Null subject language
A
null subject language, in
linguistic typology, is a
language whose grammar permits a
null subject, that is, the omission of an explicit
subject in
main clauses.
For example, in :
Maria non vuole mangiare."Maria does not want to eat."
Non vuole mangiare.:"She does not want to eat."
In the second sentence in Italian the subject (
Maria) is implied. , on the other hand, requires an explicit subject, which in the translation is supplied by the pronoun "she".
Among the null subject languages are
Latin, most
Romance languages (including
Portuguese,
Spanish,
Occitan,
Catalan,
Italian, and
Romanian â€" but
not French),
Slavic languages (
Polish,
Slovenian,
Croatian, etc.),
Finnish,
Hungarian, Modern and Ancient
Greek,
Arabic,
Hebrew,
Chinese,
Japanese,
Persian,
Tamil, and
Turkish.
In the framework of
government and binding theory of
syntax, the term
null subject refers to an
empty category. The empty category in question is thought to behave like an ordinary
pronoun with respect to
anaphoric reference and other grammatical behavior. Hence it is most commonly referred to as
"pro".
This phenomenon is similar, but not identical, to that of
pro-drop languages, which may omit pronouns, including subject pronouns, but also
object pronouns. While pro-drop languages are null subject languages, not all null subject languages are pro-drop.
In null subject languages that have
verb inflection in which the verb inflects for person, the
grammatical person of the subject is reflected by the inflection of the verb, and likewise for
number and
gender.
The following examples come from
Portuguese:
*"I'm going home" can be translated either as
Vou para casa or as
Eu vou para casa, where
eu means "I".
*"It's raining" can be translated as
Está a chover or
Está chovendo (
Brazilian Portuguese), but
not as
*Ele está a chover, where
ele would correspond to English
it.
*"I'm going home. I'm going to watch TV." only in exceptional circumstances would be translated as ?
Eu vou para casa. Eu vou ver televisão. At least the second
eu ("I") should be omitted, except to indicate a strong stress, as in "[I don't care what you are doing, but]
I am going to watch TV."
As the examples illustrate, in Portuguese, and many other null subject languages, an explicit pronoun may be stated as subject, in particular in order for emphasis, but some sentences do not allow a subject in any form, while in other cases an explicit subject without particular emphasis would sound awkward or unnatural.
and several other null subject languages are
topic-prominent languages: they require an expressed
topic in order for sentences to make sense. In Japanese, for instance, it is possible to start a sentence with a topic marked by the particle
wa. In subsequent sentences the topic can then be left unstated and understood to remain the same, until another one is explicitly introduced. For example, in the second sentence below, the subject ("we") is not expressed again but left implicit:
| Japanese | Watashitachi wa | kaimono o | shita. | Ato de | gohan o | tabeta. | | Literal translation | We (TOPIC) | shopping (OBJ) | did. | After (COMPL) | dinner (OBJ) | ate. |
|---|
| Idiomatic translation | "We went shopping. After that, we ate dinner." |
|---|
Other languages (sometimes called non-null subject languages) require each sentence to include a subject — this is the case for most
Germanic languages, such as
English and
German. Even in these languages it is sometimes possible to omit the subject, although contextual clues are usually necessary.
"Bumped into George this morning." (I)
"Agreed to have a snifter to catch up on old times." (We)
"Told me what the two of you had been up to." (He)
"Went down to Brighton for the weekend?" (You)
*
Anaphora*
Pro-drop language*
Impersonal verb*
Weather verb*Chomsky, N. (1981). Lectures on Government and Binding: The Pisa Lectures. Holland: Foris Publications, Reprint. 7th Edition. Berlin and New York: Mouton de Gruyter, 1993.
