Journal of Slavic Linguistics

Contents

In Memoriam Daniela S. Hristova     3

In Memoriam Horace G. Lunt     7

In Memoriam Rudolf Růžička     13

Articles

Varja Cvetko-Orešnik and Janez Orešnik
Natural Syntax of Slovenian: The Complex Sentence     19

Olga Kagan
On Speaker Identifiability     47

Igor Mel’čuk and Jasmina Milićević
“Budalo jedna!”-Type Constructions in Contemporary Serbian     85

Reviews

Frank Y. Gladney, Victoria Hasko and Renee Perelmutter, eds.
New Approaches to Slavic Verbs of Motion     119

Joseph Schallert, Jouko Lindstedt, Ljudmil Spasov, and Juhani Nuorluoto, eds.
The Konikovo Gospel: Konikovsko evangelie     131

Anastassia Zabrodskaja Ingunn Lunde and Martin Paulsen, eds.
From Poets to Padonki: Linguistic Authority and Norm Negotiation in Modern Russian Culture     153

Article Abstracts

Varja Cvetko-Orešnik and Janez Orešnik

Natural Syntax of Slovenian: The Complex Sentence

Abstract: This paper applies the framework of Natural Syntax to complex sentences in Slovenian, with the twin goals of introducing the framework to Slavists and showing how it deals with Slavic language data. The framework of Natural Syntax as initiated by Janez Orensnik, in the tradition of (morphological) naturalness as established by Wolfgang Dressler and Willi Mayerthaler, is a developing deductive theory. The naturalness judgments are couched in naturalness scales, which follow from the basic parameters (or "axioms") listed at the beginning of the paper. The predictions of the theory are calculated in what are known as deductions, the chief components of each being a pair of naturalness scales and the rules governing the alignment of corresponding naturalness values. Parallel an chiastic alignment are distinguished and related to Henning Andersen's early work on markedness.

Olga Kagan

On Speaker Identifiability

Abstract: In this paper, I investigate the notion of speaker indentifiablity, a term that is strongly associated with the pragmatic approach to specificity. Following Haspelmath 1997, I provide evidence from Russian for the linguistic relevance of speaker identifiablity. In particular, I discuss two series of existential indefinites, koe- items and -to items, which are inherently specified as identifiable or not identifiable to the speaker. This specification is shown to be independent of such phenomena as the free-choice effect or narrow scope relative to another operator in the logical form of the sentence. I propose a formal analysis of speaker identifiablity formulated within the framework of possible-world semantics. According to this account, an NP is speaker-world that is compatible with the speaker's worldview. Speaker identifiablity is analyzed as a condition on the relative scope of an existential operator that ranges over individuals and a universal quantifier which quantifies over a s set of possible worlds introduce by the context. I also argue that the speaker (non-)identifiablity meaning component contributed by the investigated items constitutes a conventional implicature.

Igor Mel’čuk and Jasmina Milićević

“Budalo jedna!”-Type Constructions in Contemporary Serbian

Abstract: This paper describes the qualifying exclamatory construction in Serbian exemplified by Budalo jedna! 'What a fool you are!'. This construction belongs to non-descriptive (or SIGNALATIVE) linguistic expressions which cannot be questioned, negated, or freely modified. The lexicographic description of such expressions has received insufficient attention. We argue that in the above construction the adjective JEDAN intensifies the speaker's negative feelings such that the construction means: 'You are a fool and I feel very negatively about it'. Extensions of the construction include the use of JEDAN with a positive evaluative noun, which produces an ironic effect (e.g. Genije jedan! 'You are the opposite of a genius and I feel very negatively about it') and with a non-evaluative noun, which results in the "transfer" of negativeness to the noun (e.g., Profesore jedan! 'You act as a typical professor [which is bad], and I feel very negatively about it"). Since all these effects are attributable to JEDAN, we describe the qualifying exclamatory construction in the lexical entry for JEDAN.

