Chapter 6 Flashcards
Inversion Licensing Condition
Wh-questions trigger Inversion of an auxiliary in main clauses. Inversion Licensing Condition → A null C in a finite clause is licensed to carry a T-feature triggering Auxiliary Inversion if:
(i) C has a negative or degree or conditional specifier
(ii) C has an interrogative specifier in a root/main clause.
A wh-question licenses the occurrence of polarity items like anyone and anything: this is because anyone and anything are c-commanded by the interrogative licenser why.
Wh-Movement
Question words originate in a position below C and move to spec-CP.
Echo Questions
Wh-questions in which someone echoes a structure produced by someone else but replaces part of the structure by a question word, and the question word is given emphatic stress.
Multiple wh-questions
Questions containing multiple wh-words. In such structures, one wh-word is positioned at the beginning of the clause and other wh-words are positioned internally within TP or VP.
Doubly Filled COMP Filter/DFCF
At PF, the edge of a CP headed by an overt complementiser (that/for/if/whether) cannot be doubly filled (cannot contain any other overt constituent).
Null complementiser that does not trigger Auxiliary Inversion
Standard varieties of English use a null complementiser in place of that, and thereby avoid violating DFCF. This null complementiser does not trigger Auxiliary Inversion, because the Inversion Licensing Condition specifies that a C with an interrogative specifier only triggers Inversion in a root/main clause, and the bracketed clauses are embedded clauses. For example: “He asked where she was” instead of “He asked where was she”.
Attraction Generalisation
When a head attracts a given type of item to become its specifier, it attracts the smallest accessible maximal projection containing the closest item of the relevant type. In consequence, a C with a Q-feature attracts the smallest accessible maximal projection containing the closest question word to move to spec-CP.
Chain Uniformity Condition
A condition which specifies that all the links in a movement chain must have the same structural status (e.g. all the links must be heads, or all the links must be maximal projections).
(a) Quite what kind of tax are they proposing?
(b) *What are they proposing quite kind of tax?
(VER RESUMEN²)
This results in the formation of a uniform wh˗chain, because both the overt copy quite what kind of tax at the top of the tree and the null copy quite what kind of tax at the foot of the tree are maximal projections, since both are complete QPs which are the largest constituents headed by what (because both have mothers with a different head).
Attract smallest condition
The term smallest accessible constituent means ‘the smallest constituent which can move on its own without violating any principle/condition/constraint’. ASC is a specific instantiation of the more general Economy Principle. ASC tells us to try and satisfy the Q-feature on C by preposing the smallest constituent containing the question word what. But in our example we need to satisfy both the Chain Uniformity Condition and the Constituency Condition. So, in order to form a uniform chain, the smallest constituent that can be moved is the maximal projection quite what kind of tax.
Default Spellout Rule
For a constituent whose spellout is not determined by some other rule
or requirement, the highest copy of the constituent is pronounced at PF, and any lower copies are silent.
Three operations involved in Wh-Movement
Wh-movement involves three operations:
1) creating a copy of the constituent
2) merging the copy to a new position (according to Chomsky, it is an internal merge)
3) giving null spellout to the original - copy deletion in the PF component
No Tampering Condition (Chomsky)
No syntactic operation can change any part of a structure other than the root. So, movements can occur if we consider that creating a copy isn’t tampering with the structure as the original constituent is still in place. In an example such as the one given above, the Q-feature of C attracts the pronoun what but since it is a copy that moves, the NTC is not violated.
Constituency Condition and discontinuous constituents
Discontinuous constituents are those structures which seem to be part of the same constituent and still appear in separate parts of a sentence, for example in a sentence such as What chance is there of buying the perfect present, where what chance and of buying a perfect present belong to the same constituent. Such a structure is possible if we consider that the constituent originates fully in one position and creates a copy resulting in What chance of buying the perfect present is there what chance of buying the perfect present, then deleting in the PF component the stricken parts. This analysis assumes the existence of a Low Spellout Rule which would allow for split or discontinuous spellout of constituents.
Long Wh-Movement
Chomsky argued that a long Wh-movement is bounded (in the sense that there are bounds/limits on how far a constituent can move at any one go) in consequence of a constraint which he termed the
Subjacency Condition.
In consequence of the Subjacency Condition and the Impenetrability Condition, Wh-Movement is a local/bounded operation which applies in a successive-cyclic (one-clause-at-a-time) fashion, moving a wh-constituent in successive stages (or cycles) first to the front of the clause in which it originates, then to the front of the next highest clause … and so on until the wh-constituent reaches its ultimate landing site at the front of the interrogative clause.
(Long Wh-Movement)
Subjacency Condition
No movement can cross more than one bounding node (where bounding nodes include S/TP).
