
January 11, 2019

Categories, features, interactions: Methodological reflections

Cartography and Explanatory Adequacy, Autonomous University of Barcelona 14.
By admin
January 11, 2018

Language, syntax, and the natural sciences

Cambridge University Press - Festschrift.
By admin
January 1, 2018

Third factor explanations and Universal Grammar

The biolinguistic approach to generative grammar has in recent years emphasized the relevance of principles that are not specific to the Faculty of Language. These are taken to work together with both genetic endowment and experience to determine relevant languages. Chomsky (2005) labels these non-language-specific principles ‘third factors’, and argues that computational efficiency is a […]
By Terje Lohndal, Juan Uriagereka
January 1, 2017

Condiciones de Ensamble en las combinaciones de clíticos

Una de las contribuciones más importantes de los modelos generativos fue el descubrimiento de principios de economía que rigen la sintaxis de las lenguas naturales (cf. Chomsky 1991, 1993). Sabemos, por un lado, que los fenómenos gramaticales regulares (concordancia, ligamiento, etc.) deben ocurrir dentro de un dominio D (ciclo, fase, etc.); y, por el otro, […]
By Ángel J. Gallego, Juan Uriagereka
January 1, 2017

‘Estar’=’Ser’+ X

Borealis–An International Journal of Hispanic Linguistics 5 (1), 123-156
By admin
June 1, 2016

The Immune Syntax Revisited: Opening New Windows on Language Evolution

Frontiers in Molecular Neuroscience 8, 84 Recent research has added new dimensions to our understanding of classical evolution, according to which evolutionary novelties result from gene mutations inherited from parents to offspring. Language is surely one such novelty. Together with specific changes in our genome and epigenome, we suggest that two other (related) mechanisms may […]
By Antonio Benítez-Burraco, Juan Uriagereka
January 1, 2015

“Natural” Grammars and Natural Language

Ibon Sarasola, Gorazarre. Bilbao: Editorial de la Universidad del País Vasco p. 665-674 Lucas structures can be abstracted from within Fibonacci structures expressed as Lindenmayer-trees by «atomizing» certain chunks of structure (which yields the Padovan series) and by pruning the immediate context of said atomizations. Such conditions may define a space with arguable syntactic significance. […]
By Juan Uriagereka
January 1, 2015

Chains in Minimalism

Minimalism and beyond: Radicalizing the interfaces, 169-194 This paper considers how the system identifies multiple occurrences of a syntactic object α as a chain, a set of copies. For Chomsky (1995, 2000, 2001), copies can arise only by movement (internal merge); lexical items introduced by external merge are stipulated to be distinct tokens, coded by […]
By Roger Martin, Juan Uriagereka
September 24, 2014

Principles and Parameters/Minimalism

The Routledge handbook of syntax, 509-525 The first explicitly minimalist paper, Chomsky (1993), was concerned with unifying a certain set of data and theories that had become prominent in the 1980s. What we may think of as “early minimalism” took what was known from GB for granted and attempted to unify/eliminate relevant conditions. A good […]
By Terje Lohndal, Juan Uriagereka
April 29, 2014

Regarding the Third Factor: Arguments for a CLASH Model

Biolinguistic Investigations and the Formal Language Hierarchy, 105-132 The minimalist program (MP) assumes three factors for linguistic design. Two of these (genetic endowment and contingent variation) are customarily presupposed within generative grammar. The third factor involves general principles of computation and overall economy, which remain controversial in linguistics and relatively obscure within MP. This chapter […]
By Juan Uriagereka
January 1, 2014

Clitic Placement in Western Iberian: A Minimalist View

This article examines clitic placement in Western Iberian (WI) languages. Central and Eastern Iberian (henceforth C/EI) languages are sensitive to the finiteness of the clause that hosts the clitic. The article argues that a morphophonological property of the peripheral functional category F accounts for the complex pattern of WI clitic placement versus its more homogeneous […]
By Eduardo P. Raposo, Juan Uriagereka
September 18, 2012

Structure at the Bottom

Of Grammar, Words, and Verses: In Honor of Carlos Piera, 5-18 Generative Semantics set out to unearth the intricacies of paradigms by applying the same computational devices that helped generative grammar account for syntagmatic dependencies. The proposal failed on empirical grounds, as paradigmatic relations lack the productivity, transparency and systematicity of syntagmatic ones, which the […]
By Howard Lasnik, Juan Uriagereka
April 18, 2012