Contents

Articles

John Frederick Bailyn
To What Degree Are Croatian and Serbian the Same Language? Evidence from a Translation Study     181

Barbara Citko
On the Distribution of -kolwiek ‘ever’ in Polish Free Relatives     221

Bartłomiej Czaplicki
Palatalized Labials in Polish Dialects: An Evolutionary Perspective     259

Charles Jones and James S. Levine
Conditions on the Formation of Middles in Russian     291

Reviews

Grant H. Lundberg
Tjaša Jakop. The Dual in Slovene Dialects     337

Krzysztof Migdalski
Franc Marušič and Rok Žaucer. Studies in Formal Slavic Linguistics     339

Article Abstracts

John Frederick Bailyn

To What Degree Are Croatian and Serbian the Same Language? Evidence from a Translation Study

Abstract: This article reports on the results of an experimental translation study conducted in 2008 in which 16 adult native speakers of the Croatian variant of Bosnian-Croatian-Serbian (BCS) were asked to translate nine texts from the Serbian BCS variant into their native Croatian variant in order to test the extent to which Croatian and Serbian do or do not employ distinct linguistic devices. The results show, on the basis of a statistical comparison of the purely grammatical building blocks in the original texts and their translations, that the Croatian and Serbian variants of BCS have essentially identical linguistic systems across all levels of language structure. In particular, we find that the phonological and syntactic systems are essentially identical and that over 98% of derivational and inflectional morphology tokens are identical Lexically, the open classes show a difference of less than 10% of tokens, whereas the closed grammatical classes show identity in over 95% of cases.

Barbara Citko

On the Distribution of -kolwiek ‘ever’ in Polish Free Relatives

Abstract: This paper analyzes the distribution of the particle -kolwiek 'ever' in Polish free relatives. The empirical observation it builds on concerns the obligatory presense of -kolwiek in complex free relatives. I argue against accounts that reduce this requirement to purely semantic considerations and propose a syntactic account instead. This account rests on independently motivated claims about the structure of Polish noun phrases and the positive setting of the DP Parameter for Polish. The crucial innovation lies in the structure proposed for wh-phrases in free relatives; I argue that such wh-phrases have a more complex internal structure than wh-phrases in questions, in that they require the topmost head inside the nominal projection, the Q head, to be filled by an overt element in order to support the maximality operator associated with the interpretation of free relatives.

Bartłomiej Czaplicki

Palatalized Labials in Polish Dialects: An Evolutionary Perspective

Abstract: Two types of explanations for typological asymmetries are in current use: synchronic, which rely on phonological filters that make learners more receptive to some patterns than others (e.g., markedness), and diachronic, which appeal to phonetically systematic errors that arise in the transmission of the speech signal. This paper provides a diachronic account of palatalized labials in standard and dialectal Polish. It is shown that the weak perceptibility of the palatal element in a specific phonetic context is a good predictor of depalatalization and that dissimilation arises whenever a phonetic signal can be interpreted in a non-unique manner. The Polish data exemplify three sources of natural sound change: (i) neutralization of perceptually weak contrasts, (ii) phonological reanalysis of ambiguous signals, and (iii) change in the frequency of phonetic variants. Sound change is shown to be non-deterministic and non-optimizing. There is no role for markedness in this account.

Charles Jones and James S. Levine

Conditions on the Formation of Middles in Russian

Abstract: This paper presents a VP account of the adverbial modification required, in some way, by the middle construction in Russian and the related construction in English: Kartoska pocistilas' legko 'The potato peeled easily,' The account develops a syntax and semantics for the adverbial middle (Type I: Ackema and Schoorlemmer 2006) that is free of various requirements often supposed for it, notably an "implicit agent" and generic interpretation. The main condition on adverbial middle formation is access to an embedded state predicate of the object in the logical structure of the head.

Contents

In Memorium Dalibor Brozović     3

Articles

Christina Y. Bethin
Perceptual Salience in Dialect Contact: The Okan’e/Akan’e Dialects of East Slavic     7

Natalia Fitzgibbons
Free Standing n- Words in Russian: A Syntactic Account     55

James Lavine
Case and Events in Transitive Impersonals     101

Reviews

Frank Y. Gladney
Edmund Gussman. The Phonology of Polish     131

Ivona Kučerová
Anne Sturgeon. The Left Periphery: The interaction of syntax, pragmatics and prosody in Czech     141

Robert Orr
Jussi Halla-Aho. Problems of Proto-Slavic Historical Morphology     153

Tanya Skubiak
Laada Bilaniuk. Contested Tongues: Language Politics and Cultural Correction in Ukraine     169

Article Abstracts

Christina Y. Bethin

Perceptual Salience in Dialect Contact: The Okan’e/Akan’e Dialects of East Slavic

