a case of do-support in romance - benincà

8/6/2019 A Case of Do-Support in Romance - Beninc

1/45

A Case of Do-Support in RomanceAuthor(s): Paola Beninc and Cecilia PolettoSource: Natural Language & Linguistic Theory, Vol. 22, No. 1 (Feb., 2004), pp. 51-94Published by: SpringerStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4048075 .

Accessed: 05/04/2011 10:07

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at .http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp. JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unlessyou have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you

may use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use.

Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at .http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=springer. .

Each copy of any part of a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the screen or printed

page of such transmission.

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of

content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms

of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

Springeris collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access toNatural Language & Linguistic

Theory.

http://www.jstor.org
http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=springerhttp://www.jstor.org/stable/4048075?origin=JSTOR-pdfhttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=springerhttp://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=springerhttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/stable/4048075?origin=JSTOR-pdfhttp://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=springer


2/45

PAOLABENINCA and CECILIAPOLETTO

A CASE OF DO-SUPPORT IN ROMANCE

ABSTRACT.Inthis paperwe document he existence n a Romance anguageof astrategyof do (fa) insertion n mainnon-subject nterrogativesparallelto the well-knownEnglishcase. As our description llustrates,the set of contexts where do-supportapplies in thislanguage s a propersubset of theEnglish contexts.The syntax offa-supportin a languagewith typical Romance features allows us to draw some general conclusions regarding heanalysis of English do-supportandthe interfacesbetween syntax and morphology,on oneside, andsyntax and lexical-semanticstructure,on the other.First,we will show howfa-support n this Romance languageconstitutesevidence in favor of the hypothesisthatVto C movementapplies also in Romancemainquestions. Second, some aspectsof Rizzi's(1991) proposal that subject wh-sentenceshave a CP structurewith the wh- in SpecC isconfirmedby the presence of an overt complementizer n the languagewe are dealingwith. Thirdly,the phenomenon of Romancefa-support will lead us to further developPollock's idea that do-insertion s directly connected with the theta-gridof a verb:a mainverbcannot move to a thematicallyopaqueposition,while auxiliariescan, as they do nothave a theta-grid. n the Romance dialectwe analyze some verbs move to C? (or use do-support) ndependentlyof theiruse as auxiliariesor as main verbs.In order o accountforthisaspectof thephenomenon,we suggesta more detailed descriptionof theprocess.

1. INTRODUCTION1In this paper we documentthe existence of a do-supportanalogue n cer-tain Lombarddialects in NorthernItaly, analyzing in particular he datacollected in the village of Monno. This dialect offers an interestingwayto check (some of) the predictionsmade by the theories thathave been

1 A first version of this work appearedon November 1998 as a contribution o theElectronicFestschrift orNoamChomsky's70thbirthday and t is still thereon thewebsitehttp://cognet.mit.edu/Books/celebration/).We areverygrateful o GuglielmoCinque, RichardKayne, Nicola Munaro,MairParry,Jean-YvesPollock, ChristinaTortoraand RaffaellaZanuttini or comments, suggestionsandencouragement.Wethank he editor,PeterCulicover, or his generousassistance,andthe anonymousNLLTreviewers,whose remarkshave led to substantialmprovementsnmany aspects of thepaper.This workwould not exist withouttheinsightfulandpatientcollaborationof Mrs.LiviaPasseriand Mr.and Mrs. Ferrari,who provided the Monnese data. We are also indebtedto GianniBonfadiniwho firstbrought o our attention hedialect of Monno(togetherwiththenames of theexcellentinformants)as an interestingdialectof the Lombardarea.For the concems of the Italianacademy,PaolaBeninca takesresponsibilityon sections1, 2, 4-4.2, CeciliaPoletto on sections 3, 4.3-4.4, 5.

NaturalLanguage& LinguisticTheory 22: 51-94, 2004.02004 KluwerAcademicPublishers. Printed n theNetherlands.


3/45

52 PAOLABENINCAAND CECILIAPOLETTO

advancedwith respectto the English phenomenon,and to gathera morecomplete pictureof movementphenomena n interrogative entences. Asfar as we know, the do-support strategylimited to main interrogatives,negativesand VP-ellipticalclauses- i.e., theobligatory nsertionof apro-verb in I? to play the role of a mainverb in positionsto which theV itselfcannotmove - has been reportedandanalyzedonly forModemEnglish.2The following Monnese examples display a striking similaritywith theirEnglish translation:

(I)a. fa-l maja?does-he eat?'Does he eat?'

b. ke fa-1 maja'?what does-he eat?'Whatdoes he eat?'

c. *maja-.l?*eats-he?

d. *ke maja-l?*what eats-he?

e. a- maja'?has-he eaten?

f we at-h meajtawhat has-he eaten?'Whathas he eaten?'

g. *ke fa-l aver maja?whatdoes-he haveeaten?

h. fa-l ploer?does-it rain?'Is it raining?'

2 A sort of do-support s in fact attested in Germandialects andregionalvarietiesofGerman cf. Vikner2001). The fundamentaldifferencebetweenEnglishandMonnese,onthe one hand, and Germanvarieties,on the other,is thatin the latterthe phenomenon soptional,both in interrogativeandassertivecontexts,and it shows no differencebetweenmain and embedded clauses. A similar,thoughnot identical,phenomenonwith the verbfaire is also analyzed by Miller (1997) for Old and Middle French.However,neitherGerman,MiddleFrenchnorOld andMiddleEnglishdisplaya distribution imilarto thatfound in modem English and describedherefor Monnese.


4/45

A CASE OFDO-SUPPORT N ROMANCE 53i. a-i plot?

has-it rained?'Did it rain?'

j. *ploe-l?*rains-it?

The theoreticalrelevanceof thediscoverythatdo-support xists in Ro-mance, too, concerns the analysisof Romance root interrogatives,whichwill be shown to have I-to-C movement n the syntax(contrary o recentproposals such as Hulk 1993 and Sportiche 1995). The Monnese dataare also relevant to establishingmore precisely the role played by mor-phological weakeningin the developmentof the correspondingprocessin English. A thirdbut far from minor point has to do with the recentproposalmadeby Chomsky(1995, 2000) thatdo-supportn particular ndmoregenerallyheadmovement s partof thePFcomponentand not of thecomputational ystemitself. Wewill show that thishypothesis eads to anunnecessarydoublingof the mechanismof MergeandsubsequentMove-typicalof thecomputationalomponent in thePFcomponent.Moreover,the explanationof the rarityof do-support n Romancewill shed light onhow costly the operationMerge is.The article is structured s follows: aftersumming up, in section 1.1,previousanalyses of do-support,n section 2 we present those propertiesof Monnese syntaxthat will be relevant o our analysis.This will help usin section 3 to factorout the differencesbetweenEnglish and Monnesedo-supportby showing that they derive from independentpropertiesofRomancesyntax.In section4 we presentouranalysis and discuss some ofthe potentialproblemsthatMonneseposes for the analysesof do-supportthat have been proposed so far on the basis of English data, includingadiscussionof the Minimalistaccount.1.1. Previous Analyses of Do-SupportAs earlyasChomsky(1955), thephenomenonof do-supports analyzedastheinsertionof a dummy n order o supportnflectional eatureswhenthemainverb cannot.Lightfoot(1979) linked the diachronicdevelopmentofdo-support o the appearance f a specialclass of modalverbs and the lossof a richverbal nflection: he hypothesis s that,in the history of English,theseaspectsconverged nrenderingV-movemento I no longernecessary.Froma stricteconomyperspective, hismeans that t is no longerpossible.The supportdo, which alreadywas a free substituteof the verb in I, be-came the only available host for morphologywhen a verb was required


5/45

54 PAOLABENINCAAND CECILIAPOLETTOin a projectionhigher thanV? (i.e., in negative,emphaticaffirmative ndinterrogativeentences).

An interestingdiachronicdescriptionof thedevelopmentof do-supportin English is providedby Roberts(1993) andWarner 1997), who showthatlong afterthe inflectionalmorphologyhad been lost, the verbcontin-ued to raise to I?. However,as Roberts(1993) points out, the do-supportstrategyof Middle English, as well as the one attested in the Germandialects and in Old and Middle French,is fundamentallydifferentfromits moderncounterpart, s it is neverobligatory, s not triggeredby a par-ticularsyntacticcontext and can also be found in positive non-emphaticclauses. For this reason,throughout his work we will only consider thephenomenonof modermEnglish,leavingaside the strategiesof do-supportfound in Middle English, variousmodern Germandialects, and Old andMiddleFrench,as theydisplaydifferentsyntacticrestrictions.The mostcomprehensiveanalysisof the modernEnglishphenomenonis providedby Pollock(1989), who establishesanindirect, nterestinginkbetween the impossibility formainverbsto moveto I in English andmor-phologicalpoverty.As we will makeextensiveuse of Pollock's theoryinthis work,we sum up its basic logic, which is reflected n the structure fourargumentation.Pollockmakes the followingassumptions:a. InModernEnglish- and not in French,Italianetc. - the lexical verbcannotmove to AgrS (orrather, o the highest Inflprojection n Pollock'stheory3);b. Thereasonforthelack of movement s thatthefunctionalprojectionsof IP areinherentbarriers,because"Agr n English,unlikeAgr in French,is not 'rich'enoughmorphologicallyo lift thebarrierhoodf IPandhencepermittransmissionof the verb'stheta-role(s)".Thisrenders hemopaqueto theta-roleassignment;c. Hence,a verb thatmoves to T andAgrS is unableto assignthematicroles to its arguments;d. Therefore,only auxiliaries and modals, which do not possess athematicgrid, can move to head positions in IP without violating thetheta-criterion;e. English has a substitute do as an alternative o 0 in AgrS. Onlywhen an interveningelement blocks affix-hopping s the optionto insertdo insteadof 0 chosenon thebasisof economyconsiderations:

3 In fact Pollock (1989) assumes the higherprojectionof Infl to be TP andnot AgrSP.We follow here the reformulationdue to Belletti (1990), which has become standard.Wedo notagreewiththeproposalmadeby Chomsky(1995) to eliminateAgrSentirely.Inanycase, this will be irrelevant o themaintopic we addresshere.


