Determiner spreading in Rukiga

Abstract: Determiner spreading, the phenomenon whereby adnominal modifiers carry an ‘additional’ determiner, has been studied extensively for a variety of languages, most notably Greek, Semitic, and Scandinavian languages. Interestingly, the same phenomenon occurs in the Bantu language Rukiga. We show how the Rukiga augment is parallel to the Greek determiner in the context of modification, and how it triggers a restrictive reading when present on a larger class of modifiers than familiar so far: relative clauses, adjectives, possessives, and certain quantifiers. Considering its morphosyntactic and interpretational properties, we propose that the variation in the presence versus absence of the augment on modifiers is due to different underlying structures, applying an analysis of determiner spreading in terms of a reduced relative clause structure.

Object Details

• Location: Deutsche Nationalbibliothek Frankfurt am Main
• Extent: Online-Ressource
• Language: Englisch

References and Relationships

• Bibliographic citation: Determiner spreading in Rukiga ; volume:61 ; number:5 ; year:2023 ; pages:1285-1339 ; extent:55 ; Linguistics ; 61, Heft 5 (2023), 1285-1339 (gesamt 55)

Contributors, Places and Time

• Creator: Asiimwe, Allen ; Kouneli, Maria ; van der Wal, Jenneke

Further information

• DOI: 10.1515/ling-2021-0027
• URN: urn:nbn:de:101:1-2023091214051431621697
• Rights: Open Access; Der Zugriff auf das Objekt ist unbeschränkt möglich.
• Last update: 14.08.2025, 11:02 AM CEST