Clitics and the Left Periphery in Cayuga
Michael Barrie, Inkie Chung, Roronhiakehte Deer
January 2023
 

We propose that pronominal markers in Cayuga are clitics that obey an updated version of the Tobler-Mussafia Law. Specifically, pronominal markers cannot appear at the left edge of an Intonational Phrase and undergo prosodic inversion at PF if they appear in that position at Spell-Out. This analysis has two important implications. First, we show that monomorphemic units in Cayuga are not uniformly particles, as is generally assumed. Rather, Cayuga opens up a new testing ground for the distinction between particles and clitics. Second, in order to motivate the analysis, a better understanding of the left periphery in Cayuga is developed. Specifically, the interaction between topics, wh-phrases and prosodic structure is mapped out, showing that the left periphery contains at least a Topic Phrase that dominates a Focus Phrase. Thus, this study sets the stage for a more detailed map of the clause structure in Cayuga.
Format: [ pdf ]
Reference: lingbuzz/007078
(please use that when you cite this article)
Published in: Studies in Generative Grammar (생성문법연구)
keywords: iroquoian, prosody, clitic, particle, wh-movement, morphology, syntax
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