Spell-out and the Minimalist Program

Oxford University Press.
By admin
January 5, 2012

The Archaeological Record Speaks: Bridging Anthropology and Linguistics

International Journal of Evolutionary Biology 2011 (1), 382679 This paper examines the origins of language, as treated within Evolutionary Anthropology, under the light offered by a biolinguistic approach. This perspective is presented first. Next we discuss how genetic, anatomical, and archaeological data, which are traditionally taken as evidence for the presence of language, are circumstantial […]
By Sergio Balari, Antonio Benítez-Burraco, Victor Longa, Guillermo Lorenzo, Juan Uriagereka
April 14, 2011

Derivational Cycles

This article clarifies the concept of cycle, or phase, in minimalist parlance. Cyclicity is a derivational condition if there is one, a strong constraint if derivational timing is so relevant that chunks of structure abandoning the derivation become opaque to further computation. The challenge continues to be to understand the exact nature of this condition, […]
By Juan Uriagereka
March 3, 2011

Dos tipos de argumentos y la distinción indicativo/subjuntivo

Cuadernos de la ALFAL 3, 188-199 We study some syntactic properties of embedded sentences that seem to be associated to the verb‟ s modal inflection (indicative vs. subjunctive). Focusing on the island status of indicative clauses in some language families, we defend the possibility that such distinction, apparently morphological, has a structural correlate; more specifically, […]
By Ángel J. Gallego, Juan Uriagereka
January 1, 2011

A Framework for the Comparative Study of Language

Comparative Evolutionary Psychology, J. Vonk & T. K. Schackelford (eds.), a dedicated number of Evolutionary Psychology Comparative studies of language are difficult because few language precursors are recognized. In this paper we propose a framework for designing experiments that test for structural and semantic patterns indicative of simple or complex grammars as originally described by […]
By James A. Reggia, Juan Uriagereka, Gerald S. Wilkinson
January 1, 2011

The Logic of Parametric Theories

Theoretical Linguistics, 36: 69-76 ‘Parameters in minimalist theory: The case of Scandinavian’ ( henceforth, PMT), by Anders Holmberg, is an interesting attempt to defend the view that ‘deep parameters’ should be part of the grammatical system. PMT argues that parameters should be seen as points of ‘underspecification’, and in part as 3rdfactor effects in the […]
By Terje Lohndal, Juan Uriagereka
October 1, 2010

The Biological Nature of Human Language

Biolinguistics, 4, 1 Biolinguistics aims to shed light on the specifically biological nature of human language, focusing on five foundational questions:(1) What are the properties of the language phenotype?(2) How does language ability grow and mature in individuals?(3) How is language put to use?(4) How is language implemented in the brain?(5) What evolutionary processes led […]
By Robert C. Berwick, Thomas G. Bever, Cedric Boeckx, Lisa Lai-Shen Cheng, Elly van Gelderen, Heidi Harley, Lyle Jenkins, Anna Maria Di Sciullo, James McGilvray, Massimo Piattelli-Palmarini, Karin Stromswold, Juan Uriagereka, Andrew Wedel, Kenneth Wexler
March 24, 2010

Metrical Combinatorics and the Real Half of the Fibonacci Sequence

Biolinguistics 3 (4), 404-406 Languages with stress group syllables into metrical feet (Halle and Idsardi 1995,Hayes 1995)—non-exhaustive groups of contiguous syllables. The size of feet innatural languages ranges from unary (a single syllable) to unbounded (as manysyllables as possible); in addition syllables can also remain unfooted. Under theseconditions, the number of possible metrical footings for […]
By William J. Idsardi, Juan Uriagereka
December 13, 2009

Homo loquens neanderthalensis? On the symbolic and linguistic capacities of Neandertals

Munibe El reciente análisis de ADN fósil de dos Neandertales procedentes de la Cueva El Sidrón (Asturias) ha revelado que los Neandertales poseían las mutaciones del gen FOXP2 consideradas específicas de los humanos modernos. Dado que FOXP2 está implicado en el desarrollo y uso del lenguaje, tal hallazgo está provocando una revisión de las capacidades […]
By Sergio Balari, Antonio Benítez-Burraco, Victor Longa, Guillermo Lorenzo, Juan Uriagereka
November 10, 2009

Uninterpretable features in syntactic evolution

Of minds and language: A dialogue with Noam Chomsky in the Basque Country As all of you know, every time I listen to a talk by Randy Gallistel, I think I have made a career mistake–I should have studied a different animal. But anyway, in the interests of interdisciplinarity, I will talk about human animals, […]
By Juan Uriagereka
January 29, 2009

Also Sprach Neanderthalis… Or did She?

