The organization of grammar

LEXICON

[MERGE]

BASE STRUCTURE

[MOVE]

SPELL OUT STRUCTURE

The logic of movement

[ … XP …. Gap… ]the properties of XP are the properties typically associated with the gap positionI wonder [who Mary likes]

CP CPwho IP who IP

Mary VP Mary VP V V NPlikes likes who

Argument 3: Case

I saw him he left

*I saw he * him left

who(m) did you meet? who met you?

* whom met you?

who do you think [_ should meet M in Rome]?

whom do you think [M should meet _ in Rome]?

* whom do you think[ _ should meet M in Rome]?

Argument 4: Syntactic selection

I relied on Bill for adviceI turned to Bill for advice* I relied to Bill for advice* I turned on Bill for advice

On whom do you think that Bill relies_ for advice?

* To whom do you think that Bill relies _ for advice?

The mechanics of movement

‘Pure’ physical displacement

[ you like who] [who [you like]]

Copying

[ you like who][who [ you like who]]

According to the copy theory, there are silent

traces of dislocated constituents.

Partitive clitic pronouns in Italian

Gianni ha incontrato una americana

Gianni (has) met a-fem American-fem

Gianni ha incontrato una americana

Delete the last vowel of the article if the

following word starts with the same vowel

(OBLIGATORY at a normal speech rate)

Partitive clitic pronouns in Italian

Gianni ha incontrato una ragazza franceseGianni (has) met a-fem girl-fem French-fem

Gianni met a friendly committee

Paolo ha incontrato una ne americana

Paolo has met a-fem one American-fem

Paolo met an American one

Obligatory movement of partitive pronouns

Paolo ha incontrato una ne americana

Paolo has met a-fem one American-fem

Paolo met a friendly one

ne must move onto the first inflected verb

Paolo ne ha incontrata una _ americana

Gianni one has met an __ American

Paolo met an American one

Blocking of contraction

Paolo ha incontrato una americana

Paolo ne ha incontrata una americana

Contraction is impossible here

* Paolo ne ha incontrata un americana

The copy theory arguably explains why

Paolo ne ha incontrata una ne amica

The two a’s are not adjacent, after all

A similar phenomenon in English

I want to go home I wanna go homewant to wanna in fast, informal speech

you want [CPto meet Sue at the party]

who do you want [CPto meet __ at the party]?who do you wanna meet __ at the party?you want [ Bill to meet Sue at the party]who do you want [__ to meet Sue at the party]?Can want to contract to wanna in this environment?

Traces (can) block contraction

Who do you wanna meet at the party?

Who do want to meet Sue at the paty?

* Who do you wanna meet Sue?

Who do you want [to meet who at the party]?

Who do you want [who to meet Sue]?

If movement is not copying and doesn’t leave

silent traces behind why would contraction be

blocked in the observed manner?

Summary

Two major syntactic processes

Merge: builds base structures out of lexical

items

Copy: dislocates items from base structure

position- copy introduces invisible elements that, however,

the mind’s eye sees.

Crosslinguistic variation

The Head Parameter

Cross linguistic variation

• If a language has the order [O V], we should expect the order [NP P]

• Languages with the order [O V] and [P NP] should be rare and tendentially unstable

• Latin:

puellam video me cum

girl-acc see-1st me with

An exercise in translation

Taro-ga Hiro-ga Hanako-ni syasin-o

Taro-SU Hiro-SU Hanako-DAT picture-ACC

zibun-no miseta to omette iru

self-POS showed that thinking be

An exercise in translation

Taro-ga Hiro-ga Hanako-ni zibun-no

Taro-SU Hiro-SU Hanako-DAT self-POS

syasin-o miseta to omette iru

picture-ACC showed that thinking be

Taro is thinking (thinks) that Hiro showed a

picture of himself to Hanako

Word order: After (>) or Before (<)

