Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-jn8rn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-26T00:47:29.798Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

The theoretical significance of the Latin accusative and infinitive: a reply to Pillinger

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 November 2008

Bernard Comrie
Affiliation:
Department of Linguistics, University of Southern California

Extract

Pillinger (1980) argues that the Latin accusative and infinitive construction provides evidence against some of the current assumptions of Relational Grammar (RG) and, 1to a lesser extent, the Extended Standard Theory (EST). I argue that, even if one accepts Pillinger's analysis of this construction – as I would, perhaps with less diffidence than Pillinger himself – then this analysis is completely neutral with regard to deciding between RG and EST and compatible with either.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1981

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Anderson, S. R. (1976). On the notion of subject in ergative languages. In Li, C. N. (ed.), Subject and topic. New York: Academic Press, 123.Google Scholar
Cole, P., Harbert, W., Hermon, G. & Sridhar, S. N. (1980). The acquisition of subjecthood. Language 56, 719–43.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cole, P. & Jake, J. L. (1978). Accusative subjects in Imbabura Quechua. Studies in the linguistic sciences.Google Scholar
Gary, J. O. & Keenan, E. L. (1977). On collapsing grammatical relations in universal grammar. In Cole, P. & Sadock, J. (eds), Syntax and semantics, 8: Grammatical relations. New York: Academic Press, 83120.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Keenan, E. L. (1976). Towards a universal definition of ‘subject’. In Li, C. N. (ed.), Subject and topic. New York: Academic Press, 303333.Google Scholar
Pillinger, O. S. (1980). The accusative and infinitive in Latin: a refractory complement clause. JL 16. 5583.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Postal, P. M. (1974). On raising: one rule of English grammar and its implications. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.Google Scholar