What question did this study set out to answer?

The paper aims to unify two distinct adjectival phenomena in Germanic languages through the Agreement head.

April 1, 2026Open Access

Germanic Adjectives and the Agr(eement) Head

Key Points

The paper aims to unify two distinct adjectival phenomena in Germanic languages through the Agreement head.
Analyzed adjectival structures in Norwegian, Swedish, Faroese, and West Germanic languages.
Examined the relationships between double definiteness and attributive inflection.
Discussed theoretical implications of the Agreement head's function in these languages.
Identified a complementary distribution between double definiteness and attributive inflection.
Established that Agr can only serve one function in a given language regarding these phenomena.

Abstract

Abstract This article unifies two adjectival phenomena of Germanic languages: the double definiteness of Norwegian, Swedish, and Faroese, and the attributive-only inflection of West Germanic adjectives. I argue that the functional head Agr(eement) is responsible for both. Since Agr can perform only one of these two functions in a given language (the second definiteness marker of Scandinavian and the attributive inflection of West Germanic), these two phenomena are in complementary distribution. *

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Cite This Study

Elliott Evans (Mon,) studied this question.

synapsesocial.com/papers/69ccb75916edfba7beb89397 https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1017/s1470542726100166

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