On Pivots and Subjects in Georgian

Thomas Wier

Abstract

Proceedings of LFG05; CSLI Publications On-line

In this paper I will be examining the properties of pivots in Georgian and crosslinguistically, by first focusing on two different lexicalist attempts at accounting for them: that of Manning (1996) and that of Falk (to appear). After reviewing the claims made by these theories, I will be introducing new facts from Georgian which I will claim crucially distinguish between the two in favor of Falk (to appear), and discuss their implications for syntactic theory in general. Finally, I will invoke a Complexity Metric to constrain the overall effects of Falk's lexical analysis of pivots.