Chapter 4 Flashcards
Matrix
In a sentence such as ‘I think he lied’, the (italicised) lied clause is an embedded/complement clause (by virtue of being embedded as the complement of the verb think), and the think clause is the matrix clause, in the sense that it is the clause immediately containing the lied clause.
Control Clause
A complement clause with a null PRO subject.
Control verbs
Verbs (such as like, try, want) which allow an infinitive complement with a PRO subject.
Controller of PRO
In non-finite clauses with a PRO subject which has an antecedent, the antecedent is said to be the controller of PRO (or to control PRO), and conversely PRO is said to be controlled by its antecedent; and this structure is called a control clause/structure. e.g. “John tried (PRO) to quit”
Discourse controller
When PRO refers to some entity within the domain of discourse which is not directly mentioned in the sentence.
“It’s important [PRO not to take oneself too seriously]”
In this sentence, PRO has arbitrary reference (any arbitrary person you care to mention). Consequently, PRO is the antecedent of oneself.
Cliticisation
(a process by which one word attaches itself in a leech-like fashion to another) For example, we could say that the contracted negative particle “n’t” is a clitic form of the negative particle “not” which attaches itself to a finite auxiliary verb, so giving rise to forms like isn’t, shouldn’t, mightn’t, etc. Phonological operations like have-cliticisation are sensitive to the presence of null constituents.
HAVE Auxiliary
Possessive
Causative
Experiential
In terms of the assumptions we are making here, this means that finite forms of HAVE occupy the head T position of TP in their perfect use, but occupy the head V position of VP in their causative or experiential use. Evidence in support of this claim comes from cliticisation:
(40)
(a) They’ve seen a ghost (= perfect have)
(b) *They’ve their car serviced regularly (= causative have).
(c) *They’ve students walk out on them sometimes (= experiential have)
CP Hypothesis
All clauses are CPs. We can suppose that in a CP, clause type is signalled by the nature of the (overt or null) complementiser introducing the clause.
Empty Category Principle / ECP
Every empty category must be licensed.
In the case of a sentence like (c), the empty complementiser can be lexically licensed by being adjacent to a lexical head (that is to say, a head which is not a functional category like know).
c.. We didn’t know [he had resigned]
COMP-Trace Filter
Any structure in which an overt complementiser is immediately adjacent to and c-commands a trace (i:e. a gap left behind by a moved constituent) is filtered out as ill-formed at PF.
Structural Uniformity Principle
All constituents of the same type belong to the same category.
Root overt Complementiser Constraint
No overt complementiser can be the head of a root projection in a language like English.
Clause Typing Condition
A CP is typed as interrogative (that is to say interpreted as interrogative in type in the semantic component) if it has an interrogative specifier, exclamative if it has an exclamative specifier, etc. Otherwise, a CP headed by an indicative complementiser is interpreted as declarative in type by default.
All finite clauses have the status of CPs introduced by a complementiser, in accordance with the CP Hypothesis. Finite complement clauses are CPs headed by either an overt complementiser or by a null complementiser. Finite root/main clauses are CPs headed by a C which contains an inverted auxiliary if the clause is interrogative, and a null complementiser otherwise. Clause type is determined by the Clause Typing Condition.
Null C in infinitive clauses
{I will arrange [for him to see a specialist]}
In a sentence like the one above, we assume that the complementiser for is an accusative case assigner and therefore the infinitive subject him will be assigned accusative case by the complementiser for.
This means that if the complementiser for is an accusative case assigner in complement clauses such as {She wanted [CP [C for][TP him [T to] apologise]]} then the variant of for which ultimately receives a null spellout is an accusative case assigner as well.
(Case-marking of accusative subjects) Accusative Case Assignment
A transitive head assigns accusative case to a noun or pronoun expression which it c-commands.
(Case-marking of accusative subjects) Earliness Principle
Operations apply as early in a derivation as possible.
