Ph.D. Theses
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Item Classifier constructions of Turkish(Thesis (Ph.D.) - Bogazici University. Institute for Graduate Studies in the Social Sciences, 2020., 2020.) Turgay, Tacettin.; Öztürk Başaran, Balkız.This dissertation addresses three interrelated issues concerning classifier constructions in Turkish: (i) semantics of bare noun phrases, (ii) the function of classifiers and syntactic constituency of classifier constructions, and (iii) syntax and semantics of number marking. Regarding the first issue, it is argued that Turkish bare noun phrases denote properties of entities but are inherently ambiguous with respect to whether they take kind or object entities as their domains. With respect to the second issue, it is argued that classifiers serve to restrict the ambiguous domain to object individuals only. Syntactically, a measure phrase is proposed which hosts classifiers and measure words in its head position and numerals in its specifier position. The resulting constituent, a property-denoting μP, is then applied to nouns predicatively or attributively through adjunction. It is demonstrated in particular that μP only combines with number-neutral bare nouns. As for the third issue, it is demonstrated that number specification in Turkish is relevant for DPs only, and is expressed in the φP that projects above the DP. Sub-DPs are shown to lack number specification. Number markers on bare nouns are uninterpretable agreement reflexes which must be checked against interpretable counterparts in the φP or in some other functional head. As they lack number specification, sub-DPs always receive a number-neutral reading, and thus are restricted to contexts which can handle such interpretations. DPs, on the other hand, can never receive number-neutral readings.Item Argument-adjunct distinction in Kurmanji Kurdish(Thesis (Ph.D.)-Bogazici University. Institute for Graduate Studies in Social Sciences, 2018., 2018.) Gündoğdu, Songül.; Öztürk, Balkız.; Özsoy, Sumru.This dissertation investigates the status of a number of constituents in Muş Kurmanji (MK), namely postverbal goals, certain adpositional phrases, and the nominal element of noun-verb complex predicates which fall in between argument and adjunct categories according to the argument-adjunct bipartite classification in syntactic theory. It explores the status of these constituents in the event structure and argument structure of verbs in MK. It proposes that the majority of the noun-verb complex predicates in MK are like unergatives à la Hale and Keyser (2002). They are underlyingly transitive structures where an agentive (transitive) light verb incorporates into its nominal object, and the noun element of these complex predicates checks the case of transitive LV as if it were its object. Furthermore, it focuses on the status of postverbal goals and certain adpositional phrases in MK arguing for a relation between the morphological form of the constituents and their status as encoded in the verb’s meaning; that is, structural participants are realized with case morphology while constant participants are introduced with adpositions. The data further suggests that there are certain verb classes in MK which pattern alike with respect to argument realization properties, pointing to the existence of certain event types. Based on this observation, it proposes that the verb groups patterning alike in MK project similar simplex (e.g. vGO, vBE, vDO) or complex event types (e.g. vDO+vBE, vDO+vGO), and the event participants are introduced either within the event domain and/or through event introducing projections such as VoiceP and ApplP.Item Resumption, A’- chains and implications on clausal architecture(Thesis (Ph.D.)-Bogazici University. Institute for Graduate Studies in Social Sciences, 2010., 2010.) Meral, Hasan Mesud.; Özsoy, A. Sumru.This work investigates the nature of resumption and provides an analysis of how anaphoric dependencies occur in language. I raise the question whether resumption has any explanatory power on various grammatical phenomena such as binding, control and null object licensing which have been assumed in the generative literature as resulting from different licensing mechanisms and require different grammatical operations. In this respect, this study aims at extending the applicational domain of resumption from relative clauses to anaphor licensing, control and null object licensing. I claim that resumption offers a valid solution which compromises the different requirements of these different phenomena with respect to locality. The idea in the dissertation is that the anaphors, PROs and null objects behave in the same way with a resumptive in that they form a unit with their syntactic antecedents (empty operator), then they split. The antecedent binds the grammatical formative inside the clause respecting a different sense of locality. The dissertation also argues that the A- domain in Turkish is weak due to the problematic nature of A- domain operations. Instead, what Turkish instantiates is a rich A’- domain where different grammatical phenomena such as binding and control are licensed via operator-variable chains akin to resumption. For the problematic aspects of Binding Theory conditions and the lack of pronoun-anaphor complementarity, the dissertation argues that Turkish follows a threepartite system where a third category exemplified by a complex pronominal expression (kendi)si subsumes the functions of regular pronominals and anaphors and other functions which cannot be expressed by these two grammatical formatives.Item Semantic, prosodic, and syntactic marking of Information Structural Units in Turkish(Thesis (Ph.D.)