Complementizer doubling and subject extraction in Italo-Romance

2018 ◽  
Vol 18 (2) ◽  
pp. 315-335
Author(s):  
Nicola Munaro
Keyword(s):  
Subject Position ◽  
Left Periphery ◽  
Functional Head ◽  
Movement Strategy ◽  
Doubling Construction ◽  
Embedded Clause ◽  
Subject Extraction

Abstract In this article I analyze the complementizer doubling construction attested in some early and modern Italo-Romance varieties, where a preposed (clausal or non clausal) constituent associated to the selected clause appears in the embedded left periphery preceded and followed by a subordinating complementizer. While the higher complementizer is uncontroversially interpreted as a lexicalization of the head Force°, the lower complementizer has been taken to lexicalize either the functional head Topic° or the functional head Fin°. Relying on previous formal analyses of subject extraction, I argue that in the varieties in which the lower complementizer lexicalizes Fin°, its presence reflects the lexicalization of the mood features encoded by Fin°, and is ultimately due to the extraction of the thematic subject out of the embedded clause through Spec,FinP, a movement strategy made possible by the presence of an expletive pro in the canonical preverbal subject position.

On the Subject of Negative Auxiliary Inversion

2018 ◽  
Vol 64 (1) ◽  
pp. 32-61 ◽  
Author(s):  
Frances Blanchette ◽  
Chris Collins
Keyword(s):  
Word Order ◽  
Negative Polarity ◽  
Subject Position ◽  
Left Periphery ◽  
Negative Concord ◽  
Double Negation ◽  
Polarity Items ◽  
West Texas ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Scope Freezing

AbstractThis article presents a novel analysis ofNegative Auxiliary Inversion(NAI) constructions such asdidn't many people eat, in which a negated auxiliary appears in pre-subject position. NAI, found in varieties including Appalachian, African American, and West Texas English, has a word order identical to a yes/no question, but is pronounced and interpreted as a declarative. We propose that NAI subjects are negative DPs, and that the negation raises from the subject DP to adjoin to Fin (a functional head in the left periphery). Three properties of NAI motivate this analysis: (i) scope freezing effects, (ii) the various possible and impossible NAI subject types, and (iii) the incompatibility of NAI constructions with true Double-Negation interpretations. Implications for theories of Negative Concord, Negative Polarity Items, and the representation of negation are discussed.

Equidistance returns

2018 ◽  
Vol 35 (3) ◽  
pp. 413-461 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nicholas Longenbaugh ◽  
Maria Polinsky
Keyword(s):  
Subject Position ◽  
Matrix Clause ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Object Shift ◽  
Case System ◽  
The Matrix ◽  
Case Licensing ◽  
Embedded Clause ◽  
Text Content ◽  
Semantic Object

Abstract Modern generative linguistic theory furnishes a variety of general principles that appear to be at work in the grammar of all the world’s languages. One of the most basic and uncontroversial of these principles is that Agree/Move operates according to the constraint Attract Closest, which dictates that the closest suitable goal must be the target for the relevant operation (Rizzi 1990; Chomsky 1995, 2000; Richards 1998). The Polynesian language Niuean (Tongic subgroup, predicate initial word order, ergative-absolutive case system) presents a well known challenge to the universality of {Attract Closest}. The challenge manifests in a variety of distinct constructions in Niuean, but the best known case involves an operation first documented by Seiter (1980), which he terms “raising.” Specifically, Niuean raising appears to license an A-type dependency between the subject position of the matrix clause and the object position of an immediately embedded clause. This is illustrated in (1), where the semantic object of the embedded subjunctive clause, Sione, appears as the syntactic subject of the matrix predicate maeke. (1) To maeke a Sione$_{1}$ [ke lagomatai he ekekafo $t_{1}$]. fut possible abs Sione sbj help erg doctor ‘It’s possible the doctor can help Sione.’ (lit.: Sione is possible that the doctor help [him]) Granting that the filler-gap dependency in (1) is A-type, this is both a clear violation of {Attract closest} (Rizzi 1992; Chomsky 1995; Richards 1998) and a typological anomaly. Our aim in this paper is to argue that such apparent violations of {Attract Closest} are only that. Specifically, we show first that the challenge inherent in Seiter’s raising construction is pervasive throughout the language: in general, objects are accessible to syntactic operations even if the intervening clause-mate subject is also a licit target. In other words, Niuean clause-mate subjects and objects are equally accessible to syntactic operations. Then, we argue that this typologically uncommon equal-accessibility follows from the convergence of several otherwise independently attested operations: (i) a configurational system of case licensing, with a $v$P as the case computation domain; (ii) obligatory object shift to Spec($v$P); (iii) an EPP on T triggering V/VP-raising rather than DP externalization. The resulting basic clause structure is then as below, so that Niuean adheres to standard locality constraints. (2)