Biolinguistics 2 (2-3), 225-232 Two Neanderthals from El Sidrón (Asturias, Spain; Rosas et al. 2006) have been recently analyzed by Krause et al.(henceforth K) for possible mutations in FOXP2 (Krause et al. 2007), a gene involved in the faculty of language (Lai et al. 2001). Although these mutations were believed to be specific to modern […]
By Antonio Benítez-Burraco, Victor Longa, Guillermo Lorenzo, Juan Uriagereka
January 1, 2009

Biolinguistics and information

Modern (theoretical) linguistics was born half a century ago in the midst of what is often called the cognitive revolution. Noam Chomsky (1956, 1957), Morris Halle (1995, 2002), Eric Lenneberg (1967), and others distanced themselves from the then-dominant behaviorist paradigm, and reached back to earlier philosophical concerns, using the faculty of language as “a mirror […]
By Cedric Boeckx, Juan Uriagereka
January 1, 2009

Still a Bridge too Far?

The Physics of Life Review In this paper we discuss how Fibonacci growth patterns are apparent in the structure of human language. We moreover show how familiar dynamics yielding these sorts of patterns in nature may be taken to apply, at some level of abstraction, for the human faculty of language. The overall picture casts […]
By Massimo Piattelli-Palmarini, Juan Uriagereka
December 1, 2008

Competence for preferences

Anuario del Seminario de Filología Vasca” Julio de Urquijo”, 561-571 In this paper we treat the phenomenon of syntactic preference as a grammaticality judgment that emerges in situations of structural ambiguity. There seem to be instances where, despite the fact that several relevant structures for some terminal string are grammatical, speakers somehow feel that they […]
By Roger Martin, Juan Uriagereka
February 20, 2008

Of Mice and Chimps (and Finches too)

Human Sciences, Iran, No. 55: 71-78 Perhaps the most challenging as well as the most interesting question raised in linguistic studies is the Innateness Hypothesis of Human Language. There have been various types of evidence proposed to corroborate such a hypothesis. One type is based on different linguistic disorders resulting from brain damages. In the […]
By Juan Uriagereka
January 1, 2008

Así Habló (o tal vez no) el Neanderthal

Teorema, XXVIII, pp. 73-83 Two Neanderthals from El Sidrón (Asturias, Spain) have been recently analyzed for possible mutations in FOXP2, a gene involved in the faculty of language. Although this gene was believed to be specific to modern humans, the analysis in question revealed otherwise. The present article reflects on the meaning of this finding, […]
By Antonio Benítez-Burraco, Victor Longa, Guillermo Lorenzo, Juan Uriagereka
January 1, 2008

Syntactic anchors: On semantic structuring

Cambridge University Press
By admin
January 1, 2008

Desperately Evolving Syntax

The Chomsky Hierarchy (CH) gives a first approximation as to where human syntax lies in an abstract logical space: the generating device accepting appropriate languages should be slightly more powerful than a standard Push-Down Automaton (a PDA+), although for familiar reasons not much more so. An evolutionary study of syntax ought to give us some […]
By Juan Uriagereka
January 1, 2008

Conditions on Sub-Extraction

This paper discusses the nature of Huang’s (1982) Condition on Extraction Domains (CED) in the context of Chomsky’s (2005) Phase Theory. In particular, we address Chomsky’s (2005) analysis, which takes phase edges (ie, SPEC-v* and SPEC-C) to give rise to locality problems for sub-extraction. Concentrating on the Subject Condition subcase, we provide empirical evidence that […]
By Ángel J. Gallego, Juan Uriagereka
November 21, 2007

A Critique of Phase Extension, With a Comparison to Phase Sliding

Theoretical Linguistics, 33, 65-74 1. Introduction Den Dikken’s paper (henceforth DD) explores an interesting alternative to Chomsky’s conception of Phase Theory to account for different phenomena involving Predicate Inversion (PI). In particular, DD concentrates on cases of so-called copular, locative, and dative inversion (the respective instances in (1)): a. The #1 best-seller in the country is this […]
By Ángel J. Gallego, Juan Uriagereka
August 27, 2007

