On the Development of Differential Object Marking in Romance
type: CreativeWork
description: Through an investigation of novel diachronic and synchronic data, this dissertation explores and analyses the emergence and development of Differential Object Marking (henceforth, DOM) in Romance. Although DOM has been posited as the output of semantico-pragmatic parameters such as animacy, this study follows in the vein of research that has emerged in recent decades showing DOM to be the output of a cluster of variety-specific structural (viz. nominal, clausal, verbal), semantico-pragmatic (viz. topicality, saliency, referentiality, animacy), and lexical parameters. In chapter 1, I briefly summarise the state-of-the art of the literature regarding DOM in Romance and establish several paucities within said literature that form the basis of the research questions of the present dissertation. Namely, I identify gaps within the literature that fail to account for: (i) the diachronic emergence and development of DOM in Romance at a general level, (ii) the advancement of DOM with nominal parameters along an implicational hierarchy of highly referential, topical, and salient nominals, (iii) the diachronic distribution of DOM in relation to structural, semantico-pragmatic, and lexical parameters, (iv) the diachronic interplay between these parameters and how this affects the realisation (or lack thereof) of DOM, (v) the interplay and possible cause-and-effect relationship between DOM and other syntactic parameters contemporaneous to it such as the Verb Second parameter in old Romance and low lexical V(erb)-movement in modern Romance, and, finally, (vi) the structural and non- structural parameters that underpin the absence of DOM. In chapter 2, I discuss and analyse the distribution of DOM in modern Romance and the extensive literature regarding this phenomenon from the earliest functionalist and prescriptivist accounts to modern minimalist accounts. I identify a D vs. DP split in the licensing of DOM with nominal types and establish strong parallels between non-standard R…
abstract: Through an investigation of novel diachronic and synchronic data, this dissertation explores and analyses the emergence and development of Differential Object Marking (henceforth, DOM) in Romance. Although DOM has been posited as the output of semantico-pragmatic parameters such as animacy, this study follows in the vein of research that has emerged in recent decades showing DOM to be the output of a cluster of variety-specific structural (viz. nominal, clausal, verbal), semantico-pragmatic (viz. topicality, saliency, referentiality, animacy), and lexical parameters. In chapter 1, I briefly summarise the state-of-the art of the literature regarding DOM in Romance and establish several paucities within said literature that form the basis of the research questions of the present dissertation. Namely, I identify gaps within the literature that fail to account for: (i) the diachronic emergence and development of DOM in Romance at a general level, (ii) the advancement of DOM with nominal parameters along an implicational hierarchy of highly referential, topical, and salient nominals, (iii) the diachronic distribution of DOM in relation to structural, semantico-pragmatic, and lexical parameters, (iv) the diachronic interplay between these parameters and how this affects the realisation (or lack thereof) of DOM, (v) the interplay and possible cause-and-effect relationship between DOM and other syntactic parameters contemporaneous to it such as the Verb Second parameter in old Romance and low lexical V(erb)-movement in modern Romance, and, finally, (vi) the structural and non- structural parameters that underpin the absence of DOM. In chapter 2, I discuss and analyse the distribution of DOM in modern Romance and the extensive literature regarding this phenomenon from the earliest functionalist and prescriptivist accounts to modern minimalist accounts. I identify a D vs. DP split in the licensing of DOM with nominal types and establish strong parallels between non-standard R…
author: Singh, Onkar
language: eng
keywords: DOM, DP, Latin, N-movement, old Romance, V2, V-movement
license: https://apollo8-f-pro.lib.cam.ac.uk/bitstreams/ffc75f8a-0a66-4319-8347-357f1e369e15/download
license: https://www.rioxx.net/licenses/all-rights-reserved/
date published: 2023-12-14
date modified: 2026-07-22T22:24:13Z
provider: Cambridge University
publisher: Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations
type: WebPage
source organization: University of Cambridge

PropertyValue
property ID: DOI
value: 10.17863/CAM.108895