Apparent raising in Tongan and its implications for multiple case valuation

2021 ◽  
pp. 192-215
Author(s):  
Yuko Otsuka
Keyword(s):  
Subject Position ◽  
Long Distance ◽  
The Matrix ◽  
Multiple Case ◽  
Embedded Clause ◽  
Parametric Adjustment ◽  
Matrix Subject ◽  
Case Feature ◽  
Activity Condition

Apparent raising (AR) constructions in Tongan resemble raising constructions in that the thematic subject of the embedded clause seems to occur in the matrix subject position. Unlike regular raising, however, Tongan AR shows characteristics of A-bar movement such as long-distance dependency, sensitivity to islands, and syntactic ergativity. This chapter argues that Tongan AR involves three operations: (a) topic movement of a DP to the embedded [Spec, C], (b) cancelation of the previous valuation of the case feature on the DP in [Spec, C], and (c) subsequent case valuation under Agree with the matrix v. The proposed analysis calls for a parametric adjustment to the activity condition to allow for multiple case valuation: in languages like Tongan, a DP located at the edge of a phase not only remains active, but the valuation of its case feature gets undone upon completion of the CP phase.

How to Neutralize a Finite Clause Boundary: Phase Theory and the Grammar of Bound Pronouns

2018 ◽  
Vol 49 (3) ◽  
pp. 465-499 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas Grano ◽  
Howard Lasnik
Keyword(s):  
Subject Position ◽  
Boundary Phase ◽  
Quantifier Scope ◽  
Phase Theory ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Embedded Clause ◽  
Comparative Deletion ◽  
Finite Clause

A bound pronoun in the subject position of a finite embedded clause renders the clause boundary relatively transparent to relations ordinarily confined to monoclausal, control, and raising configurations. For example, too/ enough-movement structures involving a finite clause boundary are degraded in sentences like * This book is too long [for John to claim [that Bill read ___ in a day]] but improved when the finite clause has a bound pronominal subject as in ? This book is too long [for John1 to claim [that he1 read ___ in a day]]. This bound pronoun effect holds across a wide range of phenomena including too/ enough-movement, tough-movement, gapping, comparative deletion, antecedent-contained deletion, quantifier scope interaction, multiple questions, pseudogapping, reciprocal binding, and multiple sluicing; we confirm the effect via a sentence acceptability experiment targeting some of these phenomena. Our account has two crucial ingredients: (a) bound pronouns optionally enter the derivation with unvalued ϕ-features and (b) phases are defined in part by convergence, so that under certain conditions, unvalued features void the phasal status of CP and extend the locality domain for syntactic operations.