Defective C

Alternatives to Cartography Goals: argue for the existence of a defective version of C; explore the connectivity effects of subjunctive dependents; provide an Agree-based account of long-distance obviation
By Ángel J. Gallego, Juan Uriagereka
June 1, 2007

Clarifying the Notion “Parameter”

Biolinguistic Investigations and the Formal Language Hierarchy This chapter reflects on parameters or, more generally, linguistic variation, which seems hardly a unified phenomenon. It suggests that there are three progressively deeper forms of variation to configure an I-language. The chapter argues that there are three sorts of systemic variations and also that Sub-case parameters must […]
By Juan Uriagereka
January 1, 2007

On the Metaphysics of Linguistics

Prospects for Dualism, W. Hinzen (ed.), special issue of Erkenntnis Mind–body dualism has rarely been an issue in the generative study of mind; Chomsky himself has long claimed it to be incoherent and unformulable. We first present and defend this negative argument but then suggest that the generative enterprise may license a rather novel and […]
By Wolfram Hinzen, Juan Uriagereka
October 20, 2006

The Dynamics of Islands: Speculations on the Locality of Movement

The paper is divided as follows. In section 2 we pose various questions that arise when attempting to rationalize islands. We begin to address some of these questions in section 3, where the basic LCA line is presented. In sections 4 and 5 we explore a variety of consequences that this approach has for conditions […]
By Norbert Hornstein, Howard Lasnik, Juan Uriagereka
September 29, 2006

Complete and partial Infl

This paper argues that ‘null’ Case appears in person-less elements, including (some) clauses in addition to PRO, while ‘full’ Case shows up in regular nominals. Several data are adduced in this regard, the pertinent distribution being decided when constructing cyclic lexical arrays through an economy metric: Full Case/person features are required only on elements that […]
By Cedric Boeckx, Juan Uriagereka
July 26, 2006

Towards a syntax of Proto-Basque

In this note, I reflect on a reconstructive path for the syntax of Proto-Basque, building on the results of Gomez and Sainz (1995), working on a tradition started already by Astarloa two centuries ago, and of which Trask (1977) is an excellent example. The matter is interesting not just in itself, but also in that […]
By Juan Uriagereka
April 11, 2006

Sub-extraction from subjects

Romance linguistics, 149-162
By admin
January 1, 2006

Sub-extraction from phase edges

The Complementiser Phase: subjects and wh-dependencies This chapter investigates Chomsky’s (2008) phase-based analysis of CED effects, which capitalizes on an opacity created by phasal specifiers (socalled ‘edges’). After reviewing different pieces of evidence, it is argued that an Agree/Activity Condition approach to islandhood phenomena is theoretically and empirically superior, a conclusion that is pushed to […]
By Ángel J. Gallego, Juan Uriagereka
January 1, 2006

Some Concepts and Questions Concerning the I System

Anuario del Seminario Julio de Urquijo. International Journal of Basque Linguistics and Philology This paper explores two simple, related ideas, within the Minimalist Program: that the skeletal Tense system of clauses involves a single T node, whether they are finite or infinitive, of the raising or the control type; and that this system is implicated […]
By Juan Uriagereka
January 1, 2006

The Gordian Knot of Linguistic Fossils

The biolinguistic turn. Issues on language and biology, ed. J. Rosselló & J. Martın Starting out from some well-known formal characteristics of grammars (the Chomsky Hierarchy) we revisit the question of whether the fossil record can provide us with reliable early evidence for fully syntactic linguistic behaviors. We show how the tying of knots requires […]
By Juan Uriagereka
January 1, 2006

The Evolution of the Narrow Faculty of Language: The Skeptical View and a Reasonable Conjecture

Lingue e Linguaggio, D. Delfitto, G. Graffi & S. Scalise (eds.), IV-1, 27-79, special issue on Language Evolution Enard et al. 2002 date the last mutation in FOXP2, the gene implicated in some central aspects of human language –crucially including context-sensitive syntax– to ca. 120,000before the present (B.P.). Traits in modern humans that arguably presuppose […]
By Massimo Piattelli-Palmarini, Juan Uriagereka
January 1, 2005