6/45

A CASEOFDO-SUPPORTN ROMANCE 55f. This explanationextends in a naturalway to movement to C0 inquestions:only auxiliaries andmodals,which can reachI?, can move to

C0triggering ubjectinversion,becausetheylack a thematicgrid.4On thebasisof his analysis,Pollock(1989, p. 366) statesthat "theECP,quantificationheory,and Thetatheory,which are not open to parametricvariation,wouldseem to requirea languagewith these idiosyncraticprop-erties[= of English],to developa verb like Englishdo withall its specificcharacteristics."This statementrequires some amendment f confrontedwith the dataof Monnese, a dialect thatdoes not share the idiosyncraticpropertiesofEnglish, andneverthelesshas developeddo-support. n addition,the cor-relation noted by Pollock (1989) that auxiliariestend in generalto raisemorethanmainverbscanbe further nrichedon thebasisof Monnese andmademoreprecise by adopting he view of Cinque(2001) thatmodals andsemi-auxiliaryverbs arealwaysfunctionalheads.Similarly, he assumptionmadeby Lightfoot'sand Pollock's analyses- namely thatthe do-support trategy s connectedto certainpeculiarfea-turesof Englishsyntaxandmorphology hasto be revised.Thesefeaturesare apparentlyabsent from the dialect we present,and neverthelessdo-supportshows characteristicsvery close to the English construction cf.(1)). The examples in (1) illustrate he phenomenonwe aredealingwith:theMonnesefa (the lexical andsyntacticequivalentof English do) occursimmediatelyafterthe wh-element orin firstpositionin yes/no questions)andis followedby an infinitival orm of themainverb.The supportonly appears n main questions,where it is obligatory ftheverb is not anauxiliaryora modal. In contrast o Englishdo, Monnesefa is not inserted n negativesentences, or in emphaticcontexts. It is thusmore restricted han its English counterpart.However,we show in whatfollows thatthis narrowing s an independent onsequence of otherchar-acteristicsof thedialect,while thephenomenonper se is exactly the sameas in English.

4 Pollockcharacterizeshe MiddleEnglish stagenoting that:

1. An indiscriminateuse of do as a Verbsubstitute s observed n non-emphatic ontexts;2. Agreementmorphologywas almostcompletelylost.

He hypothesizes thattherewas enoughagreement eft to renderAgr (in Pollock's theory,a projection ower thanTP) a barrier,but scarceenough to render t opaque to theta roleassignment.As a consequence, in simple sentencesdo-insertionwas chosen to avoid anECPviolation.


7/45

56 PAOLA ENINCA NDCECILIA OLETTO2. AN OUTLINEOF MONNESE

The outline of the syntax and morphologyof Monnese will help us tocorrectly nterprethe datadiscussedin section3.The generalfeaturesof this languageare common to the greatmajorityof Northern talianDialects (NIDs);5some more restrictedphenomena inparticular,wh- in situ) are sharedby otherLombardandNorthernVenetovarieties (see Munaro 1997, 1999).As alreadymentioned n theintroduction,English do-supports viewedboth by Lightfoot (1979) andPollock (1989) as a consequenceof the lossof verbal morphology,which has in turntriggeredthe loss of syntacticV-to-I movement. Thus, let us concentrateour attentionfirst on thesemorphologicalandsyntacticcharacteristics,o test whetherthey can alsobe taken to be responsiblefor the occurrenceof the Monnesedo-supportstrategy.2.1. VerbMorphologyandSyntacticV-to-IMovementMonnesehas developeda system of subjectpronounssimilar to those ofNIDs: it has tonic and clitic forms,and the clitic series is not complete:2nd sg., 1stpl., 3rd sg. andpl. have an obligatorysubjectclitic pronoun;1stpl. is represented as in French,otherLombarddialects, etc.) by a 3rdsg. verbformwith an impersonalsubj. pronounm 'man'(etymologicallyderivedfrom lat. homo 'man': cf. Frenchon, andthe semanticallyparallelGermanMan).Verbalmorphologydoes notdistinguishbetween thirdper-son singularandplural; hemorphologicaldistinction s only madeby thesubjectclitic (whichis distinct bothfor genderandnumber).This state ofaffairs s widely attested n Lombardand Venetiandialects.TheMonneseparadigm or subjectclitics is illustratedn (2):

(2) 1 2 3 lpl. 2pl. 3pl.0 te lIla m 0 i/le

1st person singularand 2ndpersonpluralarethuspro-drop n the standardItaliansense, as shown in the sampleof conjugation n (3). Notably, the5 The characteristics f verbalmorphology,verb movement and wh- movement of this

dialect are sharedby (manyormost)NorthemItalianDialects(NID), while the do- supportstrategy s only attested n this area n Northem Italy:Monno, the Lombardvillage whosedialect we are dealing with, is located off (but not far from) an ancient route connect-ing Brescia with RomanschSwitzerland.Until 1963 the village was reachable only bya footpath;contactswith people speakingother varieties were rare, and this can perhapsexplain why thisvery peculiarmode of question ormationwaspreservedhere. Possibly thephenomenonexists in othervillagesnearMonno;we haverecorded t recently n Malonno;we are not awareof other cases.


8/45

A CASE OFDO-SUPPORT N ROMANCE 57firstand secondpersonsingularof lexical verbs have an enclitic pronounagglutinatedo the rightof the verb;as will be shownimmediatelybelow,thiselement has become partof the inflectionalmorphology.Once again,this is a commonfeature n Lombarddialects.A sampleof the presentindicativeforms is given in (3); kumpraitobuy' is aregularverbof the firstconjugation,esse 'to be' andvej 'to have'are auxiliaries, a 'to do' and nda 'to go' are irregularverbs (with someauxiliaryuses).

(3) Presentindicativea. kumpra' b. esse c. vej d.fa e. nda'to buy' 'to be' 'to have' 'todo' 'to go'

1. sg. kiimprjo so o fo ndo2. sg. te kiumpret te se te e te fe te nde3. sg. Illakumpra l/la e l/laa la fa 1/laval.pl. mkiumpra me ma mfa mva2. pl. kumpre se e fe nde3. pl. iWleiumpra iAle iWlea iAlea i/le va

The 1st and2nd sg. of the lexical verbkumprazhow the agglutinationofthe subj.pronoun o 'I' and t 'thou': it appears n the presentindicativeof all lexical verbs, but is absent in auxiliaries(includinglexical verbsfa and nda). In addition to the morphologizedenclitics of the first andsecondpersonsingular, n maininterrogatives ll subjectclitics appear nenclisis,astheydo inFrenchsubjectcliticinversionandin manyNIDs (seebelow section 2.2). The two enclisis phenomenahave to be kept distinct,as the first s foundsystematically n all clauses (we call it agglutination),the second is restrictedto main interrogatives following the traditionaluse, we will define it as enclisis or inversion).It is not possible to stateasimple correlationbetween the presenceor absence of agglutinationandmovementto C: auxiliarieshave agglutination n some tenses (differentfrom the presentindicative),and always move to C, while lexical verbshavea differentdistribution f agglutinationacrosstenses andpersonsbutcan nevermove to C in interrogatives.As verbmovementappears o beindependentof the presence of the agglutinatedpronoun,we assumethatthe agglutinationappearing n some verbalforms in (3) is purely mor-phological(cf. Benincia1997, 1999),Calabrese 2003) andPoletto(2000:30 ff) for moredetailedarguments n favourof thisanalysis).Monnese inflected verbs show the type of phenomena that are con-sidered ypicalof a 'rich'inflection.Theyconcern: a)pro-drop, b) lexical


9/45


DP subject postposing,and (c) surface order of the verb with respecttoadverbs:(a) pro-drop:the inflected verb (precededby the subjectclitic in 2ndsg., 1stpl., 3rdsg. andpl.) gives a pro-dropverbalform; 1st sg. And 2ndpl. do not havea subjectclitic (cf. (3a)).(b) Subjectpostposing:apostverbalexicalsubject s fully grammaticalwith any type of verb andany type of subject (a pronoun n (4), a lexicalDP in (5), a quantifiern (6)):(4)a. livrjo me

Ifinish I'I finish'b. te livrette'

you finish you'Youfinish'

(5)a. 1 e mort le kavreit is dead(m. sg.) thegoats (f pl.)'Thegoatsdied'

b. le laveria zo i piatJ le mateletheywill.washdown the dishes thegirls'The girlswill wash the dishes'

(6) 1 me capis niigiiit me understandsnobody'Nobodyunderstandsme'

These cases are not right dislocation structures,as (6) shows, sincea quantifier ike niigii 'nobody' cannot be dislocated(see for the Italiancorrespondentnessuno, Rizzi 1986; Beninca 1988, pp. 171-175; Cinque1990, pp. 74-76). Hence the subjectsin sentenceslike (4)-(6) are not tobe dealtwithas rightdislocations.Moreover,notice that n (5a) there s nonumberand genderagreementbetweenthe verband the postposedsubject;in this dialect, a rightdislocatedsubjectwould always requirea completelyagreeing subjectclitic.6

6 Fora more detaileddescriptionof this aspectof thegrammar, ee Beninca (1997).


10/45

A CASEOFDO-SUPPORT N ROMANCE 59(c) Verbmovement:A. The sentencesin (7) show that both the inflectedlexical verbsand

the inflectedauxiliariesappearobligatorily o the leftof those adverbs hatdistinguishthe positionof French and Italian nflectedverbs from thatofEnglish. Thus, all types of inflected verbs in Monnese occupy the samepositionas thatof ItalianandNI]Ds see Belletti 1990, 1994;Cinque1999):(7)a. 1 tfakolasemper

he speaks always'Healways speaks'

b. I "a sempertfakol'ahe has always spoken'Hehas alwaysspoken'

c. 1 fiarel1 parla zathe babyhe speaksalready'Thebabyalready alks'

d. 1 'a z'a majahe has already eaten'He has alreadyeaten'

e. 1 va majhe goes never'Henevergoes'

f. le maj ndahe is nevergone'Hehas nevergone'

B. Any inflected verb is higher than the postverbalnegation mi'a,lexically the sameas Italianmica, andsyntacticallyparallel oFrenchpost-verbalnegationpas.7 AssumingCinque's(1999) hierarchyof functionalprojectionsand adverbials,we see here that the inflectedverb, contraryto English main verbs, bypasses the positions of several adverbswhen

7 Fora detailedanalysis of postverbalnegations n NIDs cf. Zanuttini 1997). The typeof postverbalnegationmia usedby Monnese derives from an item - originallya negativepolarity tem - designatinga 'minimalquantity',a 'crumb',as is the case in manyNIJDs(andin standardtalian or thepostverbalnegative markermica).


11/45

60 PAOLABENINCAAND CECILIAPOLETTOit moves to inflectionalheads. As is the case in manyNIDs, thereis nopreverbalnegativemorpheme:

(8) 1 tiakolam'iahe speaks not'Hedoes not speak'

To summarize,Monnese exhibits a verbalmorphologythat is as richas in most NIDs, as well as the placementof adverbsto the rightof theinflected verb. This shows that V-to-I movement(or rather,to AgrS inBelletti's (1990) framework)has the same characteristics n Monnese asin Italian and NorthernItalianDialects. Yet in such a languagewe haveEnglish-styledo-support, omethingunexpectedundercurrentanalyses.Before turning o interrogative lauses, let us examinethe position ofthe infinitive,since this is the verbal form that the main verb assumeswhen do-support s inserted.The infinitive(as well as the pastparticiple)occurs to the left of adverbs ikeplo '(any)more' andanmo 'again' (i.e.,still followingCinque's(1999) account,it moves higherthanthese loweradverbs):

(9)a. el 'a dit da tfakolap16he has said to talk anymore'He saidnot to talkanymore'

b. 1 'a tfakolaanmohe has talked again'Hetalkedonce again'

c. el 'a dit datfakolaanmohe has said to talk again'He said to talkagain'

d. I 'a tfakolap16he has talked (any)more'He hasn'ttalked anymore'

The infinitive of the auxiliaries optionally precedes the postverbalnegativemarkermia,8 which structurallyorresponds o Frenchpas:8 Zanuttini 1997) examinesparallelcases of postverbalnegation in NIODs, hich shelocates in the Spec of a NegP locatedlowerthan TP.