-Bogazici University. Institute for Graduate Studies in Social Sciences, 2015., 2015.) Gürer, Aslı.; Göksel, Aslı.This dissertation focuses on how Turkish encodes information structural units within semantics, prosody and syntax interface. Information packaging is investigated under the classification of (i) aboutness topic, (ii) contrastive topic, (iii) contrastive focus, (iv) discourse-new focus, and (v) discourse anaphoric constituents. Focus phrases are differentiated not based on a designated syntactic position or the feature of contrast but based on exhaustive identification with contrastive focus phrases. The prosodic properties of focus phrases in SOV order indicate that (i) when focus is in the immediately preverbal position, contrastive focus and discourse-new focus and broad focus sentences do not differ significantly with respect to duration or pitch height at any of the measurement points, (ii) focus in sentence initial, medial or final domains is always marked as the rightmost phonological phrase with intonational phrase level prominence, which marks the beginning of the nuclear fall. The syntactic investigation of the interaction of information structural units with negation and quantifier scope illustrate that all movement operations are driven by discourseinterpretational purposes. Additionally, vP does not show phasehood properties and the derivation of the data is captured via eventual, situational, and propositional domains and clause-internal functional projections. In the absence of TP, (i) CP does not show phasehood properties as evidenced by binding data, ECM clauses, bounding nodes, (ii) temporal information is encoded as a secondary effect of Mood.Item A computational approach to collectivity and distributivity in Turkish quantificational sentences(Thesis (Ph.D.)-Bogazici University. Institute for Graduate Studies in Social Sciences, 2010., 2010.) Bülbül, Eda Esra.; Demiralp, Mine Nakipoğlu.; Kelepir, Meltem.This dissertation discusses the nature of quantificational sentences with the quantifiers her “every” and bütün “all” in Turkish and investigates how quantificational sentences get interpreted in terms of collectivity / distributivity. Departing from previous approaches, the study proposes to examine the role each constituent of a sentence attributes to the interpretation of a sentence and claims that the distributive or collective interpretation of a sentence is a function of the meanings of its constituents pertaining to the notion of collectivity and of the way they are combined. The model proposed in the dissertation puts forward a computational interpretation mechanism referred to as the Modified Plus Principle which operates on the feature of [alphaCOLL] that every constituent in a structure is assumed to bring from the lexicon. This interpretation mechanism enables us to argue that lexical items associated with the [-COLL] feature such as the distributive predicates, the quantifier her “every” and singular nouns are potentially have a more influential role than the ones associated with the [+COLL] feature such as the collective predicates, the quantifier bütün “all” and plural nouns in interpreting a sentence as either collective or distributive.Item Case as an uninterpretable feature(Thesis (Ph.D.)-Bogazici University. Institute for Graduate Studies in teh Social Sciences, 2006., 2006.) Kechriotis, Zekiye Ceyda Arslan.; Özsoy, A. Sumru.The aim of this dissertation is to discuss the syntactic properties of nominals in Turkish, their Case properties and the implications of a theory of grammar in which the dislocation of arguments is not motivated by the Extended Projection Principle (EPP), but by structural Case checking. It is proposed that Turkish referential nominals possess a Determiner Phrase (DP) layer where Dº assigns referentiality to the nominal. DP in turn is argued to select a Number Phrase (NumP)/Classifer Phrase (ClP) both subcategorizing for an NP. Non-referential nominals are argued to be bare NPs without the functional categories that referential nominals bear, which accounts for the fact that they behave in a different manner than DPs. It is argued that DPs undergo dislocation from their basegenerated positions to Spec positions of higher functional heads with which they form a A- Agree relation, whereas NPs remain in their merge positions. Moreover, NPs and DPs are also argued to behave differently in their Case properties. NPs bear weak Case feature and they undergo adhesion to the verb to be licensed; whereas DPs bear strong Case feature. It is argued that the analysis where dislocation is motivated by the EPP feature of the functional heads faces several economy problems. This study claims that it is the strong Case feature of nominals which forces them to undergo dislocation.Item A split model for category specification: lexical categories in Turkish(Thesis (Ph.D.)-Bogazici University. Institute for Graduate Studies in Social Sciences, 2009., 2009.) Uygun, Dilek.; Göksel, Aslı.This dissertation discusses the nature of the traditionally recognized categorial distinctions "noun", "adjective" and "verb" in Turkish and investigates whether these distinctions are specified in the lexicon or in syntax. Based on the constraints governing the morphological and syntactic distribution of lexical expressions in Turkish, this study shows that there is a lexically specified category distinction among lexical expressions which is represented in the lexicon by the ± values of a single feature N. It is argued that this distinction divides lexical items into three major groups: +N expressions which are stative, –N expressions which are nonstative and expressions which are unspecified for the value of N. It is argued that the traditional noun-adjective distinction does not represent a category distinction in the lexicon and +N expressions become nouns in syntax through case assignment and become adjectives when they occur in attributive modification structures. It is further demonstrated that there are in fact no verbs in the lexicon and that the expressions traditionally classified as verbs are composed of a -N root expression and event heads such as CAUSE, DO and BECOME. This study, in conclusion, introduces a model of category specification which is split between the lexicon and syntax and demonstrates that as there are expressions in the lexicon with specified category features, there are also expressions with unspecified category features and which are categorized in syntax.Item A government phonology analysis of Turkish consonants(Thesis (Ph.D.)