Abstract: In East Slavic, akan’e (neutralization of /o/ and /a/ after non-palatalized consonants) has spread or is spreading to dialects which maintain the mid- and low-vowel contrast (okan’e). Under the assumption that vowel neutralization is favored in durationally deprived syllables, it is expected that akan’e would first spread in weak positions, and in some transitional dialects this is exactly what happens: akan’e is found in non-immediately pretonic and post-tonic syllables. But in other dialects, the patterns of akan’e spread are unexpected: it first appears in the immediately pretonic position and before stressed high vowels and often before stressed /a/ before it occurs elsewhere. I focus on these unexpected patterns and suggest that they may emerge as a consequence of perceptual salience through contact with neighboring strong akan’e dialects in Pskov and Novgorod oblasts of Russia and in Homel’ and Minsk oblasts of Belarus. Similar patterns are found in other East Slavic dialect contact situations under similar conditions, as is to be expected.

Natalia Fitzgibbons

Free Standing n- Words in Russian: A Syntactic Account

Abstract: This article provides a syntactic account of freestanding n-words in Russian. The analysis is based on the theory in Brown 1999, where Russian n-words are licensed by agreement with the sentential negation head. Under the proposed analysis, freestanding n-words are licensed by agreement with a phonologically null negative head. The article works out the details of this agreement process for both n-words licensed by sentential negation and freestanding n-words licensed by a phonologically null negative head. As a result, it provides an argument that the driving force of movement must lie in the moving element, the n-word.

James Lavine

Case and Events in Transitive Impersonals

Abstract: This paper provides an event-structural analysis of accusative assignment in Ukrainian and Russian impersonal predicates. Constructions in which accusative occurs in the absence of an external argument, i.e., Transitive Impersonals, are found to be necessarily dyadic and causative: one argument identifies a causing or initiating event while a second argument is associated with the verb’s core meaning. The causing event is introduced by a syntactic head within the verb’s extended functional projection that is responsible for accusative valuation, but is not argument-projecting (following Pylkkänen 2008). Event structure is thereby linked directly to Case, further elucidating the role of v in accusative valuation, and providing new evidence for event decompositional approaches to syntax. Additional support for this approach is adduced from a non-cognate impersonal construction in Russian.

Contents

Articles

Mark Richard Lauersdorf
Slavic Sociolinguistics in North America: Lineage and Leading Edge      3

Ronelle Alexander and Vladimir Zhobov
New Conclusions on the Conclusive     61

Eva Eckert and Kevin Hannah
Vernacular Writing and Sociolinguistic Change in the Texas Czech Community     87

Michael Gorham
Linguistic Ideologies, Economies, and Technologies in the Language Culture of Comtemporary Russia (1987–2008)     163

Robert Greenberg
Dialects, Migrations, and Ethnic Rivalries: The Case of Bosnia-Herzegovina     193

Alla Nedashkivska
Gender Voices in Electronic Discourse: A Forum in Ukrainian     217

Aneta Pavlenko
Language Conflict in Post-Soviet Linguistic Landscapes     247

Tom Priestly, Meghan McKinnie, and Kate Hunter
The Contribution of Language Use, Language Attitudes, and Language Competence to Minority Language Maintenance: A Report from Austrian Carinthia     275

Reviews

N. Anthony Brown
Nina B. Mečkovskaja. Belorusskij jazyk: Sociolingvističeskie očerki.     317

Michael S. Flier
Laada Bilaniuk. Contested tongues: Language politics and cultural correction in Ukraine.     327

Article Abstracts

Mark Richard Lauersdorf

Slavic Sociolinguistics in North America: Lineage and Leading Edge

Abstract:This article provides a general overview of North American research in Slavic sociolinguistics from the beginnings of the field at the start of the 1960s up to the present day. The work of North American scholars published in a selection of journals, series, and special collections, as well as in monographs and dissertations, is reviewed to illustrate the research trends and the overall coverage of languages and sociolinguistic subfields as Slavic sociolinguistics developed and matured in a North American context. This study is intended to serve as a historical backdrop for the new research presented in this volume, and it closes with a brief overview of the studies in this collection and their contribution to the further development of the field.

