This research describes and explains in the OT framework the Yaqui coordination. It is assumed that coordinate structures are asymmetric and, based in the Yaqui data, I propose that the coordination is the result of an adjunct-host relation. This work shows that the ConjP is inappropriate for explaining the place that the Yaqui coordinator into 'and' occupies in overt syntax. It demonstrates that the proposal which suggests that coordinators in second position are clitics (Agbayani and Goldston 2002) can not be maintained in Yaqui because such position is generated by fronting a topicalized constituent. If we depart from the idea that clitics and topics move to different positions, then a different explanation is required. The proposal is extended to the analysis of unbalanced verbal chaining structures. It is shown that some --kai constructions are marked syntactically as subordinated but actually they are coordinate structures. In the final part of this work I describe and analyze the agreement between coordinate nominals and verbs. The analysis indicates that Yaqui responds partially to the system of CONCORD and INDEX features proposed by Halloway King and Dalrymple (2004). However, its whole explanation requires the use of constraints in order to explain the coordinate patterns of the language.

This thesis is the first work devoted specifically to the syntax of wh-questions in a Southern Interior Salish language. As such, it provides a descriptive foundation for future work on the syntax of Okanagan, as well as forming the basis for comparative investigation of wh-questions both within the Southern Interior branch of the Salish family and between the Southern Interior and other better known branches. Chapter 2 examines the basic word order patterns for clauses and describes the distribution of determiners and complementizers in cleft constructions. Chapter 3 compares three potential analyses of wh-questions for Okanagan: a wh-in-situ analysis,, a wh-movement analysis, and a cleft analysis. I show that a wh-in-situ analysis was not viable for Okanagan on the basis of a comparison of word order possibilities in non-wh sentences and wh-questions. I then turned to the other two possible analyses, a wh-movement analysis along the lines of English, and a cleft analysis, as suggested for other Salish languages by Davis et al (1993) and Kroeber (1991, 1999). Choosing between these analyses proved much more difficult: evidence exists both for and against each analysis, and I was unable to choose between them. Chapter 4 examines multiple wh-questions in Okanagan. It appeared possible for at least some speakers to produce multiple wh-questions with either two argument wh-phrases or an argument and an adjunct wh-phrase. The latter type of multiple wh-question showed an interesting type of reverse superiority effect: speakers consistently preferred to place the argument wh-phrase in preverbal position and the adjunct wh-phrase in post-verbal position. If this really is a superiority effect, it implies that the relative structural positions of adjuncts and arguments are the opposite of those found in English. Chapter 5 investigates long-range wh-dependencies. First of all, I established that such dependencies are indeed possible. I show that long-range dependencies are sensitive to at least three standard island constraints: the Complex Noun Phrase Constraint, the Wh-Island Constraint and the Adjunct Island Constraint. Though I was unable to choose between a wh-movement and a wh-cleft analysis for wh-questions, my research unequivocally establishes the existence of A-bar movement dependencies in Okanagan. This is demonstrated by the existence of long-range movement assymetries as shown by superiority effects in multiple wh-questions and by the existence of adjunct island effects which argue strongly that there must be a configurational basis for the argument/adjunct distinction contra the Pronominal Argument Hypothesis (see Jelinek and Demers 1994 on Northern Straits Salish). Another important consequence of this work is the distinction between two types of focus structure in Okanagan. On the one hand, as in other Salish languages, a nominal predicate (including a wh-predicate based on the argument wh-words swit and stim') may occur with a relative clause introduced by the determiner i?; on the other hand both adjunct and argument DP's (including wh-adjuncts) may occur in cleft structures introduced by one of the complementizers ki?and ta?. Though this distinction corresponds in some ways to that between 'bare' and 'introduced' clefts in other Salish languages (see Kroeber 1999, pg. 370-373), the details of the introduced cleft construction in particular differ in significant ways from the rest of Salish. It remains to be seen how other Southern Interior languages behave in this respect.

In this thesis, I conduct a detailed case study of expressive suffixes in Russian. I show that although the suffixes under investigation have the same function (“expressive”), they differ significantly in their formal properties. I identify two major semantic types of expressive suffixes: attitude and size suffixes. Attitude suffixes convey an attitude of the speaker toward the referent. Size suffixes both convey an attitude and refer to the size of the referent. I argue that the two different semantic types map onto different syntactic types. Attitude suffixes are syntactic heads, while size suffixes are syntactic modifiers. As heads, attitude suffixes determine the formal properties (syntactic category, grammatical gender and inflectional class) of the derived form. As modifiers, size suffixes do not determine the formal properties of the derived form. Attitude suffixes can attach both to category-free √Roots and to categories (n/a/v), while size suffixes can only attach to a noun category. I investigate the functional and formal properties of Russian expressive suffixes in a systematic way, which has not been done before. In doing so, I analyze how expressive suffixes pattern along several kinds of criteria (gender/class change, category change, subcategorization). An important byproduct of this analysis is that I show how grammatical gender of an expressive form can be predicted from its inflectional class (combined with animacy and natural gender of the base). One implication of this analysis is that I show that the formal properties of expressives are no different from those of non-expressives (descriptives), as both expressives and descriptives can attach as heads or modifiers either to √Roots or categories. Another implication is that the formal criteria which I develop for a small set of expressive suffixes in Russian can be extended to set up a cross-linguistic typology of expressives.

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This thesis proposes an analysis of the tough construction in Japanese. It is proposed that there are actually two tough constructions, each derived by a different kind of movement. Three kinds of data which support the claim made here are presented: tough constructions with scrambling, tough constructions with reflexives, and nominals derived from tough constructions. It is argued that non-movement analysis is not appropriate and that both tough constructions are derived by movement. It is shown that tough constructions with a 'tend to' reading can also be accommodated by this analysis. The analysis accounts for a wide range of interactions between tough constructions and other phenomena, which have not been previously focused on in the literature.

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