Impossible Persons

In this theoretically austere but empirically rich study, Daniel Harbour provides a masterful new theory of possible and impossible inventories of person features. Through its formal rigor and empirical breadth, this book is bound to influence all future work on person features.

Terje Lohndal, Professor of English Linguistics, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim; Professor II, University of Tromsø—The Arctic University of Norway

In this monograph, Daniel Harbour masterfully develops a new theory of person features based on the notion of partition alone. With profound insight and empirical depth as well as theoretical rigor, he integrates typological and theoretical work, thereby identifying fascinating areas of variation in several domains where the concept of person plays a role in the languages of the world. He then seeks to explain the source of this variation, capturing its range and its limits. This novel theory will redefine the field's understanding not only of person, but also of features more generally, inviting us to rethink a concept that lies at the very core of linguistic theory.

Martina Wiltschko, Professor, Department of Linguistics, University of British Columbia

Daniel Harbour brings a mastery of classic linguistic methodology and of the typological literature to solve a longstanding textbook question for the field: why do languages show the particular categories of person that they do, and not easily conceivable others? This book is a game-changer for an increasingly essential area of linguistic theory—substantive universals governing syntactic features—and will anchor future debate about features for years to come.

Alec Marantz, Silver Professor of Linguistics and Psychology, New York University; coeditor of Distributed Morphology Today: Morphemes for Morris Halle