PhD Proposal – The Lexicon in Combinatory Categorial Grammar: An Explanatory Theory of Verbal Categories in Natural Languages

The aim of this project is to elaborate a theory of natural language lexicons for Combinatory Categorial Grammar (CCG), a mildly contextsensitive, polynomially time-parsable variant of categorial grammar. This theory will have both a descriptive aspect, exploring the use of appropriate formal machinery for expressing lexical generalisations, and an explanatory aspect, accounting for observed patterns of language variation, acquisition and change. Where appropriate insights will be incorporated from other grammar formalisms such as unification-based grammar and Principles and Parameters Theory. Particular focus will be placed on clausal word order variation among the Germanic languages, which have been both the subject of a substantial Principles and Parameters literature, as well as of much speculative work in extended categorial grammar. A common theme of this project will be to explore the option of replacing analyses of word order phenomena involving powerful permutative combinatory operations, with analyses rooted in the lexicon.