12/45

A CASE OFDO-SUPPORT N ROMANCE 61(IO)a. par ej miIaulu

for to have not wantedb. parmlaej ulufor not have wanted

'Havingnot wanted'Infinitivalmainverbsnevercross over thepositionof thenegationmi'a.9(1I)a. parm'iamaja-l

for not eat-it'Not to eat it'b. *parmaja-lmia

for eat-it notOn the basis of what we have seen regarding he morphologicalandsyntacticcharacteristicsof the verb, such as the pro-dropproperty, ree

inversion,andthedistribution f theinflectedverbwithrespectto adverbs,we conclude thatverb movementto the IP functionalprojections n Mon-nese is, in all relevantrespects,parallel to standard talian.In particular,any inflectedverb moves to a functionalheadas high as AgrS. Infinitivesalso move,although ower thaninflectedverbs.2.2. QuestionFormationIn this section we will illustratesome characteristicsof Monnese ques-tions, the contextrelevant or do-support.The differences with respect toEnglish syntaxwill be shown to be a featurecommonto other NorthernItalianvarieties,and, as such,theyhave to be factoredoutfrom theanalysisof do-supporttself (andthusdo notinterferewith ourcomparisonbetweenEnglishandMonnese).We hypothesize that in Monnese, C has to be filled by an inflec-ted verbalform in main questions. We will firstconsiderexamples with

9 Note thatobject clitics are obligatorilyenclitics on infinitivalverbs,even though theinfinitivaloccurs in a positionlowerthan the negativemarkermia, which is located lowerthan TP (cf. Zanuttini1997). This suggests thatenclisis does not necessarily occur in ashigh a position as AgrS or C, as proposed in Kayne (1991, 1994), but also lower in thestructure,using a lowerseries of clitic positions.We will notpursuethis any furtherhere.Phenomenareportedandanalyzedby Tortora 2000, 2002), for thePiedmontesevarietyofBorgomaneroet al. (2002) for some Franco-Provencal ialects, seem also to suggest theexistence of a lower layer forclitics, whichmight be active n Monnesetoo. Cinque(2001)also makesthishypothesison the basis of standardtaliandata.


13/45

62 PAOLABENINCAAND CECILIAPOLETTOcompound tenses, which do not show the do-supportstrategy.In thiscase, movement to C affects auxiliaries and the do-supportstrategyisungrammaticalust as in English.The main evidence for V-to-C movement is subject clitic inversion(SCLI),a phenomenon hat has been interpreted s indicatingV-to-C(seeKayne 1984, Ch. 10; Rizzi and Roberts1989, for French),since it is re-strictedto root contexts,both in Frenchandin NIDs. Friedemann1995)andSportiche 1995) interpretSCLI as a case of "interrogativenflection".They assume that the verb moves to C only at the LF level but not inthe Syntax.In section 4.3 we will see thatMonnesedo-supportprovidesevidence that SCLI is indeed V-to-C. For the moment,let's simply statethatthis is quite a commonphenomenon n NIDs, and, as such, it is notdirectly connected to the do-supportphenomenonwe are tudying.10Inmainquestions(bothyes/no andwh-,whenanXP otherthanthesubject sbeing questioned),3rdsg./pl. and lst/2nd pl. auxiliariesandfa display anenclitic subjectpronoun(cf. (le,f)); 1st sg. does not change,and2nd sg.only loses its procliticsubject.Thisphenomenon s also exhibitedby otherNIDs.

A less common featureof Monnese is theso-calledwh- in situstrategy.That is, wh- elements andphrasescan eitherappear n frontof the sen-tence or in sentence final position. Some wh- elements have a differentform dependingon the position in which they occur (thatis, a wh- ele-ment of this class has a slightly differentform, dependingon whether itis moved or left in situ; see examples (12c, g); (cf. Munaro1995, 1997,1999; Beninca 1997).1"This strategy s not widespread n Northern taly.Itis foundthough n otherdialects of LombardyandSouthernSwitzerland10 In severalNIDs, othertypes of structures riggerSCI. They can all be analyzedasmovementto a C0 position.Monnese showsinversionwithlexical verbs n disjunctiveandexhortative tructures:

(i) ploe-I o ploe-l nmia,rain-it or rain-itnot'Whether t rains ornot . . .'

(ii) telefon-om-i subitphone-we-her mmediately'Let's phone herimmediately'

These datashow that it is not the interrogativemorphologythatis missing in this dialect.A systematicmapof the differentstructuralayers where these insertionsoccur in NIDs isprovided n Munaro 2002a, b).11 See Munaroet al. (2002) for a remnantmovementanalysis of wh- in situ and wh-doubling n NIDs.


14/45

A CASEOF DO-SUPPORT N ROMANCE 63and in NorthernVeneto(it is also attested in spokenFrench,with somerelevantdifferences).'2 n Monnese,SCLI is obligatory n maininterrogat-ives, independentlyof the frontingof the wh-element(thesameis true inBellunese, forexample,but notin Mendrisiottonorin French;cf. footnote11).

(12)a. k e-t fat?whathave-youdone?'Whathave you done?'

b. e-t tferk-a fora kwal?/ kwal e-t tferkA fora?have-yousearchedout whichlwhich have-yousearchedout?'Whichone haveyou chosen?'

c. ngo 1e-t majada?/1e-t majadangont?whereit have-youeaten?! it have-youeaten where?'Wherehaveyou eaten it?'

d. a ki i l-e-t dat?/ i l-e-t dat ato whom him it have-you given?! him it have-you given toki?whom?'Whom haveyou given it to?'

e. a-I vist ki?has-heseen whom?'Whom hashe seen?'

f. a%-i vist ki?have-they een who?''Whom have theyseen?'

12 See Benincaand Vanelli(1982), Beninca (1986) for Veneto dialects, Lura(1987) forLombarddialects,Rizzi (1991) forFrench.The phenomenonhas beenanalyzedby Munaro(1995, 1997, 1999): the wh-elementsthatcannot be left in situ are identifiedby Munaroon the basis of a difference in the internalstructureof the wh- itself and on the featurethat it instantiates.What concernsus here is thatthispossibility exists independentlyromdo-support.In the Lombarddialect of Mendrisio(Switzerland: ee Lura 1987) inversionapplies only if the wh- moves to SpecCP,while Belluneseis like Monnese, and shows SCIeven when thewh-elementhas remained n situ (see footnote 18 below). Hence, the wh- insitu phenomenon s independentof verbmovementto C, in principle,and consequentlyofdo-supportper se. This is the reasonwhy we do not discussthis any furtherhere andreferto the workby Munaro.


15/45

64 PAOLABENINCA AND CECILIAPOLETTO

g. ke e-f kunt'ao?/ e-f kuntazo kuewhathave-yousaid down?/have-yousaid down what?'Whathave you said?'

h. kwat ef speta'?/ e-f speta kwat?how.muchhave-youwaited?!have-youwaited how.much?'How long haveyou waited?'

In our view, this means that movement of the verb to the C? positionoccurs even thoughthe wh- element has remained in situ. Here we willassume that the SpecC position is occupied by an abstractwh-operatorwhen the wh- elementhas not moved, andthat it is the abstractoperatorwhich triggersverb movement to C?, as discussed in Poletto (1993) andMunaro(1997, 1999), wherea generaldescriptionof the phenomenon sprovided.In all main questions,it is impossible for a lexical subjectto appearimmediatelyafter the moved verb. This is a featurethat(again)Monnesehas in common with most otherRomancevarieties;so, no subjectDP ispermitted n the Spec,Agr position in French,Italian,Spanish,andNIDs(exceptfor V2 varieties).

(13)a. *ke a(-l) Mariomaja?whathas(-he)Mario eaten?

b. *ngo e(-l) Marionda'?whereis-heMariogone?

Inall embedded nterrogatives CLI is impossible (cf. (14d) vs. (12h)).We argue, following Rizzi and Roberts (1989), that the verb does notmove to a C0position in these cases. In general,wh-elements n embed-ded interrogatives equirea following complementizerke (cf. (14a, b)).An exceptionis ngo 'where' (see (14c)). Yes/noquestions areintroducedby the complementizerse 'if, whether'. A lexical subject is not easilyallowed in the Spec,Agrposition, althoughnot totally ungrammatical sshown in (14a). Compare 14b) with (14c), where a preverbalDP subjectis completelynatural:(14)a. i xo domandakol ke (??Mario)1 a fat

to.himLIhave sked thatwhat(Mario) he has done'I asked him what Mario did'


16/45

A CASE OFDO-SUPPORT N ROMANCE 65b. I so miakii ke i I aro dat

it Lknownot to whom thatI it will.havegiven'I don'tknow whomI could havegivenit to'

c. 1 so miango la mader I a cumpra fjur13it L.know ot wherethe mothershe has bought the lowers'I don'tknow wherethe motherboughtthe flowers'

d. *1 so miaquat e spetait I.knownot how.muchhave-youwaited'I don'tknowhow long you have waited'

Hence, both features found in Monnese (SCLI and the wh- in situstrategy)are not a peculiarityof Monnese syntax;they are foundin othervarietiesas well, all of which do not showdo-support.Therefore,we con-clude thatboth SCLI and thewh-in situstrategyare notdirectlyconnectedto thedo-supportphenomenon,andmust be factoredout fromour analysis.2.2.1. Questioning heSubjectWhenthe wh- element is a subject, here s no evidenceof verbmovementto C': the wh-subject s frontedand a complementizers obligatorilynser-tedin C'. Maininterrogatives n the subjectshow thena structureparallelto that of embedded nterrogatives:

(15)a. ki *(ke) 'a maja?who that has eaten?'Who ate?'

b. el so miakii *(ke) a ma.it l.knownot who that has eaten.'I don't knowwho has eaten'.

Anotherpossibilityis only open to unaccusativeverbs:the wh- subjectappears n postverbal position as an object, and the auxiliary optionally13 Note thatwhile otherwh-itemsare ollowedbythecomplementizer,ngo is not. Thisisprobablyrelatedto the fact thatngo is the only wh-itemthat admitsdoublingin embeddedcontexts. This is tangential o the phenomenonwe analyze here: see Poletto andPollock(2002) for a possible solution.14 The object clitic el at the beginning of the sentence is a pronominalcopy of theembeddedclause. Notice thattheinterrogative+human]pronoun who' has the formki inmaininterrogatives nd kii in dependentnterrogativesparallely, he [-animate]pronoun ske in maininterrogatives kue when it is in situ - and kol ke in dependent nterrogatives).


17/45

66 PAOLA ENINCA NDCECILIAOLETTOinverts with an expletive subjectclitic. This structure s not available toany other type of lexical verb:

(16) e-(l) viiiiu ki l'altrasera?is-it come who last night?'Whocame lastnight?'

(17)a. *a'-(I) maj'aki?has-it eatenwho?'Whoate?'

b. *a'-(I) telefon'a ki?has-it telephonedwho?'Whophoned?'

We will discuss this in a more detailed fashion in section 4. Concerningwh-subjects, or the momentwe simplystatethat:- the complementizer appears when the wh-element has moved toSpecC (cf. (15a) vs. (16));- the SpecAgr positionis notavailableforwh- in situ subjects;- the in situ strategyis possible only with unaccusative subjects thatremain n the free inversionposition.

Note that these data show thatthe extraction ite of unergative ubjectsis different from the extractionsite of unaccusatives.Only unaccusativesubjectshave the optionof stayingin situ, a property ypicalof objects.

3. DO-SUPPORT N MONNESELet us now turnourattention o thedo-supportphenomenontself.Firstweexamine thecharacteristicst has in commonwithits English counterpart;in the next section we attempt o derive the differences from independentsyntacticfactorsthatdistinguishRomancefromEnglish.Main interrogative entences with a simple verb have the followingform:15

15 In all cases, it is impossible to have a DP subject immediately after the verbfa ininterrogatives:

(i) *Ngo fa- (1) Mariomaja?where does (he)Mario eat?'Wheredoes Mario eat?'


18/45

A CASE OF DO-SUPPORT N ROMANCE 67(18)a. fa-I maja?

does-he eat?'Does he eat?'

b. kome fa-l komporta-s?how does-he behave-himself?'How does he behave?'

c. kwata fa-l maja-n?how.muchdoes-heeat-ofit?'How much does he eat?'

Following Rizzi (1991) (see discussionin section 2.2), we assumethattheverbfa ('to do') is located in C' - as SCLIsuggests.The mainverbap-pearsin its infinitival orm; object clitics are encliticizedon the infinitivalform- if theyarepresent;cf. (18b, c) (19b,) and (20a)- as is the case withall infinitival ormsin this dialect.16Since SCLI applies whether the wh-elementmoves to Spec, CP or isleft in situ, do-supportoccursindependentlyof the movementof the overtwh-element in section 2.2 we hypothesized hepresenceof a nulloperatorin SpecCwhenthe wh-element s left in situ).(19)a. kome fa-l komporta'-s?

how does-he behave-himself?'Howdoes he behave?'

b. fa-l komport'a-s kume?does-hebehave-himselfhow?

This is an instanceof the general constraintwe illustratedabove in (13).16 As is the case with a numberof NIDs, this varietyhas no Clitic Climbing (see Rizzi1982;Beninc'a1986;Kayne 1989). Verbssuch as riu-j 'can' (lit 'to arriveat') ole 'want',ve da 'have to; must', which in otherItalianvarieties can or must host the clitics of thecomplementclause, cannot do so in this dialect.Notice that a, when used as a support,behaveslike the othermodals(i.e., it refusescomplementclitics), but when it is thecausat-ive auxiliary, t obligatorilyhosts the complementclitics of its dependentclause (as is thegeneralcase in Romance):

(i) 1 m I fa vedehe to.meit makes see'He makes me see it'


19/45


(20)a. kwata fe-t maja-n?how.muchdo-youeat-ofit?'Howmuchwill you eat?'

b. fe-t maj'a-nkwata?do-you eat-of it how.much?

Letus now systematicallyconsider herespects n whichdo-supportn thisdialect is parallel o English.3.1. A ComparisonwithEnglishDo-Support:TheSimilaritiesAs in English,do-supportn Monnesehas thefollowing characteristics:(a) it occursbothin wh- andyes/no questions:

(21)a. fe-t maja'?do-you eat?

b. ke fe-t maja'?whatdo-youeat?c. fa-l ploer?does-it rain?

d. *pl6e-l?rains-it?

(b) it does not occur in embedded nterrogativeontexts:(22)a. (i domandjo)kol ke 1 maja

I ask what thathe eats'I wonderwhat he eats'

b. i t domandjose 1plofI you ask if-itrains'I'm askingyou if it is raining'

c. *i t domandjoke fe-t majaI you ask whatdo-you eat'I askyou whatyou eat'

d. *i t domandjo se) fa-l ploerI you ask (whether)does-it rain'I askyou whether t rains'


20/45

A CASE OFDO-SUPPORT N ROMANCE 69(c) it cannotapply to 'have' and 'be', even when they are used as mainverbs: 7

(23)a. kwal e-t tferk"a fo?whichhave-yousearched out?'Whichdidyou choose?'

b. *kwal fe-t ej tferkA fo?whichdo-youhave searched out?

c. ngo e-l na?whereis-he gone?'Wheredidhe go?'

d. *ngo fa-l esse na?where does-he be gone?'Wheredid he go?'

e. *kwal fe-t ej?whichdo-you have?

f. *ngo fa-l essewhere does-hebe?

(d) as in English,it can occur with the verbfa 'do,make':18(24)a. fe-f fa-l?

do-you(pl)do-it?'Do you do it?'

b. ke fa-l fa?whatdoes-he do?'Whatdoes he do?'

(e) it cannotoccurif the wh- is a subject.In this case a complementizer sinserted(see section 2.2.1), giving rise to a structurehat is in factparallelto embeddedquestions:'9

17 In fact, thereis a total similaritybetween English and Monnese with respect to theverbbe/esse;however, he similaritys onlypartialwithhavelej.Lexicalhave cannotmoveto C in AmericanEnglish, while it can in some varieties of BritishEnglish. In Monnese,lexical and auxiliaryhave are not distinct n thisrespect.18 This is also the case whenfa is the causativeauxiliary.19 Monnese is similar to standardItalian and pro-drop languages in general in notdisplaying anydifferencebetweensubjectextractionandobjectextraction.


21/45

70 PAOLA ENINCA NDCECILIAOLETTO(25)a. ki ke maja/a maja?

whothat eats! has eaten?'Whois eating/haseaten?'

b. *ki fa(-l1) maja'?whodoes(-he)eat?

These facts are consistentwith the idea that a-support(as do-support) striggeredby the need to fulfill therequirement f occupyinga headhigherthanAgrS (presumably,C?). So, in thecases where the verb cannot moveanyfurther,he supports inserted.As we will pointoutin whatfollows, the absenceoffa-support n struc-tureswitha wh-subjects strikinglyparallel o thephenomenonn English.InMonnese, though, here s clearerevidence thatthewh-subjectmoves toSpecCP,since in this type of structure complementizers inserted n C?.This structure an be then consideredas identicalto English,with the onlydifference hat n Englishthecomplementizerhas no phonologicalcontent(as is the case in otherconstructions).20We will reconsider he strategyadoptedwith unaccusativewh-subjectsin section4.1.1: for the momentwe just pointoutthat,if they stay in situ,the verbmust move to C0(see above(25b)for the case of theauxiliarybe);in the case of a lexical verb, a is inserted.3.2. TheDifferencesThe contextsof do-support n Monnese are morerestricted hanin Eng-lish, due to independentdifferencesbetween the two languages,the mostrelevantbeing the fact that the lexical verbin Monnese moves furtherupthantheEnglishverb n theIP field. Forprincipled easons,then,Monnesedo-support s limited to interrogative ontexts(i.e., to movementin CP),and does not appearto substitutefor verb movementin IP (see section4). Moregenerally, nside the interrogativedomain,thereareno syntacticcontextswheredo-support pplies nMonneseandnotinEnglish,but thereare lexical differencesin the members of the class of verbs allowing orprohibitingt.3.2.1. MonneseDoes Not Show Do-supportwithNegation

(26)a. 1 so miait I.knownot'I do notknowit'

20 See section 4.1.1.


22/45

A CASEOFDO-SUPPORT N ROMANCE 71b. *fo mia save-I

Ldo not know-itA sentencelike (26a) is similar to its positivecounterpartwith respecttoverb syntax. The only difference is due to the presenceof the sententialnegative markermia, which we showed above is in any case lower thanany inflectedverb(andoptionallybypassedeven by an infinitive f it is anauxiliary;but thesyntaxof infinitives s - as faras we know- irrelevantorthedo-supportphenomenon tself: see section4). The Monnesepostverbalnegativemarker s thereforeto be analyzedas a specifier,as it does notblock head-movementof the inflected verbhigherthan the negativepro-jection (see Pollock 1989;Zanuttini1997).As forEnglish,it is irrelevantwhether the negativemarker s a head or a specifier,as the verb nevermoveshigherthanNegP.213.2.2. MonneseDoes Not ShowEmphaticdo(27) *mad te FETkantabe!

butyou you DO sing well!ThisdifferencebetweenEnglish and Monnesewill also be treatedas due toan independent actorconcerningverb movement.The emphaticreadingis also supposedto result from movement to a functionalhead that theEnglishverb cannotreach(see amongothersLaka(1990) who definesthehead where negationand emphaticassertion are encoded as X-phrase).These differencesare then to be considered as a consequence of the factthat the Monnese inflected lexical verb moves in the IP field bypassingNegP (or a PolarityPwhere bothnegationandemphasisarerealized)andreachinga positionwhereit can checkthe relevant eature.3.2.3. MonneseDoes NotHave a Pro-predicatedoMonnese does not permitVP Ellipsis withpro-predicate o. This appearsto be a specialcase of the fact thatMonnese- as is apparently he case inall Romancevarieties(except perhapsPortuguese) does not permitVPellipsis afterauxiliariesat all:

(28)a. *anko 1 Mario 1 maja a l'osteria e an 1 Carlotoday the Mario he eats at therestaurantand also the Carlo1 fa22he does

21 Anotherpossible independentdifferencemight be the use of do in negative imperat-ives. Here we assimilatenegativeimperatives o the othernegativecontexts.22 Theposition of the subject s irrelevanthere.


23/45

72 PAOLABENINCA AND CECILIAPOLETTO

b. *i butiger i a als'a i presi ma i tfinema itheshopkeepers heyhave raised theprices butthe cinemastheya miahavenot

c. *la turtaI e suspendiida 6 be ma 1 pa I e mia.thecake it is risen upwell but the bread it is not

This is alsotruefor other ypesof VP-ellipsiswithauxiliaries,as is the casein Romancein general (butsee Miller (1997) for cases offaire-support nOld and MiddleFrench).3.2.4. LexicalDifferencesFinally,some differences are foundin the class of verbs that must or canhave do-supportn main interrogatives.We have seen that 'have' and 'be',both as auxiliariesand main verbs, cannot have do-support.As is wellknown, do-supportdoes not applyin English when the verb is a modal,while it is obligatorywith all main verbs and with lexical do. The situ-ation in Monnese is more complex: ole' ('want; wish') does not admitdo-support: n (29) we show all the possibilities with wh-questions,wh-in CP, wh- in situ andwh- in situ with a copy in CP; (29 d, e, f) show thatfa is always ungrammaticalwithole.

(29)a. kwal o-l?which wants-he?'Whichdoes he want?'

b. o-l kwal?wants-hewhich?

c. k 6-1 kwal?wh- wants-he which?'Whichdoes he want?'

d. kwal fa-l ole?which does-he want?

e. fa-l ole kwal?does-hewant which?

f. ke fa-l ole kwal?wh- does-he want which?'Whichdoes he want?'


24/45

A CASE OF DO-SUPPORT N ROMANCE 73

Thedeontic modal 'must' is expressedby thephrasevej da 'have to' and,as such, it does not show do-support contrary o the Englishmodalform'have to' butsimilarlyto 'must').The verbpode ('can, may') necessarilyhas do-supportn maininterrogatives.t has to be noticedthat this verb isprobablya borrowingromothervarieties,a very frequentalternativewiththe samemeaningbeingthe formruiai-jto arrive+loc.clit'.This formtoo,being a lexical verb,cannotbe moved to C0 andrequiresdo-support.23Two otherverbs,namelynda 'go' andfa 'do' can be optionallycon-strued with do-support,but can also be moved to C?, as the followingexamples illustrate:

(30)a. ngo fe-t nda'?wheredo-yougo?'Wheredo you go?'

b. ngo ve-t?wherego-you?'Wheredo you go?'

c. ke fa-l fa?whatdoes-he do?

d. ke fa-l?what does-he?'Whatdoes-he do?'

Speakersdo notperceiveany significantdifference n termsof grammatic-alityor interpretationetween the two variants.Othersemi-auxiliaryverbsmeaning'finish', 'begin', 'succeed', 'stop',etc. (i.e., thoserestructuringerbs whichhave,in manyRomancevarieties,quasi-modalproperties),behave like lexical verbs and always need do-support n interrogativeentences.The differencesbetween English and Monnese in this respect can besummedupas follows:Monneseinflectedverbs raise to AgrS while Eng-lish inflected verbsdo not. Moreover, n English a verbsuch as do movesor does not move, dependingon its semanticvalue(when it is used as anauxiliary t moves, when it is usedas a mainverb t does not). InMonnesethe auxiliaries 'have' and 'be' and the sole true modal ole 'want'always23 It hasbeenpointedout to usby ananonymousreviewer hatMonnesemight lackcliticclimbingbecause the class of realmodals is extremelyrestricted.However, t is a fact thatmany otherNIDs do not display clitic climbing (see Beninca 1986) despite the fact thatthey have a realclass of modals.


25/45

74 PAOLA ENINCA NDCECILIAOLETTOmove to C0 in interrogatives ndnever takedo-support.Fa 'do' andnda'go' optionally move to C?, again independentlyof theirbeing used asauxiliariesor as main verbs.This partiallyresemblesthe situation of theBritishvarieties mentionedabove (footnote 16), where the verb have op-tionallymoves to C0 even thoughit is used as a possessive and not as anauxiliary.24Thesedistinctionswill be discussedin section 4.3.3. Factoringout theDifferencesThe differences found between Monnese and Englishdo-supportcan beseen as differences regardingthe syntactic context in which the phe-nomenonappearsor differencesregarding he behavior of single verbs,dependingon whetherornot theybelong to the class of verbs"movingtoC0in interrogatives"thiswill be discussedin section4.4).In Monnese only interrogativecontexts both admit and requiredo-support:no do-supportis found in negative, emphatic, or VP-ellipsiscontexts. As has been shownin section 2, Monnese, on a par with otherRomancevarieties,has obligatoryV-to-I movementwhichcrosses thepo-sition where thenegativemarkermia (andprobably hepositiveemphatictoo) is realized.This is apparentlyrue for all modemRomancevarieties,even if the verb reaches differentpositions in the IP fields (see Cinque1999).Since every main verb in Monnese raises in the syntax to a positionlocatedhigherthan the negative/emphatic osition,it seems obvious whydo-supports notpossible in thesecontexts. Thatis, becausedo-supports'a last resort'strategy (so analyzedas earlyas Chomsky 1955), it is notpossible when it is notnecessary,as is the case in Monnese.Monnese shows that the differenttypes of do-supportmust be distin-guished on the basis of the functionalprojectionthat needs the verbaldummyelementin order o be renderedvisible (orin moretechnicaltermsto check its features).Monnesedataalso suggest thatalthoughdo-support n the IP domainand do-supportn interrogative tructuresareonly indirectlyrelated,theyare fundamentallydue to the same syntacticmechanism,thusconfirmingPollock's intuition.In both cases it is a matterof a movement thatis not

24 There is in fact variation n English too, with verbs such as dare, use to, which canmove to C0 (as is shownby formssuchas how dareyou?, they used not to go) despite thefactthat nEnglish theyhaveno clear modalproperties butG.Cinquepointedoutto us thatthe Italian verbosare corresponding o Englishdare belongs to the class of restructuringverbs in Italian,p.c.). Another case to take into account is how come?, which does nottoleratedo-support,butis mostprobablya fixed formwith theC0 position already illed.


26/45

A CASEOFDO-SUPPORTN ROMANCE 75open to a main verb.The Monnese verb cango pastthe negation/emphaticprojection, the English verb cannot.The reason why the verb has to gopast negation s anothermatter,andMonnesehas little to say aboutit. Inparticular,t gives us no hints concerningthe following two competinghypotheses:(1) not is a head blocking the relation of the inflectedverband the subject,or (2) the verbhas to move to a functionalprojection hatis 'too far' in order to appear n a properconfigurationwith the negativemarker. nany case theMonnesenegativemarker s notablockingheadbuta specifier,and the inflectedverbmovingto an Agrprojectionbypassesit(a similarclaim is madebyPollock(1989) for Frenchand Zanuttini 1997)forNIDs, respectively).We will thereforeconclude that Monnese and English do-support ninterrogative tructuresare instancesof one and the same phenomenon,namelythe lack of movement o C0 of a mainverb.3.4. UnaccusativeSubjectsMonnese andEnglish also differconcerningthe syntax of subjectinter-rogatives: while in English thereis no differencebetween transitiveandunaccusative ubjectinterrogatives,n Monneseunaccusativewh-subjectsdisplay do-support. 5 In compound tenses of unaccusativeswe have theauxiliarybe with expletive SCLI. In an interrogativewith a lexical unac-cusative verb in a simple tense- besides the usualstructurewithwh-item

25 In Monnese, as in otherdialects, the unaccusativesubjectis not forced to reach theAgrS projection,where an expletive subject clitic satisfies the ExtendedProjectionPrin-ciple; the inflected verb agrees with the expletive (as we can infer from the unmarkedmasculine formof thepast participle, he3rd sg. inflectionbeing identicalwith 3rdplural):

(i)a. 1 e rua ina letrait is arrived (m.sg.) a letter(fi)'Aletterhas arrived'

b. 1 e vuJf-nu la maestrait has come (m. sg.) the teacher(f)'Theteacherhas come'

c. la letra 1 e ruadathe letter(f:) is arrived (f)'Theletterhas arrived'

d. la maestra1 e vuifiiudatheteacher(f:) is come(f)'Theteacherhascome'


27/45

76 PAOLABENINCAAND CECILIAPOLETTO+ complementizerand no verbmovement(as in (3 la)) - there s theoptionof insertingdo-supportwith anexpletive subjectclitic (as in (3 ib)). In thelattercase the wh-subjectpresumablybehaves as an object- in the termsof Burzio (1986) andBelletti(1988) - and is left in situ:

(31)a. ki ke 1 va a ka?who that hegoes to home?

b. fa-l nda a ka ki?does-itgo to home who?'Whogoes home?'

Thus, Monnese andEnglish are similarin thatthey do not admit do-support with the wh- subject of a transitive or unergative verb. OnlyMonnese unaccusativewh- subjectspermitdo-support; hey arenormallyleft in situ. Do-support invertswith the expletive subject clitic and thethematicsubject s left in situ, forminganA-chainwith theexpletive. Suchwh- subjectsthus permit do-supportbecause of an independent yntacticproperty,26 namely the possibility of leaving a postverbalunaccusativesubjectin its baseposition.27Once again, the differenceconcerningsentences like (31) and theirEnglish counterparts oes not residein themechanismof do-support tselfbut is a consequenceof a more general propertycommonto several Ro-mance languages,namely the possibility of leaving unaccusative ubjectsin their basic object position (cf. Belletti 1988).

26 Differencesbetween unaccusative ubjectsand othersubjectscanalsobe found in thewhole of northern taly.As in manyvarietiesthat do not show wh- in situ, the subjectof atransitiveorunergativeverbmust be questioned hrougha cleft sentence(as in (ic)), whilea directquestion s possiblewith unaccusativewh- subjects(as in (ia) in contrastwith(ib)).(i)a. ki vjen stasera? Paduan

who comes tonight?b. *ki maha kwa?

who eats here?

c. ki zeke mafa kwa?who is that eats here?

27 English seems to possess a limited set of unaccusativeverbswhose subject is inser-ted in the object position (see Tortora1997). However, as it does not have a wh- in situstrategy ornond-linkedwh-words, hereflexes of thisphenomenoncannotbe observed ninterrogative entences.


28/45

A CASEOFDO-SUPPORTN ROMANCE 77In thenextsectionwe will see how theanalysisof Monnesedo-supporthas both empiricaland theoreticalrelevancefor English and Romance

syntax, as well as for a general theoryconcerningthe relationbetweenauxiliariesand verb movement.

4. RECONSIDERING o-SUPPORTOnce we have factored out the differences noted in section 3.2., we areleft witha Romance anguagethathasdo-supportnsertionruledby struc-turalconditions thatarea propersubset of the Englishones. This stateofaffairshas consequencesboth for Englishand Romancesyntax, and fortheMinimalist heory n general.Let us firstexamine howthe existenceofa languagelike Monnese influencesthe analysisof English interrogativestructures.4.1. Consequencesor English4.1.1. TheAnalysisof SubjectInterrogativesIn 2.2.1 and3.1, we have seen the two strategies or questioning he sub-ject. We noted that in Monnese do-support s impossible when the wh-elementcorrespondso thesubject; n thiscase, the C0position is occupiedby a complementizerand the wh- subjectis located in SpecC, as shownby (15) here repeated as (32a). The form correspondsto an embeddedinterrogative, xemplified n (32b,c):

(32)a. ki ke 'a majia?whothathas eaten'Whohas eaten?'

b. el so miakiu ke 'a majait LIknow ot who thathas eaten'Idon't knowwho has eaten'

c. mdomandjoa ku ke 1 g I "a datI wonder to whomthathe to.him t has givenThis structure hows thatthe CP level is activatedwhen a wh-subjectap-pears even when no verb moves to the C' position. Hence, in Monneseall interrogative lauses are CPs, even those on the subject.This can beconsidered o be an independentpiece of evidencefavoringan analysis ofEnglish subject interrogativesas CPs also. We point out that in no case


29/45

78 PAOLA ENINCA NDCECILIAOLETTOdoes modem StandardEnglish show a complementizer ollowing a wh-element, while in Monnese a complementizers obligatoryin embeddedinterrogativescf. (32b,c)). On the otherhand,modem StandardEnglishhas in general a phoneticallynull complementizer n embeddedclauses(relatives and complementclauses). Moreover,the Doubly Filled CompFilter, which describesthe impossibilityfor a wh-item to be followed bya lexical complementizer,s a recentinnovationof modem standardEng-lish; it was in fact absent in Middle English as it is in variousmodemdialects.28 t seems to us that we get aninterestinggeneralschemeforwh-movementphenomenaif we conclude that the two languages- EnglishandMonnese- have the same structure n subject nterrogatives,he onlydifferencebeinga differentconstraint egarding hephoneticrealizationofthecomplementizer.The analysis of Monnese syntax thus seems to favor a CP analysisofEnglish subjectinterrogative lauses such as the one proposedby Rizzi(1991) over an IP analysis as the one put forth by Grimshaw(1997).Grimshawassumes thatsubjectwh-itemsare located in SpecIP in virtueof principle Spec-OP,accordingto which operatorsneed to occur in aspecifierposition, not necessarily in the SpecCP.29As subjects are theonly elementsthat are alreadylocatedin a specifierposition, thereis noneed to projectan additionalsyntacticlayer like CP. Hence, the reasonwhy subjectinterrogativesare IPs andnot CPs is derivedfroma generaleconomy principleon structure ormation:CP is not projectedbecause,in the case of subjectwh-items,SpecIP can performthe same function.If this were so, we would expect a language like Monnese not to exist,becauseeconomyconditions aregeneral andnot language-specific.Evenwithinan OT account,wherewe could imaginethateconomy conditionsare rankedlower than otherprinciplesand can be violated in some lan-

28 Ithas beenpointedoutto usby ananonymous eviewer hattheovertrealizationof thecomplementizermightbe anirreducibleparametric ifferencebetweenMonneseandEng-lish. It is a fact thatthemajorityof NIDs hasdevelopedaninterrogative omplementizernembedded nterrogativesand often also in main interrogativesas an altemative o I to C0movement. We cannotsay why NIDs choose to phonetically realize a headwhichcan beemptyin English, andsimply pointout that(a) theovertrealizationof thecomplementizerdoes notdependondo-support,given that t is widespreadn NIDs; (b)thisis partof amoregeneralphenomenon,as complementizers retypicallyfound n temporal, onsecutive,andrelativeclauses. InMiddleEnglishand n modemEnglishdialects exical complementizersarefound in variouswh-constructionscf. e.g. OzarkEnglishcited in Chomsky1981; anoverview of Middle English cases in Viel 2001). This leads us to consider the option offillingthe C0 head with a lexical orphoneticallynull complementizeras a quitesuperficialparameter.29 In Grimshaw'sapproach abels like IP or CP are irrelevant,and are used only asnotationalconvention.


30/45

A CASE OFDO-SUPPORT N ROMANCE 79

guages, it is not clear what the conflictingprinciplewould be that couldoverrideeconomy and force the projectionof the additional ayer CP, asthe Monnese and English syntax of interrogative lauses is surprisinglysimilar.We canconcludethateither(a) Englishis like Monnesein havingCP subject interrogatives,or (b) the reason why English has IP subjectinterrogativeswhile Monnese does notcannotbe economy.4.1.2. A Note on the DiachronicDevelopmentof EnglishAs alreadymentioned n the introduction,Lightfoot(1979, 1991),Roberts(1985), and Pollock (1989) connect the developmentof the do-supportstrategy n Englishto thedisappearance f inflectionalmorphology,whichhas triggered n turn the loss of syntacticV-to-Imovement.Since Mon-nese has never lost obligatoryV-to-Imovementand nevertheless showsdo-support,we are forced to conclude that the lack of V-to-Imovementcannotbe a necessaryconditionto produce hedo-support trategy.30As Pollock(1989) alreadysuggests,theloss of inflectionalmorphologyis only indirectlyconnected o theloss of verb movement tself:do-supportis ultimatelytriggeredby a conspiracyof factors: (a) the lack of syn-tactic movement and (b) the necessity of checking a given feature in theinaccessible projection.Roberts(1993), in his analysisof the diachronicdevelopmentof verbmovement n English,has shown thattheverbcontinuesto movefor a cer-tainperiodevenwhen overtmorphologyhasbeen lost. V2 in theGermaniclanguages s a typical nstanceof thisphenomenon,as V to Cdoes not needany special morphologyas a trigger.In this sense, English andMonneseareparallel: n bothlanguagesa strong eatureprovidedby anindependentrequirementhas to be checkedin a syntacticposition that is inaccessibleto themain verb:a dummyverbis inserted.InMonnesedo-support s onlytriggeredby main nterrogatives ecause t is only C that s banned ormainverbs,while V to I (as shown in section 2.1) is completelypreservedas inall Romancelanguageswe knowof. Englishhas lost both V-to-Iand V-to-C.Hence,bothlanguagesreact o thesame tensionbetweentwoconflictingconstraints,the necessity to check a strongfeatureand the fact that theposition hostingthe featurehas become thematicallyopaque in Pollock'sterms; orbothlanguages heproblem s solved by insertingadummyverb.Monneseshows moreclearlythanEnglishthatverbalmorphologydoes notplay any role in the evolution of do-support,which is entirelydue to the

30 Independent videncethat sucha conclusion s necessarycomes fromthecomparisonbetween English, which lacks V-to-I-to-C,andmainlandScandinaviananguages, whichhave maintainedV-to-Cmovementbut show a verypoor morphology andno evidenceofV-to-Imovement(see, amongothers,Vikner1995).


31/45

80 PAOLAENINCANDCECILIAOLETTOloss of verb movementto C. Nevertheless, t is necessaryto conclude thatthe necessityof checkinga strongfeature s retained,and this is consistentwith the idea thatMonnese as otherRomance anguagesare "residual"V2languages,31 conclusion sharedby much recentresearch.4.2. ConsequencesRomance: V-to-CMovementConfirmedThe fact that do-supportalso exists in Romanceshows that in interrog-ative structureshe verb moves higherthan in normaldeclarativeclauses.Furthermore,t casts some doubtson recentanalysesof Romance nterrog-ativesas displayingonly LF(non-overt) -to-C:theMonnese data ndicatethat the verb moves in the syntax to the CP layer (contraHulk 1993;Sportiche 1995).We can see do-supportas a strategy o compensateI movementto C?,thus fulfillingthe requirements f (some versionof) the wh-Criterion cf.Rizzi 1991).In general,the diachronic endencyin Romancevarietieswith subjectclitic inversion(SCLI)in maininterrogativess to develop some strategyto avoid it. This is clearlyshown also by the evolutionof a languagelikeFrench,where wh- in situ, clefting andsimple wh-movement ollowed byno inversionare used in spoken language.All NIDs (exceptfor Triestino,whose storyis morecomplex)used to have consistentSCLIuntil 30, 50,or 100 years ago; many of them exploit more thanone strategyand stillpreservetraces of the obsolete SCLI,whichcan be still optionallyused atleast in some syntacticcontexts. Thisevolutionseems to indicatethatI-to-C movement n interrogativess beinglost in Romance, ust as generalizedV2 had been lost at the end of the medievalperiod.Theinsertionoffa can

31 We suggestthatMonnese solution to theloss of V-to-I-to-Cmovementwas to replaceit with a do-support trategy.We have to assume thatMonnese was most probablya fullyV2 language n the MiddleAges, even thoughwe do not haveaccess to the diachronicde-velopmentof this variety.This is the case for all Northem Italianvarieties, ncludingthoseNIIDs or which we have older texts preserved(cf. Beninca 1984, 1995, where evidenceis provided n favorof a V2 syntax for northemandsouthem medievalvarieties of Italianand Old French).These languageswere V2 in the medievalperiodand lost this propertyat the beginningof the Renaissanceperiod (cf. Beninca 1986, 1995). Most NITDs avelost generalizedV2: some haveretainedresidualV2 in interrogative ndoptativecontexts(Rhaetoromance arieties still have a V2 syntax:see Benica 1985/6;Poletto2000, Ch. 4).Some dialects have lost V-to-I-to-Caltogether, ubstitutinga complementizer or the verbin C. Monnese has not completely lost residualV2, as the requirementof a V in C is stillat work. Inthis dialectthe less costly strategyof merginga dummyverb nstead of movingthe lexical verb has been chosen.

Since Monnese has apparentlyost I-to-C,but not V-to-I,the context of applicationofthe do-support trategyseems to be limited to the C' projection: ee section 4.4. for morediscussion).


32/45

A CASE OFDO-SUPPORT N ROMANCE 81be seen as one of the possible ways (certainly he least used in Romance)to fulfill the task of an inflected verbmovingto C?. The existence of thedo-support trategy n the Romance domain s thuspotentiallyvery inter-estingas it confirmsRizzi's (1991) intuition hat the verbmoves to theC?positionin maininterrogativesnRomance, oo (as it does in theGermaniclanguages).4.2. 1. Lexical Verbsand Theta TheoryIn this section we will consider the second type of differences foundin Monnese do- supportwith respectto its English counterpart,namelythose foundinside the domain of modals andauxiliariesmovingto C0(cf.section3.2, 3.3).We have seen that in Monnese, the only modal which always movesto C0 is olh 'want/wish',while othermodals cannot be taken as relevant:either they are borrowingsfrom standard talian and behave as lexicalverbs,32or are a compoundformedby 'have' plus a preposition and assuchbehave ikeauxiliary have'.33Two othersemi-auxiliaryverbs,fa 'do'and nda 'go', optionally move to C0 or takedo-support.The problemthatarises withtheMonnese data s thatnone of theseverbs- ole, fa, andnda-shows anysyntacticdifference n their use as mainverbsor as auxiliaries.Ole alwaysraises to C0,even in those contexts in which it is a mainverbwhich takes a direct object, 34 while fa and nda optionallyuse the do-supportstrategyif they are used as main verbs which take a direct anda locativeobject (respectively)or when they are used as auxiliaries.Thisconstitutesa problemforPollock'stheory,morepreciselyforthe ideathatthepresenceof a theta-grids thefundamental easonfor theimpossibilityof movement cf. Pollock 1989, section4).Monnese, as we have seen for many othersItaliandialects, has richverbal morphology and movement of the inflected verb to AgrS. Thelast step of interrogativemovement,however,has to be performedbyfa:clearly,fa is insertedwhen the verb has to go fartherthan AgrS, to apositioncorresponding o C0. In thisrespect,MonneseconfirmsPollock'sintuition.What is weakened is the correlationbetween theta-theoryandverbmovement:Pollocksuggeststhataverbcanraiseto anopaquedomainonly when it is theta-transparenti.e., when it does not assign any theta-role). Hence, auxiliaries, which do not assign any theta-role,can raise32 This fact is not at all obvious: we must assume that modals behave as they do inthe syntax only when they undergoa "grammaticalizationrocess"losing part of theirsemanticsandphonologicalweight (on this subject,see RobertsandRoussou 1999).33 InMonnese,both 'be' and 'have'arealwaystreatedas auxiliaries; his is not thecasein all varietiesof Englishfor 'have', which in AmericanEnglishbehavesas a full verb.34 Butsee Cinque(2001) forarguments hat t is arestructuringerb even in thesecases.


33/45

82 PAOLABENINCAAND CECILIAPOLETTOto I and C, while main verbs do not, as the thematicrelationwith theirargumentswouldbe inhibited.Here,boththe differencesandthe similar-ities betweenMonnese andEnglishshow that the assignmentof a verb tothe class of items that can reachC? is partially diosyncratic.Auxiliariesnecessarilybelongto thisclass, while modals canswitchfromone class toanother n different anguages.A realdifferencebetween Englishand Monneseappears o be the factthat n Englisha verb(e.g., will) movesordoes notmove to higherprojec-tions(andconsequentlyhasordoes not havedo-support)dependingon itsauxiliaryversusmain verb status.If it is a modalauxiliary t moves, if itis not (with the meaningof 'to want' or 'to make a will'), it cannot. Thisdifferencebecomes less obviousif we considerthose oftencited varietiesof BritishEnglishwhere 'have'- boththe auxiliaryandthe lexical verb-can(orusedto be ableto) invertwiththesubjectandavoiddo-support,n-dependentlyof its value.These varietiesof Englishare in factproblematicforPollock'sanalysis,if lexical have is assumedto assigna theta-roleandcan still move to C?.The samedifficulty s moreevidentin Monnese. Wehave seen that in Monnese an ambiguousverb (likefa 'do' or ndai'go')apparentlyhas the optionof movingor not,regardlessof its meaning.Hence, the do-support heoryproposedby Pollock seems to be con-firmedby Monnese data except for one point: Pollock attributes o thepresenceof a theta-grid he impossibilityof mainverbsto raise to opaquepositions.Monnese shows thatthis cannotbe entirelytrue, as some verbsmove to C0 (or use do-support), ndependentlyof theiruse as auxiliariesor as mainverbs,which meansindependently romthe supposedopacitythatwouldaffecttheircapacityto assigntheta-roles.

Pollock's hypothesis can be maintained f, adoptingKayne's (1994)proposalon auxiliaries,we argue hat modalsas well havethe samestruc-ture,regardlessof whetherthey are used with an infinitive or with a DP.Hence, verbs like ole 'want' in Monnese would always have the samestructure, .e., the structureof an auxiliarycapable of raisingto opaquepositions,as it does not assign thematicroles.When the modal apparentlydoes have a thematic grid, this is notprovidedby the modal auxiliaryitself, butby a phoneticallynull verbalheadinsertedunderV?,much in thespiritof Larson'sproposalconcerningcomplexVP shellsand of muchsubsequentworkthatadmitstheexistenceof null (light)verbalheads.35The structure f a modalverb like ole whenit has a DP complementwouldthusbe approximatelyheone in (33):(33) [AgrS [TPmodalaux [vpnullV [DP]]]]

35 Cf. Cinque (2001) for independentevidence based on restructuring henomenainfavor of this analysis of modalverbs in standardtalian.


34/45

A CASE OFDO-SUPPORT N ROMANCE 83The hypothesis that modal (and some aspectual)verbs are the overtrealizationof functionalcategorieshas been advancedby Cinque(2001)on the basis of phenomenaconnectedto restructuringn Italian.Verbslike nda 'go' andfa 'do', which optionallymove to C?, wouldhave the possibility of switching between the structureof a main verbandthe structure f an auxiliary; he switch would be independentof theiruse as mainverbs or as auxiliaries.It remainsto be investigatedwhattheconditionsrulingthis syntacticswitch could be. Trying o account for thisstateof affairs,one couldproposethatthese verbshavetwo separateexicalentries,a move thatdoes not seem veryilluminating o us.We develop a moreprincipledaccountalongthefollowing lines:up tonow we have seen thatthe standardheoryprovidesus with two types ofverbs:mainverbs,which areinsertedunderV? andhave a thematicgrid,andpurelyfunctionalverbs,whichconstitute he phonologicalrealizationof a given functional head. Verbslike Monnese nda andfa can be seenas a thirdclass, representingan intermediate tageof grammaticalizationfrom a fully lexical verbtowards a "pure" unctionalAuxiliary.36 Moreprecisely, as alreadymentionedabove, we will appealto Larson's(1988)

theoryof VP-shells andassumethat the VP layer is constitutedby at leasttwo distinctprojections,the higher one occupiedby a light verb and alower one containingthe lexical verb head with its semanticandphono-logical endowment:eitherfunctionalheadcan be filled by a phoneticallynull element.Such a theory providesus with the tools for getting a more preciseidea of grammaticalization,.e., a processthroughwhich a lexicalelementbecomes a functional one (see Roberts and Roussou 1999 for a recentaccount of this phenomenon in formal terms).We claim that the semi-auxiliaryverbs in question have undergoneonly the first stage of thisprocess; n moretechnicalterms,theyaremerged n thelightverbpositionof a complexVP and can optionallybe associatedwitha null lexical verb,as in (34):

(34) [vP emi-aux[vpnullVDP]]When they are, they undergoall the lexical and syntacticrestrictionsde-riving fromthe presenceof the thematic gridselectedby the null lexicalverb;whentheyarenot,theyarefree to move to thefunctionalprojectionsthatarebanned or a lexical verb.Summingup:we notedthatMonnese hasthreedistinctclasses of verbs,whichbehavedifferentlywithrespect to thedo-supportphenomenon:

36 See also Cardinalettiand Giusti (2001) on movementverbs that behave as modalheads in SouthemItaliandialects.


35/45


(a) auxiliariesandmodals,which lackdo-supportobligatorily;(b) semi-auxiliaries,which can but need not use do-support;(c) mainverbs,whichrequiredo-support.Both modals and semi-auxiliariesseem compatiblewith a thematicgrid. We claim that in fact they are not: modals are always generatedin a functionalhead (as proposedby Cinque2001). Semi-auxiliariesaresimilarto modals in the sense that they are instances of a higherhead,namely v? andnot V. Nevertheless,both modals andsemi-auxiliariescancooccur with anemptyverbalhead,which is theone thatassignsthematicroles. In this way we capturethe exceptionsto Pollock's generalizationthatdo-supportcan be dispensedwith only when the verb does not havea thematicgrid:neither modalsnor semi-auxiliarieshave a thematicgridof theirown;the thematicgridis providedby the null V thatthey can beassociatedwith.374.3. GeneralTheoreticalConsequences4.3.1. TheRole of MorphologyWe have seen that Monnese verbal inflection is strong (as it usually isin pro-droplanguages),with obligatoryV-to-I movement.Nevertheless,Monnese hasdevelopedthedo-support trategy orI-to-C. Insection 4.1.2we pointedout that t is possibleto maintain hehypothesisthatdo-supportoriginateswhen themovementof the verbto a givenF?is lost: thedummyverbsubstitutes or the mainverbin theF?whichhasbecome inaccessible(opaquein Pollock's terms) to main verbs.Do-supportcan in principleoccur in anyof thefunctionalheads thatbecomeopaque.English has lost V-to-I and has substituteda dummyverb in the I toC0 positions whenevera strong feature has to be checked in a verb inthesepositions.If we considerEnglishsyntax,it is reasonable o thinkthatthe loss of V-to-Imovementtriggersthe do-support trategy.The relationbetween the loss of syntacticmovementto the 10 position andthe loss ofovertmorphology s muchless clear,as thelack of overtmorphologydoesnot imply the lack of syntactic movement:we can see, for example, thatin V2 languages the featurethat attracts he verb to C0 is not necessarilyan overtmorpheme;moreover,mainlandScandinaviananguageswithoutany overt verbmorphologyprovide evidence of verbmovement to I andto C (see Vikner1995, amongothers).As discussedabove,do-support striggeredby the interactionof two factors:on the one hand,the I' positionis still strongenough to requirea visibleelement;on theother, heverb haslost thepossibilityof extending ts thematicdomainto thefunctional ayer

37 This analysiscouldpossiblybe extended to causativeverbsas well.


36/45

ACASEOFDO-SUPPORTN ROMANCE 85of thestructure ndtherefore annotmove to I?,unless it is a verbthatdoesnot assignany thematicrole.Inthisperspective, he loss of morphology sthe reflex of this syntacticprocess,namelythe loss of verbmovement o agiven functionalheadF?.Hence,the relationbetweenpresence/absence fovertmorphologyanddo-supports not direct andautomatic. n this per-spective,Pollock'shypothesis s made even moreprecise:it is an abstractpropertyof the V - namely its thematicendowment which is more dir-ectly related o thetype of movementa V is able to perform.Thispropertymay ormay not be accompaniedby a loss of overtmorphology.Letus nowturn othecase of Monnese:Monnese haslost I-to-C move-ment of lexical verbsand hassubstituted dummyverbin the C0position.Again, this process mustbe due to the interactionof the two factors men-tionedabove:theexistence of a strongC position,whichcontainsfeaturesthathaveto be checkedby someovertelement,andthe loss of thepossib-ility of extending the thematicdomain of a verb to the highest functionallayer,namelyCP.Note however, hat this loss does not correspond o anymorphologicalimpoverishment f the verbalhead,or of the systemin general.Therefore,what seems to be weakenedby the observationof Monnese syntaxis theroleof overtmorphology.As NIDs do not showmorphologicaldifferenceswhentheypass from a V2 to a non V2 status,we canonly hypothesize hatthefeaturewhichpermits heextensionof thethematicdomainof theverbis anabstractone.4.3.2. Where he VerbalSupportArisesAnotherproblempartiallyrelatedto thepreviousones is the following:ifMonnese syntax is substantially imilar to that of English,do is insertedto realize the featuresof an opaqueposition that cannotbe reachedbya main verb.38We would expect the Monnesedo-support o originate nthe C0position,since the lowerposition(AgrS) is transparent ndconsti-tutesa landingsite for verbmovement(as we haveshownin section2.2.).We shouldthereforeexpect cases like the following to be grammaticalnMonnese,if we taketheformfa as aphonologicallyunmarked erbalroot:

(35)a. *Fat cumpret?dOrootyouyou.buy?

38 One of the anonymousreviewershas suggestedthat we mightconsideran alternativeperspective,namely viewing the impossibility for the verbto move from I to C as a con-sequenceof theinsertionof do (in I), which occupiesthe position;it seems to us thatwhatremains o be accounted or in this theory s theinsertionof do, whichappearsunmotivated.


