Subject: syntax

the following is a book which readers of this list might find of interest . for more information please visit http : / / mitpress . mit . edu / promotions / books / zubpps98 prosody , focus , and word order maria luisa zubizarreta this monograph exemplifies a new trend in grammatical theory in which researchers combine findings from more than one area of linguistics . specifically , the author looks at the relationship between phrasal prominence and focus in romance and germanic languages to provide new insights into how these properties are grammatically articulated . building upon previous results in the field , she argues that phrasal prominence ( nuclear stress ) reflects syntactic ordering . there are two varieties of syntactic ordering . the first is the standard asymmetric c-command ordering . the second is the ordering derived from the primitive relation of selection holding between a head and its associated argument . part of the difference between germanic and romance languages stems from a difference in the way the two syntactic orderings interact in the mapping onto phrasal prominence . the author shows that the symmetry between syntactic ordering and phrasal prominence so defined may be broken because of the independent requirement that a focused constituent must contain the most prominent element in the sentence . two kinds of processes come into play to repair the broken symmetry . one is a process of deaccenting . the other is a process of movement , called " p-movement . " the author shows that a proper understanding of the properties of p-movement can be attained within the framework of the minimalist program . maria luisa zubizarreta is associate professor at the university of southern california . linguistic inquiry monograph 33 august 1998 6 x 9 , 232 pp . , 4 illus . paper isbn 0-262 - 74021 - 4 cloth isbn 0-262 - 24041 - 6 jud wolfskill associate publicist phone : ( 617 ) 253-2079 mit press fax : ( 617 ) 253-1709 five cambridge center e - mail : wolfskil @ mit . edu cambridge , ma 02142-1493 http : / / mitpress . mit . edu
