Conférence du Professeur Guglielmo Cinque (Univ. de Venise) | Cognition, Typological Generalizations and Universal Grammar

In this talk, I would like to discuss two puzzles. One revolves around the fact that of all the concepts that populate our system of thought only a limited number receives a grammatical encoding in the languages of the world (the exemplification will include Mood/Tense/Aspect morphemes and related adverbs, as well as nominal modifiers). The other puzzle rests on the fact that of all mathematically possible orders of constituents (in the nominal phrase and in the clause) only a subset is actually attested. Neither limitation appears to follow naturally from cognitive, historical, cultural, processing, or other factors; which makes it at least possible to think of them as forced upon us by Universal Grammar, perhaps as a consequence of how it crystallized at some distant point of the evolution of our species.