Regular and copular fragments in Basaá

Linguistics ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 57 (5) ◽  
pp. 915-966 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul Roger Bassong
Keyword(s):  
Left Periphery ◽  
Matrix Clause ◽  
Polarity Item ◽  
Regular Source ◽  
Fragment Answers ◽  
The Matrix ◽  
Embedded Clause ◽  
Crosslinguistic Variation ◽  
New Evidence ◽  
Different Sources

Abstract The aim of this Article is to propose that fragment answers in Basaá (Bantu) derive from two different sources, namely, a regular source and a copular source. Regular fragments are those that are derived by movement of a Negative Polarity Item (NPI) or a CP complement to the left periphery of the clause followed by clausal ellipsis (Merchant 2004 and related work). Conversely, copular fragments involve a biclausal structure whereby the focalized fragment, no matter the syntactic function it fulfills in clause structure, finally ends up being the subject of the null verbal copula of the main clause. The fragment is initially selected as the external argument of the null verbal copula within the matrix VP along the lines of the VP-Internal Subject Hypothesis (Koopman and Sportiche 1991). From Spec-VP it raises to Spec-TP to satisfy the EPP requirements. The internal argument of the null copula is a headless relative in which a relative operator (covert/overt) moves to Spec-CP, a position above FocP the target of ellipsis. This gives rise to a structure whereby the fragment answer in the matrix clause and the relative operator in the embedded clause resist ellipsis. The analysis also provides semantic evidence that copular fragments are not clefts. The ellipsis approach is supported by a range of grammatical properties such as connectivity effects, locality constraints and subcategorization requirements. This paper is not only a contribution to Merchant’s (2004) ellipsis approach but it also provides new evidence for our understanding of the crosslinguistic variation of ellipsis.

Les questions multiples : le débat continue

2007 ◽  
Vol 52 (3) ◽  
pp. 279-312
Author(s):  
Denis Liakin
Keyword(s):  
Functional Category ◽  
Left Periphery ◽  
Alternative Analysis ◽  
The Matrix ◽  
Embedded Clause

AbstractIn this article we offer an alternative analysis of multiple questions in Russian that is not only related to topic and focus, but also to other discourse factors. The characteristics that put Russian is the same group as Chinese and Japanese also apply to other multiple wh fronting languages such as Bulgarian, Romanian, and Serbo-Croatian, which, according to previous classification, belong to two different groups. We argue that multiple wh fronting languages can be classified on the basis of the presence of a functional category D-WhP in the left periphery of the matrix or embedded clause. This category is related to the discourse and the speaker’s intentions—one of the wh phrases is more important to the speakers than the others.

scholarly journals The That-Trace Effect: Evidence from Spanish–English Code-Switching

Languages ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 6 (4) ◽  
pp. 189
Author(s):  
Bradley Hoot ◽  
Shane Ebert
Keyword(s):  
Code Switching ◽  
The Other ◽  
Linguistic Features ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Embedded Clause ◽  
Core Questions ◽  
Subject Extraction ◽  
New Evidence ◽  
Acceptability Judgment ◽  
Intense Research

The that-trace effect is the fact that many languages (like English) ban the extraction of embedded-clause subjects but not objects over an overt complementizer like that, while many other languages (like Spanish) allow such extractions. The effect and its cross-linguistic variation have been the subject of intense research but remain largely a mystery, with no clear consensus on their underpinnings. We contribute novel evidence to these debates by using Spanish–English code-switching (the use of two languages in one sentence) to test five contemporary theoretical accounts of the that-trace effect. We conducted a formal acceptability judgment experiment, manipulating the extracted argument and code-switch site to test different combinations of linguistic features. We found that subject extraction is only permitted in Spanish–English code-switching when both the C head (que ‘that’) and the T head (i.e., the verb) are in Spanish, but not when either functional head is in English. Our results demonstrate indirect support for two of the five theories we test, failing to support the other three. Our findings also provide new evidence in favor of the view that the that-trace effect is tightly linked to the availability of post-verbal subjects. Finally, we outline how our results can narrow the range of possible theoretical accounts, demonstrating how code-switching data can contribute to core questions in linguistic theory.

