Syntax in the 21th century Reflections on The Bloomsbury Companion to Syntax

Abstract

The Companion to Syntax takes as its stated mission a highly unusual approach which covers syntax without committing itself to any single syntactic framework. Some chapters are written within the generative framework, others come with a functionalist-typological orientation. I will follow a similar path in my review, therefore contrasting different approaches. I will also complement the issues under discussion by using data from Finnish. Core ideas and empirical phenomena are explained with the help of illustrations. These should help a non-expert reader to understand the matter under discussion.