Iconicity：A Generative Perspective

1、Iconicity：A Generative Perspective     Iconicity：A Generative Perspective,關鍵詞是Ic,co,on,ni,ic,ci,it,ty,y：,：A,AG,Ge,en,ne,er,ra,at,ti,iv,ve,eP,Pe,er,rs,sp,pe,ec,ct,ti,iv,ve,e,             1 Introduction   &#

2、160;Iconicity, the direct/non-arbitrary/non-symbolic relation between meaning and form, is not usually considered by the generativist to be a prominent feature of language. Chomsky (1995, 2000) considers vocabulary (probably correctly) as a list of exceptions among which the arbitrary relation betwe

3、en the form and meaning of a lexical item is a very typical example. Moreover, he assumes that the faculty of language FL consists of a cognitive system that stores information (the computational system and the lexicon), and some performance systems - the "external" systems A-P and C-I int

4、eracting with the cognitive system at two interface levels of PF and LF respectively - responsible for using and accessing information (Chomsky,1995). He takes a particular language L to be a procedure of constructing pairs (pi, lambda) out of lexical items LIs selected from the lexicon and mapped o

5、nto a lexical array/numeration to be introduced into the derivation by the computational system. The operation Spell-Out strips away pi elements from the structure sigma to be mapped to pi by the phonological component of the computational system and leaves the residue sigma-L for its covert compone

6、nt to map to lambda so that they are interpreted at A-P and C-I interfaces respectively as "instructions" to the relevant performance systems. If they consist entirely of interpretable objects, i.e. those that are legible to the external systems, the derivation D converges as it satisfies

7、the condition of Full Interpretation. 'A derivation converges at one of the interface levels if it yields a representation satisfying FI at this level, and converges if it converges at both interface levels, PF and LF; otherwise, it crashes' (1995: 219-220). In case there are more than one c

8、onvergent derivation possible, the most economical one blocks all others. Given the assumption that the convergence of a derivation is conditional upon its interpretability at both interface levels, he hypothesises that 'there are no PF-LF interactions relevant to convergence. This seems to leav

9、e little space for iconicity in this as the performance systems access phonetic and semantic information at non-negotiating autonomous levels of PF and LF. This seems to thoroughly banish iconicity from Chomskyan models of language as under such circumstances only a general theory of performance cov

10、ering the possible interactions among different performance systems can capture iconic phenomena. This paper attempts to show how iconicity can be incorporated into a generative model of language. It also takes iconicity in language to be an empirical challenge to Chomsky's theory of split inter

11、faces as the model fails to explain the direct correlations between certain A-C interpretations made at the PF interface level and some C-I interpretations at LF.                2 Semantico-Phonetic Form   

12、; Let's assume Chomsky's account of the architecture of language as formulated in the Minimalist Program to be true. Now we have two types of tough empirical questions to answer:    (1) Suppose the derivation D converges at PF but crashes at LF. This means D is expec

13、ted to crash in the final run. Now how does PF 'understand' that D has crashed at LF, then NOT to be articulated phonetically? How do PF and LF communicate? Are sensori-motor instructions sent to PF temporarily stored somewhere (where?) so that the case of D is decided on at LF, and then PF

14、is informed (how?) to proceed with its articulation of D?    (2) Also suppose that two rival derivations have converged but only one of them, say Da, passes the test of optimality. For example, (1a) below is more economical than (1b) in terms of the DISTANCE/STEPS needed for the

15、Wh-word to move from its cannonical position to Spec C.    (1)a. Whom did you persuade t to meet whom?b. Whom did you persuade whom to meet t?    Da (1a here) must be blocking the less economical but still convergent derivation (1b). How is it signalled to the

16、 other interface level to phonetically articulate this single admissible derivation and not the other? How long should PF wait before deciding to articulate a pi (it is too risky to articulate pi even if D has converged at LF as it may simply prove to be less economical than another)? Can one take c

17、are of such a mapping between PF and LF without violating the independence assumption of interface levels? Is it the computational system that monitors PF and LF in this respect? Or perhaps all these questions are to be dismissed as the concern of "a full theory of performance" rather than

18、 those of the minimalist syntax as a theory of competence (or at best, a less-than-full theory of performance)? Chomskyan accounts of language seem to be silent in these respects.    In agreement with Liberman's (1993) requirement 'that in all communication the processes

19、of production and perception must somehow be linked; their representation must, at some point, be the same' (Place, 2000: par. 40), Lotfi (to appear) proposes a more conservative and conceptually simpler ALTERNATIVE HYPOTHESIS - THE UNITARIANIST INTERFACE HYPOTHESIS - according to which at one a

20、nd the same interface level, say the Semantico-Phonetic Form, the derivation D containing bundles of diverse information types-phonological, formal, and semantic features-is accessible to both C-I and A-P performance systems. Compatible features (phonological features for the A-P system, and formal-

21、semantic features for the other) are processed by each system, which ignores incompatible features, leaving them to the other system to interpret. The derivation crashes if it still contains uninterpreted features when the processing is over. Otherwise, it converges.    Is it pos

22、sible for one and the same feature to be legible to more than one performance system? Such a thing is out of question in the orthodox minimalist models as a feature is inevitably interpreted by either the A-P or the C-I system. Even if some feature is potentially legible to both, the model leaves no

23、 place for its simultaneous interpretation by two performance systems as the feature cannot be present at two autonomous interface levels at the same time. The unitarianist model, on the other hand, readily takes account of such "doubly interpretable" features (or even "multiply inter