Ronelle Alexander and Vladimir Zhobov

New Conclusions on the Conclusive

Abstract:The renarrated mood, sometimes called the “evidential”, is an innovation in Bulgarian grammar. Although it is primarily expressed with inherited forms, it includes one innovative form, a participle built on the imperfect stem of the verb. Prescriptive grammars of the socialist period stated that this participle could be used only in the meaning “renarrated”, and only without auxiliaries in the 3rd person. In the face of ample evidence that the participle is indeed used in a perfect-like compound form (i.e., with 3rd person auxiliaries), several grammarians proposed in the 1980s that this perfect-like form carried inferential meaning and should be termed the “conclusive mood”. This paper claims that the form in question is currently taking on a different, much broader meaning than either of these, and that this meaning, roughly defined as “generalized durative action in the past” is rapidly gaining acceptability among the younger generation.

Eva Eckert and Kevin Hannah

Vernacular Writing and Sociolinguistic Change in the Texas Czech Community

Abstract:This study examines the issue of language variation as characterizing the usage of an immigrant community in diaspora, specifically the Texas Czech community. It is demonstrated that the immigrants' language usage was rich and multifaceted, and that their language played a defining role in the maintenance and redefinition of ethnic and national identity. Specific features of language planning and language ideology of the Czechs and Moravians living in Texas are identified and discussed, chiefly as formulated in their press.

Michael Gorham

Linguistic Ideologies, Economies, and Technologies in the Language Culture of Comtemporary Russia (1987–2008)

Abstract:In this article I outline a theoretical and methodological framework for pursing a comprehensive study of the dominant issues and trends of Russian language culture from the Perestroika era through the present day. My chief claim is that the general shape, tone, and trajectory of a language culture will change over time and depend largely on the interdependence of three driving forces: language ideologies, economies, and technologies. To illustrate and substantiate this working hypothesis I examine both secondary theoretical sources and concrete case studies from the language culture of contemporary Russia (1987–2008).

Robert Greenberg

Dialects, Migrations, and Ethnic Rivalries: The Case of Bosnia-Herzegovina

Abstract:This article investigates the interface between dialect, ethnic identity, and political developments in the rural communities of Bosnia-Herzegovina, where the cultural and linguistic differences among Croats, Serbs, and Muslims have been most pronounced. On the basis of a fresh reanalysis of linguistic data which have previously been cited in the literature to aggrandize the differences, it is argued that the claims of Bosnia's Serb, Croat and Bosniak communities for separate identities based on the criteria of language are dubious, and that the language differences are relatively minor. It is further suggested that only certain key ethnolinguistic markers have been used to construct the notion of separate linguistic identities there.

Alla Nedashkivska

Gender Voices in Electronic Discourse: A Forum in Ukrainian

Abstract:The present study analyzes electronic discussion forums in Ukrainian from a gender linguistic perspective. First, it tests hypotheses about the egalitarian vs. hierarchical nature of electronic communication. Second, it delineates a set of genderlect features found in electronic communication in Ukrainian. Finally, based on the discourse-oriented Speech Act Empathy Hierarchy (Kuno and Kaburaki 1975/1977, Kuno 1987), the analysis demonstrates that linguistic choices signal distinct discourse orientations of females and males in electronic communication space. Namely, in mixed-gender settings, on the continuum Speaker >< Addressee >< Others, females operate more locally: Speaker >< Addressee >(< Others). Males operate with the two opposite ends of the continuum: Speaker >(< Addressee >)< Others. The analysis emphasises that both genders have a range of speech strategies that are situational; however, in some settings, males and females negotiate meaning and perceive their relationship with the addressee/others differently.

Aneta Pavlenko

Language Conflict in Post-Soviet Linguistic Landscapes

Abstract:In this article it is argued that the study of linguistic landscapes (public uses of written language) can benefit from viewing them as dynamic phenomena and examining them in a diachronic context. Based on the changes in the post-Soviet space since 1991, five processes are identified and examined in with regard to language change and language conflict. It is further argued that the study of linguistic landscape offers a useful tool for post-Soviet sociolinguistics and for Slavic sociolinguistics at large, and illustrations are provided of the insights afforded by such inquiry.

Tom Priestly, Meghan McKinnie, and Kate Hunter

The Contribution of Language Use, Language Attitudes, and Language Competence to Minority Language Maintenance: A Report from Austrian Carinthia

Abstract:During fieldwork in the Slovene-minority area of Austrian Carinthia in 1998–2000, over two hundred informants were interviewed in six localities. The interviews were designed to elicit three types of data: (i) language use in social networks, (ii) subjective perceptions of “ethnolinguistic vitality”; and (iii) linguistic competence in Standard Slovene and Standard Austrian German. The three parameters were expected to correlate with each other. This article describes the questionnaire, scoring and analysis, and demonstrates that the three parameters of attitudes, social networks, and linguistic competence are indeed correlated with each other. Several specific conclusions are reported with regard to the factors which are involved in Slovene language-maintenance in Austria.