Measuring Language

International Journal of Bifurcation and Chaos, 14 (2), special issue on Cognition and Complex Brain Dynamics The study of language, its processing and its bearing on human cortical processes are all extensive domains of investigation in their own right. In this overview tutorial we limit ourselves to a sample of core illustrative issues. Our central […]
By Douglas Saddy, Juan Uriagereka
March 23, 2004

The Immune Syntax: The Evolution of the Language Virus

Variation and universals in biolinguistics, 341-377
By admin
January 25, 2004

Conditions on sub-extraction

Coreference, modality, and focus, 45-70
By admin
May 25, 2003

Progress in the Simulation of Emergent Communication and Language

Adaptive Behavior, 11, 37-69 This article reviews recent progress made by computational studies investigating the emergence, via learning or evolutionary mechanisms, of communication among a collection of agents. This work spans issues related to animal communication and the origins and evolution of language. The studies reviewed show how population size, spatial constraints on agent interactions, […]
By James A. Reggia, Juan Uriagereka, Kyle Wagner, Gerald S. Wilkinson
March 1, 2003

Infinitival Complementation in Basque

Anuario del Seminario de Filología Vasca” Julio de Urquijo”, 597-609 In this paper we analyze the core instances of infinitival complementation in Basque. Some familiar facts are discussed, and also a surprising one which has never been analyzed: the peculiar Case/agreement distributions apparent in instances of obligatory control. If valid, our analysis has potentially important […]
By Itziar San Martin, Juan Uriagereka
January 1, 2003

On the Poverty of the Challenge

The Linguistic Review, 19 (1-2) 147-150 Positive data involving auxiliary fronting are never evidence for a constraint such as the structure-dependent hypothesis. At best, positive data of any complexity are direct evidence for a simple-minded hypothesis, of the sort of ‘front the first auxiliary (after something or other)’. On the widespread assumption that negative data […]
By Howard Lasnik, Juan Uriagereka
June 26, 2002

Reprojections

Derivation and explanation in the Minimalist Program, 106-132
By admin
January 1, 2002

Cutting Derivational Options

Natural Language & Linguistic Theory, 19-4, 891-900 Lappin, Levine and Johnson (LLJ) categorize my first reply to their piece as something ’which addresses our main objection to the MP by attempting to present a substantive defense of economy conditions in the theory of grammar’. This is why I chose the paradigm I did, among other […]
By Juan Uriagereka
November 1, 2001

Doubling and possession

Clitics in phonology, morphology and syntax, 405-431 This paper explores the conjecture that clitic doubling in languages like Spanish shares some fundamental aspects of the semantics of inalienable possession, especially if understood in terms of a syntax of the kind originally advocated by Szabolcsi (1983). A few paradigms are discussed where this correlation would explain […]
By Juan Uriagereka
February 1, 2001

Conditions enabling the emergence of inter-agent signaling in an artificial world

Artificial Life, 2001, 7(1), 3-31 In the research described here we extend past computational investigations of animal signaling by studying an artificial world in which a population of initially noncommunicating agents evolves to communicate about food sources and predators. Signaling in this world can be either beneficial (e.g., warning of nearby predators) or costly (e.g., […]
By James A. Reggia, Reiner Schulz, Juan Uriagereka, Gerald S. Wilkinson
January 1, 2001

On the Emptiness of Design Polemics

Natural Language & Linguistic Theory, 18 (3), 863-71 Lappin, Levine and Johnson (henceforth ‘LLJ’) are concerned about the field gravitating towards the Minimalist Program (MP) without having exhausted the possibilities of the ‘Government and Binding’ (GB) theory.1 In this reply, I concentrate on a concrete paradigm that has resisted a GB analysis. Since LLJ attack […]
By Juan Uriagereka
November 1, 2000

A Simulation Environment for Evolving Multiagent Communication

Digital Repository at the University of Maryland A simulation environment has been created to support study of emergent communication. Multiple agents exist in a two-dimensional world where they must find food and avoid predators. While non-communicating agents may survive, the world is configured so that survival and fitness can be enhanced through the use of […]
By James A. Reggia, Reiner Schulz, Juan Uriagereka, Gerald S. Wilkinson
September 1, 2000

Cyclicity and Extraction Domains

Minimalist Syntax: The Essential Readings, 337
By Jairo Nunes, Juan Uriagereka
April 1, 2000

