Headedness and/or grammatical anarchy?

More about the book

In most grammatical models, hierarchical structuring and dependencies are central features, often encapsulated by the concept of “head” or “headedness.” While this notion is generally accepted, there remains significant debate over the precise properties of grammatical heads and their theoretical implications. Additionally, various linguistic structures challenge the idea of “headedness.” This volume examines these challenges, building on seminal discussions by Zwicky (1985) and Corbett, Fraser, & Mc-Glashan (1993). It aims to explore the concept of “headedness” from its margins, addressing key questions about the nature of heads, the distinction between headed and non-headed structures, the dynamics of gaining and losing head status, and whether grammar theory could exist without heads. The contributions present new empirical findings that challenge the traditional conception of grammatical heads and discuss the implications for grammatical theory. The papers offer diverse theoretical perspectives, including HPSG, Generative Syntax, and Optimality Theory, and employ various empirical approaches, focusing particularly on typological and corpus-linguistic data from German.