Abstract

The volume is a collection of papers given at the workshop Specificity and the Evolution / Emergence of Nominal Determination Systems in Romance at the Freie Universität of Berlin in October 2004. The papers investigate synchronic variation as well as diachronic development of the different determiner/pronominal systems and especially of different systems of "differential object marking"(DOM). They provide more insights into the interaction between the semantics of specificity (and other referential categories) and the morpho-syntax of the languages under investigation, yealding a new understanding of different typologically relevant choices made by different Romance languages as to their morphosyntactic make-up.