Plural Conjuncts and Syncretism Facilitate Gender Agreement in Serbo-Croatian:Experimental Evidence.

ABSTRACT: The literature on agreement in South Slavic generalizes that conjunct agreement in gender is only possible when all conjuncts are plural (e.g., Bošković, 2009). Marušič et al. (2015) and Arsenijević and Mitić (2016a,b) attest a significant level of patterns contradicting this claim in elicited production experiments. They weaken the earlier generalization to a facilitating role of plural number for conjunct agreement in gender. However, the stimuli in the two respective experiments involve syncretism between the members of conjunction. The syncretism removes the possibility - at Phonological Form at least - that by agreeing with one conjunct, the verb disagrees with the other. It is hence expected to result in a similar surface effect as the facilitation by plurals, which makes it a potent

SUBMITTER: Mitic I 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6514152 | biostudies-literature | 2019

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature