Re: [lojban] X-bar, chomsky and lojban

[Arnt Richard Johansen <arj@nvg.org>]

On Mon, 15 May 2006 bill@thebranchhearth.net wrote:

> Hello All,
>
> Does anyone know if the Lojban grammar is consistent with the X-bar theory
> put forth by Chomsky.

I am not very familiar with X-bar theory, but I doubt that zoi quotes or 
terminators can be captured in any grammatical framework that relies on 
having a context-free syntax.

> As far as we know, all natural languages are consistent with X-bar at the
> deep structure level.

How about Swiss German, the prime example of context-dependency among 
natural languages?

--
Arnt Richard Johansen                                http://arj.nvg.org/
The names of a species, empire, language, homeworld, homestar and so
on will all be self-evidently related; Ogrons come from Ogros,
Arisians come from Arisia, Arcturans come from Arcturus, and Humans no
doubt come from Humus. --Justin B. Rye in A Primer In SF Xenolinguistics