Taro-SU [[Hiro-SU Hanako-to self-POS

picture-ACC showed]IP that]CP thinking be

Element A Element B J E

V DO > <

V PP > <

V CP > <

P complement NP > <

N complement NP > <

Comp complement IP > <

Aux V > <

The head-complement parameter

No invariant universal basic orderNo ‘any basic word order goes’ (27 = 128)Conditionals statements of the form:If the language is O V it has postpositionsIf the language is V O it has prepositions[Greenberg’s universal # 3][X YP] English, Edo, Thai,.. 42%[YP X] Japanese, Lakhota, Latin,.. 45%

English vs. Japanese clause structure

IP

NP I’

Chris

is VP

V PP

talking P NP

with Pat

IP

NP I’

VP iru ‘is’

John-ga PP V

NP P renaisite

to ‘in love’

Mary ‘with’

Another parameter

John wonders [Lea ate what]?

John wonders what Lea ate __

* What does John wonder Lea ate __

* What does John wonder whether Lea ate __

wh-words move to mark the scope of a Q

(= what is being asked)

wonder takes Qs; wh-words must move next to it to satisfy this requirement

Verbs of believing

John believes [Mary ate what]?

* John believes what Mary ate__

what (does) John believe [Mary ate __]

believe takes a proposition (‘a thought’); it cannot take a Q. Hence, a wh-word cannot move next to it. It must move passed it. Otherwise, it would wrongly signal that you are ‘believing a Q’

To reiterate the point (from a different position)

John wonders [who stole the cookies]

* who does John wonder [__ stole the cookies]

* John believes [who stole the cookie]

Who does John believe[ __ stole the cookies]

Versatile verbs: know

John knows [Lea ate what]?

John knows what [Lea ate __]

What does John know that [Lea ate __]?

know takes both Qs and propositions

Therefore, a wh-word can move either next to it, or passed it. In either case, the semantic needs of know will be met.

Mandarin: A language without wh-movement

a. [Zhangsan wen wo [shei mai-le shu]]

Zhangsan ask me who buy-ASP book

b. [Zhangsan xiangxin [ shei mai-le shu]]

Zhangsan believe who buy-ASP book

c. [Zhangsan zhidao [shei mai-le shu]]

Zhangsan know who buy-ASP book

What do these sentences mean?‘ask’ vs. ‘believe’

a. [Zhangsan wen wo [shei mai-le shu]]

Zhangsan ask me who buy-ASP book

Zhangsan asked me who bought the book

b. [Zhangsan xiangxin [ shei mai-le shu]]

Zhangsan believe who buy-ASP book

Who does Zhangsan believe bought the book

What do these sentences mean?

c. [Zhangsan zhidao [shei mai-le shu]]

Zhangsan know who buy-ASP book

Interpretation 1 (Indirect Q):

Zhangsan knows who bought the book

Interpretation 2 (Direct Q):

Who does Zhangsan know bought the book?

A simple explanation

wh-words move to mark the scope of a Q

In English, they move before spell out

John knows [Lea ate what]

John knows what [ Lea ate __]

What (does) John know (that) [Lea ate__]

In Mandarin, they move after spell out

J. Huang “Wh-movement in a language without wh-movement” (1982)

Examples of ‘parametric variation’

• The Head-parameter: put heads of phrases first/last

• The wh-parameter: Move wh’s before/after spell out

Language

• A universal, specific structure (X’-schemata, move X to Y)

• Dimension of variation/parameters(the head-parameter/the wh-movement parameter)

• The universal part constitutes the initial state of the language learner

• What needs to be learned:- Which categories are in use- How parameters are set- The lexicon

Syntactic competence

- Data: native speakers intuitions, language internal regularities, universals, language contrasts

- Model: A formal system for language generation (head, merge, …), with parameters

- Universals as theorems

- Insight on language variation and language acquisition

Nature of the account

Formal model of a cognitive capacity

• Language specific

• Realized in the brain