Abstract GRAMMATICAL ANALYSIS OF VARIOUS BIBLICAL HEBREW TEXTS ACCORDING TO A TRADITIONAL SEMITIC GRAMMAR Richard Charles McDonald, Ph.D. The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, 2014 Chair: Dr. Russell T. Fuller Although linguistic Hebraists are dissatisfied with traditional grammatical analysis, this dissertation demonstrates that traditional Semitic grammar--primarily based on Arabic grammar and grammarians--still provides the most simple, clear, and accurate description of biblical Hebrew grammar. Chapter 1 illustrates the role of Arabic grammar in the study of Biblical Hebrew grammar. From the inception of biblical Hebrew grammatical studies, Jewish scholars drew from the insights of Arabic grammar. For centuries afterwards, Jewish and Christian Hebrew grammarians followed this method. In recent decades, grammarians have turned to modern linguistic principles, leading to a misunderstanding of various points of Biblical Hebrew syntax. Chapters 2 and 3 analyze the syntax of select verses in Genesis 2 and 3, respectively. Barry Bandstra's Genesis commentary in the Baylor Press series serves as the main point of comparison between the traditional Semitic approach and the modern linguistic approach. Each chapter introduces typical categories and definitions of traditional Semitic grammar, and critiques Bandstra's analysis when it contradicts Semitic grammar. Both chapters discuss a few main grammatical issues; in these discussions, other linguistic Hebraists are taken into consideration. For example, chapter 2 argues that the terms `nominative,' `genitive,' and `accusative,' are still valid grammatical categories in biblical Hebrew syntax, contra Jan Kroeze. Chapter 2 also contends that the pronoun הוּא is not a copula. Chapter 3 demonstrates that the Hebrew verb היה is not a copula but a real verb showing action, and that the energic suffixes on the imperfect do, in fact, have semantic value and do show emphasis. In chapter 4, the analysis shifts to Ruth 1. Robert Holmstedt's commentary on Ruth from the Baylor Press series serves as the point of reference. There are three main discussions in the chapter. First, the chapter outlines biblical Hebrew word order in opposition to Holmstedt's claim that the typical word order is Subject-Verb. Second, the chapter demonstrates that the masoretic accents are crucial for biblical Hebrew syntax. Third, the chapter critiques Holmstedt's theory that the particle ⚀הַ marks headless relative clauses. The remainder of the verses are utilized to highlight traditional analysis or to contradict Holmstedt. Appendix 1 outlines Geoffrey Khan's use of comparative Semitics to defend his copula pronoun theory. The excursus contends that Khan reinterprets Semitic grammar through discourse analysis, and that his copula pronoun theory cannot be substantiated. Appendix 2 differentiates between the participle as a verbal adjective (the traditional Semitic definition), and John A. Cook's placement of the participle in the class of `adjective.' This appendix maintains that the participle cannot be included in the biblical Hebrew verbal system. Appendix 3 responds to the external reader's critiques regarding the author's Arabic descriptions, the analysis of the reflexive Niphal, the use of the masoretic accents, and casus pendens.

This work presents an enhancement of a search process that is suited for a problem that can be solved using a graph grammar based generative tree. Generative grammar can be used to generate a vast number of design alternatives by using a seed graph of the problem and a set of transformation rules. The problem is to find the best solution among this space by doing the least number of evaluations possible. In a previous paper, an interactive algorithm for searching in a graph grammar representation was presented. The process was demonstrated for a problem of tying a necktie and the work here builds on top of this process to be useful for solving engineering problem. To test the search process, two problems, a photovoltaic array topology optimization problem and an electromechanical product redesign problem, are chosen. It is shown this search process converges in finding the best solution within a few hundred evaluations which is a manageable number compared to the large solution space of millions of candidates. Further optimization and tweaks are done on the process to control exploration vs. exploitation and find the parameters for fastest convergence and the best solution. / text