-Bogazici University. Institute for Graduate Studies in Social Sciences, 2006., 2006.) Balcı, Ercan.; Denwood, Ann.The main topic of this dissertation is a detailed analysis of Turkish consonants in theframework of Government Phonology. In order to explain a number of phonologicalphenomena involving consonants, the elemental composition of consonants in Turkish is proposed for the first time. Stem-final and suffix-initial voicingalternations are discussed to find out the best way to represent voice. Fortition by theelement H and spreading of H are proposed respectively to explain these voicingalternations in phonological expressions containing the ? element. In the light of the representation of voice, the representation of all consonants is based on the proposedanalysis of voice contrasts. The governing relations in word-final consonant clustersare accounted for by inter-onset government. The elemental composition ofconsonants explains consonant clusters, the word-initial phenomenon and the wordfinal phenomenon. The role and the representation of palatalized consonants with theI element help us to account for the different ways of interpreting the first vowel of aword and to explain unexpected vowel harmony in the suffixes after word-finalpalatalized consonants. The data concerning word-final consonant clusters is drawn from TELL, and the data about the effect of palatalized consonants on neighboringnuclei is tested with 40 native speakers of Modern Turkish orally. This studyprovides elemental representations of Turkish consonants generated by a set ofsuggested Licensing Constraints on the combinations of elements and accounts for various phonological phenomena by referring to universal principles and parameters.Item Temporal clauses in Turkish Sign Language(Thesis (Ph.D.) - Bogazici University. Institute for Graduate Studies in the Social Sciences, 2021., 2021.) Özkul, Aslı.; Gökgöz, Kadir.; Kelepir, Meltem.This dissertation aims to investigate the typological, structural, and semantic properties of temporal clauses in Turkish Sign Language (TİD). It is shown in this thesis that temporal clauses that denote sequentiality, simultaneity, duration, and frequency are attested in TİD. Some of these are headed by postpositional subordinators AFTER, BEFORE, DURATION, and GÖRE. Syntactically, temporal clauses must occur in the pre-verbal area, i.e. either to the left of the matrix clause or between the matrix subject and the matrix verb. They also display characteristics of subordinated clauses: They form constituents with the postpositional subordinators and they are usually marked by a non-manual marker, head thrust, which functions as a clausal boundary marker in TİD. The presence of semantically vacuous negation in BEFORE-clauses also provides evidence for subordination. Moreover, temporal clauses in TİD provide visible evidence for a number of abstract semantic notions proposed previously: (i) temporal and matrix clauses as Ground and Figure (Talmy, 1975), (ii) spatiotemporality, i.e. topographic relations between temporal arguments (Demirdache and Uribe-Extebarria, 1997), (iii) properties of durational and locating temporal markers, and (iv) loci as temporal variables. Regarding the last topic, this thesis extends Schlenker’s (2013, 2017) analysis of loci as temporal variables to a complex sign -DURATION- in which {duration} is the bound root and temporal pronouns attach to this root in the form of clitics. Finally, a new timeline which has not been observed in any other sign language before is proposed.Item Adverbials in Turkish: the third parameter in aspectual interpretation(Thesis (Ph.D.)-Bogazici University. Institute for Graduate Studies in Social Sciences, 2004., 2004.) Güven, Mine.; Taylan, Eser Erguvanlı.The main argument of the present dissertation is that T/A adverbials in Turkish constitute the third parameter in aspectual interpretation along with the other two parameters, namely situation type and viewpoint aspect. Concerning the expression of viewpoint aspect in Turkish, (i) the semantic distinctions denoted by Turkish T/A morphology and (ii) the basic opposition between perfective vs. imperfective and their extended interpretations are considered. As for the second parameter, the interaction of situation type with objects, Turkish perfective vs. imperfective morphology and T/A adverbials is analyzed. A time-relational analysis/categorization of T/A adverbials is proposed. The data suggest that T/A adverbials constitute one of the core elements of aspectual interpretation and that a combination of the insights of B. Comrie, C. Smith, W. Klein and M. Krifka is required to account for Turkish data adequately. In conclusion, it is argued that aspectual oppositions derive from universal properties of time intervals, relations between intervals and mereological structure and that aspect is a linguistic instantiation of boundedness. The opposition between perfective and imperfective is argued to be an instantiation of a total vs. partial overlap relation between the reference interval and the time of the situation, in analogy to one that obtains between an adverbial interval and the time of the situation. This, in turn, suggests that from a wider perspective aspect is a linguistic reflection of the basic conceptual /perceptual contrast between figure and ground in the sense of L. Talmy and H. Demirdache & M. Uribe-Etxebarria.