Contents

Articles

Vita G. Markman
The Case of Predicates (Revisited): Predicate Instrumental in Russian and Its Restrictions     187

Jacek Witkoś
Genitive of Negation in Polish and Single-Cycle Derivations     247

Ilse Zimmermann
On the Syntax and Semantics of kakoj and čto za in Russian     289

Reviews

Ronald Feldstein
Paul Garde. Le mot, l'accent, la phrase: études de linguistique slave et générale     307

Frank Y. Gladney
Tore Nesset. Abstract Phonology in a Concrete Model: Cognitive Linguistics and the Morphology-Phonology Interface     311

Ivona Kučerová
Mojmír Dočekal, Petr Karlík, and Jana Zmrzlíková, eds. Czech in Generative Grammar     317

Andrea D. Sims
Olga Mišeska Tomić. Balkan Sprachbund Morpho-syntactic

Features     331

Article Abstracts

Vita G. Markman

The Case of Predicates (Revisited): Predicate Instrumental in Russian and Its Restrictions

Abstract:This paper addresses the syntax of copular constructions in Russian with special attention to the prohibition on the appearance of instrumental predicates in present-tense copular constructions and their obligatory presence in argument small clauses with null predicators. I argue that copular constructions with instrumental predicates involve an eventive Pred (following Adger and Ramchand 2003), which I call “PredEv”. PredEv introduces an event argument and checks instrumental case on the predicate. In contrast, constructions with nominative predicates involve a non-eventive Pred that has no case to check. I further argue that the event argument introduced by PredEv must be licensed by Asp. However, the present-tense form of the Russian verb ‘be’ (est’) lacks the relevant aspect features. Consequently, instrumental predicates are impossible in present-tense copular constructions. In argument small clauses, on the other hand, the event argument is licensed by the Asp of the matrix verb, which makes instrumental predicates possible. In the course of the discussion I also address predicate case in adjunct small clauses and in constructions with overt predicators. Finally, I briefly compare predicate case phenomena in Russian to those in other Slavic languages.

Jacek Witkoś

Genitive of Negation in Polish and Single-Cycle Derivations

Abstract:This paper is inspired by the discussion of Genitive of Negation in Bondaruk (2004, 2005) and by an observation made in Błaszczak (2001) that, on the basis of examples such as (7) below, a construction known as Long Distance Genitive of Negation (GoN) in Polish is essentially entirely incompatible with Chomsky’s (2000, 2001, 2004, 2006, 2007) hypotheses concerning derivations proceeding in phases. We will present general conditions which a system based on single cycle syntax and phase-based derivations should meet to account for Long Distance GoN. We attempt to work Błaszczak’s critique of phase-based minimalism into a more positive set of postulates for a successful single cycle system. Another aim of this paper is to present and compare two minimalist accounts of the Genitive of Negation in Polish, the one discussed in Bondaruk (2004, 2005) and the one suggested here. First, we provide the basic set of facts that warrants the analyses that follow and refer to theoretical foundations that lead to Błaszczak’s observation. In section 3 we outline the proposal in Bondaruk (2004) and explore its virtues and weaker points. In section 4 we propose an alternative, preferable on both conceptual and empirical grounds, which is based on the notion of double probing: a relation between a single (or multiple Goal) and a double Probe, that is a Probe that consists of two adjacent heads rather than a single head. The key condition on double probing is that both Probes must be placed in the same derivational phase and no intervention effect should arise. Finally, the appendix presents a critical review of the HPSG approach to GoN proposed in Przepiórkowski 2000.

Ilse Zimmermann

On the Syntax and Semantics of kakoj and čto za in Russian

Abstract:This contribution deals with the attributive pronouns kakoj and čto za in interrogative and exclamative sentences of Russian. It is an investigation into the polyfunctionality of these expressions, their integration into the DP structure, and their interplay with sentence mood. The morphosyntactic and semantic properties of these lexical items will be considered within the framework of Chomsky’s Minimalist Program, taking into account their semantic form and conceptual structure.