The Typology of Constituent Questions
Louise Mycock(Author)
Oxford University Press
Will be published approx. on 26. November 2026
Book
Hardback
384 pages
978-0-19-958999-9 (ISBN)
Description
This book explores and analyses the typology of constituent ('wh') questions within the non-derivational framework of Lexical-Functional Grammar (LFG). Part I examines fundamental features of constituent questions, focusing on syntax, semantics, information structure, and prosody. The chapters examine the roles of syntax and prosody in encoding information structure status and delimiting interrogative scope, and consider how these aspects of linguistic structure and their interfaces are modelled in LFG. Part II turns to the syntax and prosody of constituent questions in three case-study languages, each exemplifying a distinct constituent question formation strategy: in situ (Japanese), ex situ (Hungarian), and combined ex situ and in situ (English). One chapter also considers a further possibility for constituent question formation, namely scope marking constructions, exemplified by the Q-marking construction (partial 'wh' movement) in Hungarian and the bare Q-scope construction (bare scope marking) in Malay. Along with clausal pied-piping, these constructions are analysed as constituent questions that include a question clause rather than some other type of question expression. Drawing on data from a variety of languages, Part III explores wider issues relating to the typology of constituent questions: variation within and across languages in terms of the formation strategies available, optionality, and constraints. What emerges is a view of the typological space that is built on the acknowledgement of the roles that syntactic and non-syntactic aspects of linguistic structure can play in constituent question formation, which in turn provides a more complete understanding of constituent questions cross-linguistically.
More details
Language
English
Place of publication
Oxford
United Kingdom
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Dimensions
Height: 246 mm
Width: 171 mm
ISBN-13
978-0-19-958999-9 (9780199589999)
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Schweitzer Classification
Person
Louise Mycock is Associate Professor of Linguistics in the Faculty of Linguistics, Philology and Phonetics at the University of Oxford, Tutorial Fellow of Somerville College, and Lecturer at St Hugh's College. She received a PhD. from the University of Manchester in 2007 before taking up a Faculty of Humanities Research Fellowship at Manchester, and subsequently completing a British Academy Postdoctoral Fellowship at Oxford. Between 2010 and 2016, she was a Departmental Lecturer in Syntax at Oxford, and was a visiting researcher at the Research Institute for Linguistics of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences.
Author
Associate Professor of Linguistics, Faculty of Linguistics, Philology and PhoneticsAssociate Professor of Linguistics, Faculty of Linguistics, Philology and Phonetics, University of Oxford
Content
Part I. Fundamentals of the analysis 1: Introducing constituent questions 2: Lexical-Functional Grammar 3: Analysing constituent question formation in Lexical-Functional Grammar Part II. Case studies 4: In-situ language: Japanese 5: Ex-situ language: Hungarian 6: Combined ex-situ and in-situ language: English 7: Scope marking constructions Part III. Exploring the typological space 8: The typology of constituent questions 9: Conclusion