24、pretable" ones if considering involuntary gestures accompanying speech as the motor interpretation of lexical features) given both its formulation of a single interface level SPF and also the standard minimalist assumption that imperfections in a biological system like language (here, the absen

25、ce of a perfect one-to-one correspondence between the features to be interpreted and the systems to make interpretations) are just natural. With the A-P and C-I systems accessing information at a single interface level, such features will be inevitably iconic as their phonetic interpretations direct

26、ly correlate their semantic ones.                3 The Phonosemantics of Yes/No Questions in Persian    Persian is an SOV language in which unmarked yes/no questions are signalled by both the high-pit

27、ched question marker aya at the beginning of a sentence, and the rising intonation with its major pitch movement normally beginning on the final syllable of the verb. In less formal uses of the language, however, aya is usually dropped, which leaves the rising contour as the sole marker of Q. As far

28、 as prosody is concerned, pitch plays no phonemic role in Persian. This confines high and low pitches to intonational rises and falls. Stress, on the other hand, is phonemic. Despite that, there is a strong tendency in Persian to put the primary stress on the  3  Iconicity：A Generativ

29、e Perspective,關鍵詞是Ic,co,on,ni,ic,ci,it,ty,y：,：A,AG,Ge,en,ne,er,ra,at,ti,iv,ve,eP,Pe,er,rs,sp,pe,ec,ct,ti,iv,ve,e,            final syllable of each word.        (2)    TP HaSAN raf

30、t. (the stressed syllable in bold capitals)    Hasan went    "Hasan went"        CP Aya TP HaSAN raft? (the stressed syllables in bold capitals)    Q Hasan went    "

31、Did Hasan go?"        CP f TP Hasan raft?    Hasan went    "Did Hasan go?"     In Chomsky's (2000, 2001) "probe-goal" system, even semantico-pragmatic specifications of hu

32、man language might happen to be affordable (only) via some formal mechanism in which uninterpretability plays a central role: uninterpretable features of a probe seek the matching features of a local goal (the operation Agree) in order to be erased. For instance, the wh-phrase (the goal) contains an

33、 interpretable feature Q that agrees with the uninterpretable Q feature of the complementiser C (the probe). The goal also contains an uninterpretable wh feature that is erased together with the Q feature of the probe once the goal has moved to Spec CP.    For Lotfi (to appear),

34、on the other hand, sound-meaning and sound-syntax correspondences suggest that the C-I and A-P systems access the relevant pieces of information at the same interface level. The striking similarities between prosodic structures (shaped by phonological features, which are the input to the A-P system)

35、 and grammatical ones (shaped by formal features of L not interpretable at PF under minimalist assumptions) are taken to support this unitarianist account of language. Furthermore, the direct associations between such prosodic features and semantico-pragmatic considerations like pragmatic emphasis,

36、information structures, and illocutionary force are understood to suggest that sound-meaning direct non-symbolic correspondences are real. To be more specific, the formal feature Q is interpreted by the A-P and C-I systems as "high pitch" and "asking a question" respectively. As

37、Vaissière (1995) and Vlimaa-Blum (2001) observe, intonational rises and falls cross-linguistically signify incompleteness and completeness respectively. Apparently, this in/completeness is not only discoursal but also phonetic. Vlimaa-Blum notes that such rises are also typically present in non

38、-terminal items on a list. The last item on the list, on the other hand, has a fall that brings the hearer's (phonetic and semantico-pragmatic) expectations to an end. Similarly, Vaissière and Vlimaa-Blum argue that questions are examples of incomplete discourse while answers to them illust

39、rate potential completion. Translating this into unitarianist terms, one could say questions and intonational rises are two sides of some formal feature, say Q for convenience, with the property of 'incompleteness' open to both semantic and phonetic interpretations by performance systems.

40、60;   Given the assumption that Q in Persian is generated within TP and then moves to Spec CP in the fulfillment of some morphological requirements (whatever they are) of the probe C, the unitarianist model predicts that the leftward movement of the feature Q of the goal towards C tri

41、ggered by a matching formal feature of the question marker aya (or its null counterpart) correlates with the leftward spread of the prosodic feature H. While feature movement itself takes place covertly, the corresponding changes in pitch can be empirically measured with sufficient precision. &

42、#160;  The graphs (1-3) represent the typical intonation contours of the declarative "Hasan ba Maryam raft" (Hasan went with Maryam) and the corresponding yes/no questions with aIconicity：A Generative Perspective,關鍵詞是Ic,co,on,ni,ic,ci,it,ty,y：,：A,AG,Ge,en,ne,er,ra,at,ti,iv,ve,eP,

43、Pe,er,rs,sp,pe,ec,ct,ti,iv,ve,e,            for interpretation by the relevant performance system. That one and the same formal feature, i.e. Q, is interpreted by both systems as 'question' and 'high pitch' may be due to inc

44、ompleteness (Vaissière 1995) inherent in both Q and H. Whether incompleteness plays any role in the iconic relation between Q and H or not, the non-arbitrariness of the relation strongly suggests that for some lexical features both phonetic and semantic performance systems of interpretation are

45、 called into action. Iconicity in this sense is the reflection of the ability of a single lexical feature to function as two different instructions to sound and sense systems. Although this actually reduces iconicity to the double interpretation of lexical features, it still remains an open question

46、 whether double interpretation itself is due to the nature of the features in question, the imperfect design of the performance systems, or both. Even if originally a design imperfection, there are chances that the failure of performance systems (to read the intended feature exclusively) was favoured (/NOT disfavourd) by the proce