Contiguity Theory and the word order of reduced nominals in Mongolian

This paper discusses the word order properties of object nouns and adverbs in Mongolian. As is well known, the accusative case marker appears only sometimes on the object. I review Guntsetseg’s (2016) in depth discussion on differential object marking and pseudo noun incorporation in Mongolian and present some prior work on the prosody of these two constructions (Barrie and Kang, 2022). I show that a caseless non-specific object can be separated from the verb by at most a low VP-adverb. A case-marked or specific, caseless object cannot appear between the verb and a low VP-adverb. Furthermore, a case-marked or specific, caseless object can appear above a higher, temporal adverb, but a caseless, non-specific object cannot. I analyze these facts within a Contiguity Theoretic framework (Richards, 2016) starting with the premise that a caseless non-specific object is an nP and that case-marked or caseless, specific object is a full KP. I argue that an nP object must be contiguity prominent with its selector, the verb, only and that a KP object must be contiguity prominent first with the verb and then with v, which assigns it accusative Case. I show that maintaining contiguity prominence gives rise to the patterns discussed.