The Syntax of Honorification

Author: F. Niinuma, Year:2003

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ABSTRACT:

This dissertation investigates syntactic properties of subject and object honorific agreement in Japanese.

In chapter 2, I examine object honorification in Japanese. I provide evidence that the element that is responsible for object honorification does not undergo movement to the specifier position of the relevant head. I give an account of object honorific agreement based on the long distance agreement as proposed by Chomsky (2000, 2001a,b). Furthermore, I argue that Miyagawa's (1997) analysis of double object constructions in Japanese, on which both the indirect object-direct object and direct object-indirect object order can be base-generated, should be rejected, the indirect object always being higher than the direct object underlyingly, and that so-called short scrambling involves movement to a higher position than v .

In chapter 3, I examine so-called possessor honorification in Japanese. I show that the relevant feature for honorific agreement is [+human], and that a phrase that has a [-human] feature is transparent to it.

In chapter 4, I investigate the interaction of honorific agreement with dative subject constructions. I provide evidence against the analysis which maintains that honorific agreement is an instance of phi-feature agreement (Ura (1996, 2000), Boeckx and Niinuma (in press)). I show that PPs, in addition to NPs, can participate in honorific agreement, while only NPs can trigger phi-feature agreement.

In chapter 5, I investigate honorific agreement in unaccusative constructions in Japanese. I provide evidence against analyses which maintains that the nominative NP of unaccusative verbs stays within VP in overt syntax (Yatsushiro (1999), Ura (1996, 2000)). Instead, I argue that the nominative NP overtly moves to Spec TP, passing through Spec v P, the T head undergoing subject-honorific agreement with it while it is located in Spec v P. I show that the analysis accounts for different behavior of floating quantifiers with unergatives and unaccusative verbs in Japanese.

 

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Chapter I ......................................................................................1     

Chapter ll Object Honorification ..........................................................6

1. Introduction .................................................................................6

2. The properties of object honorification................................................7

      2.1 Morphological properties ..............................................................8

       2.2 Syntactic properties ...............................................................10

3. More on data ............................................................................. 15

       3.1 Ni NP...............................................................................15

       3.2 Kara NP..............................................................................17

       3.3 To NP .............................................................................. 18

       3.4 E NP ................................................................................. 19

       3.5 No tame-ini NP ....................................................................20

       3.6 Causatives .........................................................................21

       3.7 Transitive Verb ................................................................... 22

       3.8 Summary ............................................................................23

4. Against Spec-head Configuration......................................................24

       4.I. Toribios (1990} analysis ........................................................24

       4.2. Against Spec-head agreement with v .......................................................33

              4.2.1 Head-Internal Relatives ..................................................34

              4.2.2. Secondary Predicates .,...................................................38

5. An Analysis .............................................................................. 44

6. Several Constructions and Object Honorification in Japanese ..........................51

             6.1 Passives and object honorification ..........................................51

             6.2 Object honorification and pro..............................................56

7. Conclusion ...............................................................................58

Chapter lll Possessor Honorification ....................................................60

1. Introduction ..............................................................................60

2. The Data ..................................................................................63

3. An Analysis ..............................................................................74

4. Au/iru Alteration ........................................................................90

5. Conclusion ...............................................................................94

Chapter III Dative Subjects and Honorification .......................................96

1. Introduction ..............................................................................96

2. Properties of dative subjects in Japanese .............................................98

       2.1 Types of predicates...............................................................98

      2.2. Syntactic properties ............................................................101

3. Dative subjects in Korean ................................................................................108

4. Uras (1996, 1999, 2000) analysis ...................................................................111

5, An analysis ..............................................................................116

6. Evidence .................................................................................121

8. Summary ..........................................................................................................127

Chapter V Unaccusativity and Honorification .....................................................129

. Introduction .......................................................................................................129

2. Unaccusativity in Japanese ..............................................................................130

3. Honorific agreement ........................................................................................134

       3.1. Problem ..................................................................................................134

      3.2. An Analysis ............................................................................................140       

4. Evidence ...........................................................................................................142

       4.1. VP-Preposing .........................................................................................142

       4.2. Scrambling ......................................................................146

5. Counterarguments .....................................................................149

       5.1 Scope test.........................................................................150

       5.2 Locative Inversion...............................................................153

       5.3. Problems with counterarguments .............................................156

6. Consequences ...........................................................................164

7. Summary .................................................................................170

References .................................................................................172