scholarly journals Specificational Copular Sentences in Russian and English

2010 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Barbara H Partee
Keyword(s):  
Recent Work ◽  
Information Structure ◽  
Initial Position ◽  
Subject Position ◽  
Left Periphery ◽  
Budget Cuts ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Copular Sentences ◽  
Specificational Sentences ◽  
Predicate Type

The Russian sentence (1), from Padučeva and Uspensky (1979), and English (2) are examples of specificational copular sentences: NP2 provides the ‘specification’, or ‘value’ of the description given by NP1. (1) Vladelec ètogo osobnjaka – juvelir Fužere. owner-NOM this-GEN mansion-GEN jeweler-NOM Fuzhere ‘The owner of this mansion is the jeweler Fuzhere.’ (2) The biggest problem is the recent budget cuts. Williams (1983) and Partee (1986) argued that specificational sentences like (2) result from “inversion around the copula”: that NP1 is a predicate (type ) and NP2 is the subject, a referential expression of type e. Partee (1999) argued that such an analysis is right for Russian, citing arguments from Padučeva and Uspensky (1979) that NP2 is the subject of sentence (1). But in that paper I argued that differences between Russian and English suggest that in English there is no such inversion, contra Williams (1983) and Partee (1986): the subject of (2) is NP1, and both NPs are of type e, but with NP1 less referential than NP2, perhaps “attributive”. Now, based on classic work by Roger Higgins on English and by Paducheva and Uspensky on Russian, and on a wealth of recent work by Mikkelsen, Geist, Romero, Schlenker, and others, a reexamination the semantics and structure of specificational copular sentences in Russian and English in a typological perspective supports a partly different set of conclusions: (i) NP1 is of type and NP2 is of type e in both English and Russian; (ii) but NP1 is subject in English, while NP2 is subject in Russian; and (iii) NP1 in specificational sentences is universally topical (discourse-old), but only in some languages (like English) is that accomplished by putting NP1 into canonical subject position. In other words, both English (2) and Russian (1) move the -type NP1 into some sentence-initial position for information-structure reasons, but in English NP1 ends up as syntactic subject, whereas in Russian, it’s inverted into some other left-periphery position.

On Null Subjects and Null Arguments

1993 ◽  
Vol 38 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-41 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul Law
Keyword(s):  
Subject Position ◽  
Inflectional Morphology ◽  
Null Subjects ◽  
Long Distance ◽  
Null Subject ◽  
Null Arguments ◽  
Agreement Morphology ◽  
Verbal Agreement ◽  
Subject Extraction

In the literature on Null Subject Languages (NSLs) since Rizzi (1982), the three properties that are commonly thought to be connected are (i) the richness of inflectional morphology, (ii) free subject inversion, and (iii) the COMP-trace effect. The connection between them is that if a language (e.g., Italian) has the option of having a null subject (NS) pronominalproin subject position (i.e., SpecIP) as a result of having rich inflectional (i.e., verbal agreement) morphology, as represented in (1a), then the same element may appear in the same position in cases of subjects occurring postverbally as in (1b) and in cases of long-distance subject extraction where the postverbal trace is properly governed by the verb, as in (1c):

Subject Doubling, Free Inversion, and Null Argument Languages

1986 ◽  
Vol 31 (1) ◽  
pp. 55-80 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yves Roberge
Keyword(s):  
Subject Position ◽  
Clitic Doubling ◽  
Null Argument ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Doubling Construction ◽  
Similarities And Differences ◽  
Subject Clitics

The aim of this paper is twofold. First, I shall propose a unified account of the subject doubling construction and point out its similarities and differences with respect to object doubling — the so-called clitic doubling. The discussion is based on Trentino, a northern dialect of Italian, and Colloquial French. I will argue that it is not desirable to establish a connection between subject doubling and free inversion as is implicitly assumed in Safir (1982). Rather, it seems preferable to assume that the subject clitics are generated in the AGR element of INFL and that they are associated with pro in subject position. The possibility of subject doubling is then related to a parameter making reference to the optionality of Case absorbtion or spell-out by the clitic.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document