Person complementarity and (pseudo) Person Case Constraint effects: Evidence from Inuktitut

• Published in: Canadian Journal of Linguistics/Revue canadienne de linguistique
• Main Author: Compton, Richard
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Cambridge University Press (CUP) 2019
• Subjects: Linguistics and Language; Language and Linguistics; aleut; eskimo*; Eskimo–Aleut; inuktitut
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/cnj.2019.20; https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/S0008413119000203

Abstract This paper examines the nature of person complementarity in Eastern Canadian Inuktitut (Eskimo-Aleut), arguing that despite its apparent patterning as a Person Case Constraint (PCC) effect, it is not due to the presence of a defective intervener blocking person agreement with a lower argument, as is often the case in other languages. Instead, the observed effect is caused by a defective or missing person probe on C that cannot value local person features on absolutive arguments. Given the use of the PCC as a diagnostic for differentiating clitics and agreement, this result has implications for the proper identification of φ -marking in Inuktitut.