Lexical feature-driven incorporation in two Oceanic languages: Iaai and Fijian

Abstract

Syntactic incorporation processes are arguably available as an outcome of a particular configurational relation between two heads. In this paper, an analysis of data from two Oceanic languages, Iaai and Fijian, shows that, in an identical syntactic relation, that of verb and direct object, incorporation is dependent on the content of the highest head in the direct object constituent. The heads that incorporate may be Ns or Ds but they must have content which is not purely grammatical or functional. Heads that are purely grammatical or functional do not incorporate. The incorporating heads thus bear intrinsic lexical features. It is possible that the proposed featural content distinctions sho..