Ch. 10: Multiple Spell-Out

A main desideratum of the Minimalist Program is reducing substantive principles to interface (or bare output) conditions, and formal principles to economy conditions. Much energy has been devoted to rethinking constraints and phenomena that appear to challenge this idea, in the process sharpening observations and descriptions. In this chapter, I attempt to reduce a version […]
By Juan Uriagereka
November 22, 1999

Minimal restrictions on Basque movements

Natural Language & Linguistic Theory 17, 403-444
By admin
May 1, 1999

Multiple spell-out

Current Studies in Linguistics Series 32, MIT Press
By admin
January 8, 1999

Some Thoughts on Economy within Linguistics

DELTA, 16, 221-43, Unicamp, Brazil One of the cornerstones of Chomsky’s Minimalist Program is the role played by economy. This paper discusses different ways in which Chomsky’s notion of economy in linguistics can be understood, given current views on dynamic systems and, in particular, on evolution in biological systems. Um dos pontos principais do Programa […]
By Juan Uriagereka
January 1, 1999

Warps: Some Thoughts on Categorization

Theoretical Linguistics, 25 (1), 31-73 Language presents paradigmatic regularities, together with the usual syntagmatic ones that syntax is designed to capture. This article proposes a way of deriving systematic hierarchies by analyzing linguistic categories through the algebraic structure of numbering systems (hence by way of dimensions, each recursively defined on the previous). The goal is […]
By Juan Uriagereka
January 1, 1999

A Note on Rigidity

Possessors, predicates and movement in the Determiner Phrase, 361-382 Sentences like the one above pose a well-known difficulty for the now standard theory of names. What makes Antony Antony, and not Brutus, is (in the Kripkean view) the fact that Antony originates’ from a certain hunk of matter’and has some reasonable properties concerning a given’substance’essential […]
By Juan Uriagereka
October 15, 1998

Indefinite se

Natural Language & Linguistic Theory 14 (4), 749-810
By admin
November 8, 1996

This a title

This is an excerpt
By Juan Uriagereka
October 25, 1996

A Brief Response

Current Issues in Comparative Grammar, 338-345 It probably is uncontroversial that the determiner cliticization paradigm discussed in this chapter obeys some locality restriction in terms of government (or a similar notion). Whether the locality condition is syntactic or phonological in nature may be an open question, but I have nothing to say about the second […]
By Juan Uriagereka
January 1, 1996

Determiner Clitic Placement

Current issues in comparative grammar, 257-295 Some time in the High Middle Ages, the Romance languages created a determiner system from chunks of the demonstrative paradigm of Latin. This language did not have definite articles, nor did it have third person pronouns—it used demonstratives to refer to third persons. In fact, in many (though not […]
By Juan Uriagereka
January 1, 1996

An F position in western romance

Discourse configurational languages 26, 79-123
By admin
January 8, 1995

Word order and wh-movement: Towards a parametric account

Ms., University of Connecticut & University of Maryland
By admin
January 11, 1994

Aspects of the syntax of clitic placement in Western Romance

Linguistic inquiry 26 (1), 79-123
By admin
January 1, 1994

Indicative dependents

Ms. U. Mass Boston/UMD
By admin
January 11, 1992

GB sintaxi ikastaro bat: uztardura eta kategoria isilei buruzko irakastaldia

Servicio Editorial, Universidad del País Vasco= Argitarapen Zerbitzua
By admin
January 1, 1992

A Note on Development Syntax

Let me set aside some issues I will not deal with. First, I will have nothing to say about whether the methodology of the experiments discussed in this conference is sound. I am not a psycholinguist, others have already commented on this, and in any case I am more interested in discussing the syntactic consequences […]
By Juan Uriagereka
January 1, 1991

Long-distance case assignment

Linguistic Inquiry 21 (4), 505-537
By admin
January 10, 1990

Different Strategies for Eliminating Barriers

It follows from (1) and (2) that functional projections which have a lexical specifier may be barriers, whereas functional projections specified by an empty categor y may not. 3 Finally, I will assume (contrary to Chomsky (1986b) but in line with several others) that IP gan be a barrier. This is of course the null […]
By Juan Uriagereka
January 1, 1989

On government

University of Connecticut dissertation
By admin
January 1, 1988