This dissertation is a description of Darma, an under-documented Tibeto-Burman language spoken in the eastern corner of the state of Uttarakhand, India. With fewer than 2,600 speakers and no writing system, Darma is considered endangered. This is the most comprehensive description of Darma to date. Like the other Himalayan languages, the genetic classification of Darma has not been definitively determined. It is widely described as a western Himalayish language that is closely related to Byansi, Chaudangsi and Rangkas (the latter being extinct). The data presented in this dissertation were obtained through three methodologies: direct elicitation, participant observation, and the discourse-centered approach to data collection advocated by University of Texas linguistic anthropologist Joel Sherzer. The discourse-centered methodology relies on naturally occurring speech, including conversation, stories, songs and public dialogues. The resulting data are contextualized in a cultural framework, which is useful to linguists and anthropologists alike; and the majority of examples presented come from these texts. The dissertation is presented in five sections with a total of nineteen chapters and a glossary. The first section provides background information on the Darma people, the language, and how this project came about. The second section describes the sound system of Darma, including its typologically unusual class of oral stops. The third section introduces the words that comprise a noun phrase including nouns, personal pronouns, and pronominal demonstrative forms, which are marked on a spatial axis (e.g. proximate, neutral, distal, and non-visible). The fourth section examines the affixes that combine with verb stems to form clauses and sentences. This includes a discussion of the basic SV/AOV constituent order, and the ergative/absolutive alignment system. Here nominalization/relativization, a common feature of Tibeto-Burman languages, is also presented along with the clause chaining strategy commonly found in narrative discourse. The analysis for this dissertation is informed by a functional-typological perspective, and an effort has been made to capture general patterns found in the grammar. The goals are to provide a description of the grammar of Darma in a format that is accessible to many, and to avoid relying on any overly specific theoretical framework that may become obsolete. / text

Word order universals constitute a well-known problem in language typology, first outlined in Greenberg (1963). It has been firmly established in databases of over 1500 languages that languages with verb-object ordering are very likely to have prepositions and noun-genitive ordering, while languages with object-verb ordering are very likely to have postpositions and genitive-noun ordering (Dryer and Haspelmath 2011). This thesis attempts to give a historical explanation for these facts in terms of the origin of syntactic categories: adpositions have historically developed from nouns and verbs (Givon 1984, Aristar 1991); and verbs often develop from nominalizations used with a genitive object. These types of grammaticalization can explain why adpositions retain the ordering of their source nouns or verbs, and why verb/object ordering often parallels noun/genitive ordering. This historical explanation is elaborated on, with data from different language families. Examples of verbs grammaticalizing from nominalizations used with genitive objects are given, drawing on historical work such as Salanova (2007) on Brazilian Jê languages and Starosta, Pawley and Reid (1982) on Austronesian. Different languages show varying degrees of 'nominalism', the morphosyntactic resemblance between verb forms and noun phrases/nominalizations. Other languages show a less developed distinction between adpositions and verbs/nouns. These examples of gradience in syntactic categories are argued to be behind resemblances in word orderings. Language contact is responsible for preserving word order types, when languages undergo change in more than one word order (e.g. Greenberg 1969); and the difference in rates of word order change across constructions is argued to be behind hierarchies such as Hawkins (1983)'s Prepositional Noun Modifier Hierarchy. This explanation of word order universals contrasts with more mainstream accounts such as Hawkins (1994) in terms of processing efficiency, and Kirby and Christiansen (2003) in terms of learnability. While these explanations are perhaps compatible with the historical explanation, they are argued to be redundant; grammaticalization arguably is not driven or constrained by learnability and processing efficiency, with memetics, 'typological poise' (Enfield 2003) and language contact given as alternatives. Instead of reflecting functional biases, word order patterns are argued to reflect language history, both the history of language contact, and the history of syntactic categories developing through grammaticalization. / published_or_final_version / Linguistics / Master / Master of Philosophy

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published_or_final_version / English Studies and Comparative Literature / Master / Master of Arts

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In this thesis, I propose a theory of ergativity in which NP arguments are checked for Case by moving to projections of agreement at LF. The Case-marking pattern of an ergative language arises when transitive subjects move to the projection of agreement usually associated with objects (AGR.o), while transitive objects and intransitive subjects move to the projection of subject agreement (AGR.s). While this proposal assigns the same underlying structure to clauses in an ergative language (unlike Marantz, 1984), it does have distinctive syntactic effects. In this it contrasts with a purely morphological approach to ergativity, such as that of Anderson (1976). / Arguments can move to the specifier position of agreement, or adjoin to its maximal projection. Movement cannot take place across the same kind of position as the landing site, which leads us to predict that transitive subjects cannot undergo grammatical extraction in an ergative language. This prediction turns out to be correct in a number of languages, including Chamorro, Mam, and other members of the Mayan group. Our theory also allows for a plausible account of split ergativity--non-canonical patterns in an otherwise ergative language where transitive and intransitive subjects are marked the same, but behave differently under extraction. / The proposal that NPs are not checked for Case until LF entails that they remain in their base positions at S-structure. Evidence for this claim is adduced from the distribution of empty pronoun arguments whose contents must be identified. Our prediction is that transitive subjects in an ergative language will interfere in the identification of an empty object pronoun, since it is closer to the pronoun than its legitimate identifier, AGR.s. This is also shown to be the case.