37/45

86 PAOLABENINCAAND CECILIAPOLETTOb. *Dohebuys?c. fe-t kumpra?

you.do-youbuy?In (35a) theauxiliaryoriginatesn C0(oraposition ocatedbetween CoandAgrS) andthe main verb reaches theAgrS positionbelow and is inflectedfor tense and agreement: he subject pronounprecedes it, in SpecAgrS.However,this structures ungrammaticaln Monnese(cf. (35c)); we havethe parallelEnglishcase in (35b), which is ungrammaticaloo: the mainverb is inflected and the do-support s directly inserted where needed.Monnese then is very similar to English in that the auxiliary s inflectedand followed by an infinitival orm of the mainverb (as in (35c), whichremains,mostprobably,belowAgrSandT?,as suggestedabove,in section2.2.39A straightforwarduestionarisesat least for Monnese:if in Monnesethe AgrS position is a transparent osition, there is nothingthatpreventsthe verb frommovingas highas it usuallydoes in declarative ontexts anddo-support rommergingdirectlyin CP.As this is not the case, we haveto find a reason thatpreventsthe auxiliaryfrom being inserteddirectlyunder heCoposition,forcing t to be generatedower down in thestructure(probablyat the T? level, where the English do is also inserted).If theauxiliary s generatedunderT?, it cannotbe compatiblewith an inflectedmain verbthat hasto raise to T?andAgrS?to checkits features.Note that a similarproblemarises for English too, for we could inprincipleexpect to find an inflectedlexical verb and an uninflected do'in interrogative entences. Thatis, do would appear n C0 and would befollowedby a declarative entencestructure,wherethemainverbtakes theinflectionalmorphemewithoutraisingto T? (andsubsequently o AgrS?).If we assume Kayne's (1989) hypothesis thatthe inflectionalmorpheme-s of the thirdpersonsingular s the morphologicalcounterpart f a Num-ber projection(located lower than AgrS), the problemremains, since itshould always be possible to use the structureof a declarativesentence,with the main verb raising to the projectionwhere it usually raises indeclarativesentences,and insert do where it is needed (namely, in C? inthe interrogative ases we aredealingwith).

39 One interesting ine of research that we do not pursuehere but that is nonethelessworthmentioning, s the idea thatdo-supportmight be also relatedto the raising possibil-ities of the infinitivalverb:only in languagesthathaveinfinitival ormsthat do not raise upto AgrS coulddo-supportdevelop.In otherwords,languages like standard talian, wherethe infinitivalverbraises veryhigh in the IP structure, ouldneverdevelop do-support.


38/45

A CASE OFDO-SUPPORT N ROMANCE 87We see two possible ways to answer these questionsandexplainwhycases illustratedby (33a, b) areexcluded:

1. If we assume Rizzi's (1991) idea thatT?containsthe [+wh]feature hatmust be movedto the head of the CP in order to enter into a Spec-Headrelationwith the wh- operator, 33) is excluded becausetheauxiliarymustbe generated n T?and not in C0,since it has to carrythe wh-feature romI?to C?.Note that this impliesa particular iew of do-supportas realizinga lowerfeaturewhich has to be moved onto another higher)head,andnotas the simple realizationof a strongfeatureon a givenF0whichotherwisewould remainunspelled. This could be correctfor both V-to-I and I-to-Cdo-support, f a split IP hypothesisis adopted.However,the hypothesisthatT? contains[+wh]featurescannotbe maintained or all those dialectsmentionedabovewherea complementizers directly nserted n C0,andnoT to C movement s visible. Thisobviouslyweakens the basicidea, whichcould nevertheless till be true for some languages;2. We can see the fact thata dummyauxiliarysuch as do/fa cannot begenerateddirectlyunder he C0projectionas aninstanceof a moregeneralprinciple,one which does not depend on the particular equirementsofinterrogativetructuressuchas movementof the [+wh]feature rom T0 toC0).We couldassume thateveryverbalelement hasto originate n a lexicalor functionalpositionof a 'verbalnature'.The functionalpositions insidethe IP field are verbal in theirnature,while CP is not, as it constitutesthe interface between IP and the outside of the clause (cf. Rizzi (1997)and Grimshaw(1997) for similarobservationson the nature of the twofunctional ields,IPandCP).Hence,a verbalelement ike do couldonlybegenerated nside the IP/VPdomain.Therefore,Monnesedo-supportusesa structurewhichis substantiallyverysimilarto that of English,and not astructureikethe one in (33a) eventhoughthelattermeetstheexpectationsconcerninga language n whichAgrS is transparentn Pollock's terms.Thus, theexaminationof Monnesedo-supportprovides nterestingem-piricalevidence on the generalconstraints hatare active when a supportstrategy s instantiated.4.4. Consequencesor theMinimalistProgramIn this section we will brieflydiscuss the potentialproblemsfor the Min-imalist framework Chomsky 1995) and the possible consequences thatcan be derived on the basis of Monnese. First of all, Monnese providesinterestingevidence for assuming a gradationconcerningthe cost of thetwo strategiesof Merge andMove. It has been noted in section 2 that the


39/45

88 PAOLAENINCANDCECILIAOLETTOdo-supportstrategyis rarein itself and that the majorityof NIDs eitherhave V-to-C or a complementizermergedin C?; i.e., thatthey use eitherMove orMergebut not a combinationof thetwo.We noticed that Monnese constitutesan intermediatestage betweenthose NiIDs hathavemaintained esidualV2 and those dialects thathaveentirelysubstitutedverb movementwith the insertion n C0 of a comple-mentizer(whichcan be eithernull or phoneticallyrealized).Monnese hasmaintaineda strong C, which attractsa verb, but uses a Merge strategyinstead of a movementone to satisfythe requirementmposedby the CP.As the Merge strategy s considered ess costly in the Minimalist frame-workthan the movementstrategy,we shouldfindmanydialects that showdo-support.However,this is not the case. Most dialects arein theprocessof substitutingverb movementwith a complementizerandneverdevelopthrougha stage comparableto Monnese. The reason why this is so isthe following, in our view: as we have pointedout in section 4.3.2, thedummyelement,in Englishas in Monnese,is not inserteddirectlywhereit is required:even when C0 requiresa verb, the dummy is insertedin10; therefore,neither in Englishnorin Monnesedo-supportdo we have acase of Mergesubstituting orMove;in bothlanguagesMergeof a lexicalelement is substitutedby Merge plusMove.Thus,Monnese combines the two strategiesof MergeandMove, and,judging fromthe extremelyscarce distributionof the phenomenon,endsupbeingless economical thanboth thosevarietieswithresidualV2, whichuse Move, and those with the complementizer,which use Merge. Thisline of reasoningaccounts for the rarityof the construction,but raisesa problemfor its existence: if Merge+Moveis more costly than Movealone, we would not expect a languageto change from a Move strategyto a Merge+Moveone, as Englishcertainlydid andin all likelihood-Monnesedid too.On the otherhand, if this account of the rarityof the phenomenon nterms of economy conditions s correct, t showsthat(a) eithera languageis not as strictlysubject o economy principlesas we would like it to be, or(b) althoughMergeis less costly thanMove alone,Merge plusMove mustbe more costly thanMove alone. Hence, Merge must itself cost a certainamount of effort, and not simply be totally free. This bringsback fromanotheranglea problemfor theMinimalistprogram hat has alreadybeennoted, namelythenecessity of comparing omputations hathave differentnumerationsat theirbasis, a move disallowed by the system (see Frank2002).Moreover, he analysisof Monnese casts some doubts on the assump-tion that do-supportis simply a PF-phenomenon(cf. Chomsky 1995),


40/45

A CASEOFDO-SUPPORTN ROMANCE 89wherea strong eaturehas to be made visibleby mergingadummyelementin thatposition.However,as discussedabove,Mergedoes not occurin CP,where the strongfeatureis, but lower thanthat, in I, as the presence ofverbalagreementon the dummyand lack of agreementon the mainverbshow. Thus, we are forced to postulatethat in the PF componentthereismovement,but movement s atypicalfeatureof thecomputationalystem.Even if all instancesof head movement are transferrednto the PF com-ponent,as proposedin much recent Minimalist iterature, he problemofdoublingthemechanism inthecomputationalystemand atPF)remains,and its consequencesareparticularly umbersome:n order o accountforthe derivationof do-support not only in Monnesebutin Englishas well,as we pointedout in section4.3.2) we would have to assume thatalso atPFwe firstmerge thedummyelements thatarerequired o satisfya featurelocatedhigherin the structure ndthenmove them.Hence,both at PFandin the computational omponentMergeprecedesMove: while this order-ing has a straightforwardxplanation or the computational omponent, tdoes notfollow fromanythingatPF.Moreover, hereduplication f MergeandMoveat twodistinct evels of the grammar learly ooks redundant ndshould be avoided.A thirdinterestingaspect is the very fact that the dummyverb cannotoccur directly in C0 as Merge in C is open only to complementizers,asshownby manyNorthern taliandialects(cf. Poletto2000). Inotherwords,althoughC projectionsareopen to verbmovement,a verb,even a dummyone, can neverbe directlymerged in the C domain. The reasonwhy thisis so remainsmysterious and cannotbe accounted for in the MinimalistPhasetheory,whereonly vP and CP arePhases of the computational ys-tem. Although IP is clearlynot a phase, it appears o constitutea kind ofunity distinctfromCP, and this once againseems to be a propertyof thecomputational ystem and not of the PF component.We will not go anyfurthernto a detailedproposalof whichmechanismaccountsfor this factandlimitourselves to pointingout that,on the one hand,the natureof thebarrierbetween IP andCPappears o be partof the computational ystemand not a PF phenomenon,while, on the otherhand,this does not seemsomethingthatcaneasily be accounted orby the theoryof Phases.

5. CONCLUSIONSDo-supportin the Romancevarietywe have analyzedhere shows strik-ing similaritieswith theEnglishphenomenon.It is triggeredby the samefactor:the impossibility for the verb to raiseto a given functionalprojec-tion. It is thereforesubjectto the same restrictions it only occurs in the


41/45

90 PAOLABENINCAAND CECILIAPOLETTOcontextin which it is needed).Romancedo-support onfirms he intuitionthatthe phenomenon s a 'last resort'strategy,andalso sheds somelightonthegeneraltheoryof auxiliary nsertionas well as on Englishdo-support.In general,there seems to be a requirementhatforcesauxiliaries o beinserted nside thelIPdomaineven if their nsertion s triggeredby featuresinsertedin C?:IP is verb-related,while the CP domainis not (cf. Rizzi1997 and Grimshaw1997).Do-support annotarise n C?; t mustoriginateinsidea lowerFP in theIP field.Moreover, t seems thatthe class of verbsthatdo notneeddo-support ontainssome modalsusedas mainverbswitha theta-grid.

The examinationof do-supportalso has consequencesfor ouranalysisof Romance n general,as it confirms hat n maininterrogativesheinflec-ted verbmoves to C0in theselanguages,too (as proposedby Rizzi 1991),while it does not in embeddedclauses.The Monnese facts also suggest some conclusionconcerningsEnglishsyntax:(1) in Romancedo-supportshows t

a case of do-support in romance - benincà

Documents