University:
Boston University
Course:
CAS LX 110 | Say What? Accents, Dialects, and Society
Academic year:

2022
Views:

322

Pages:

12
Author:

Giovanny Schmidt

Islands Syntax I • There seem to be certain structures out of which you cannot move a wh-word. These are islands. • CNP (complex noun phrase) islands: A wh-word cannot get out of a DP. • • • Wh-islands: A wh-word cannot get out of an embedded question. • • We can understand island constraints in terms of phases. • • The structure is built up from the bottom, but in chunks (phases). • C is a phase head. Once CP is finished, the complement of C is “spelled out”—frozen, inaccessible to further computation. • Phase Impenetrability Condition Feature matching reaches no further than the specifier of an embedded phase. Complex Noun Phrase islands • Complex Noun Phrase islands: DP is also a phase. (Also: definite D cannot host a uwh* feature) • *Who does Jack believe [DP the claim [CP that the list does not include _ ]]? • • • *Who did Pat ask [CP who kidnapped ]? Adjunct islands: A wh-word cannot get out of an adjoined modifier. • Phases *Who does Jack believe [DP the claim [CP that the list does not include _ ]]? *What did Dr. Hibbert laugh [CP when Homer lost ]? Wh-islands An embedded question forms an island: a wh-island. • The embedded C already had a [uwh*] feature, which was checked by moving the first wh-word into SpecCP. • We can’t move another wh-word to C before the lower CP phase is completed. • By the time we get to the main clause C, it can no longer see a wh-word inside the embedded clause. *Who did Pat ask [CP who kidnapped ]? Pat wondered [CP Op if Hauptmann kidnapped the Lindbergh baby]. *Who did Pat wonder [CP Op if Hauptmann kidnapped ]? Adjunct islands modifiers constitute adjunct islands. • Adjoined (A wh-word cannot escape an adjoined modifier.) • Dr. Hibbert laughed [ when Homer lost a finger]. • *What did Dr. Hibbert laugh [ when Homer lost]? CP CP • *Who does Jack believe [DP the claim [CP that the list does not include _ ]]? don’t yet have a good explanation for this. So far, • We we predict these should be possible. Adjunct islands • To account for the islandhood of adjuncts in our system, we will add one further condition: • • Sentences are “chunked” into phases as they are built up. Phases are CP and DP. • A feature outside of a phase cannot match a feature further inside the phase than its specifier. • This leads to island phenomena, configurations in which a wh-word would be “trapped”: The specifier of a phase is only visible to feature matching if the phase gets a !-role. • • In sum… Note: Adger makes this one step more complicated, to account for “subject islands” but we won’t do that here. Adjuncts differ from arguments in precisely this property. • CNP islands: A wh-word cannot get to the specifier of DP and so is not visible from outside. • Wh-islands: A wh-word cannot get to the specifier of an embedded question (that already has a wh-word, or Op, in its specifier). • Adjunct islands: Even the specifier is not visible if the phase did not get a !-role. “Island effects” are a property of movement 1) Jack believes [DP the claim [CP that the list does not include Ethan ]]? 2) *Who does Jack believe [DP the claim [CP that the list does not include _ ]]? “Island effects” are a property of movement • • Taroo-ga [DP Hanako-ni nani-o ageta hito-ni ] aimasita ka? T-nom H-dat what-acc gave man-dat met.pol Q ‘*What did Taro meet [ the man that gave _ to Hanako ]?’ • Taroo-ga [CP Hanako-ga nani-o yomu maeni ] dekakemasita ka? Q T-nom H-nom what-acc read before left.pol ‘*What did Taro leave [ before Hanako read _ ]?’ • Wh-words don’t move. Islands don’t matter. 3) Who believes [DP the claim [CP that the list does not include who ]]? 4) Dr. Hibbert laughed [CP when Homer lost a finger ]. 5) *What did Dr. Hibbert laugh [CP when Homer lost _ ]? 6) Who laughed [CP when Homer lost what ]? • So long as the wh-phrase doesn’t move, it seems that there’s no problem with simply having a wh-phrase inside an island. Why phases? • One of the main motivations behind phases (conceptually— empirically, there is plenty of evidence) is that is makes computation easier. • • • That is, again, the system is lazy. It works in chunks, it never has to look too far to find a feature for checking. What happens when a phase is “committed”? • The standard idea is that the phonological interpretation and semantic interpretation of that chunk becomes fixed, and can’t be altered later. Terminology: “Spell-out” Terminology: The requirement that movement not go “too far” (not escape a committed phase) was known in the old days as Subjacency—you may still encounter this term when talking to linguists at parties (or reading older papers). Japanese: a wh-in-situ language. A word about interpretation think for a moment about what a wh• Let’s question means: did Pat meet? • Who [ [ who] T +C [ CP DP i k TP Pat meet tk]] like (a ‘logical form’): • Something Tell me (a person) x ! such that Pat met x is true. Pronouncing & interpreting • • There are two things we need to do with the lexical items we assemble on the workbench: • • • Our model of grammar Here is the little picture of our model of grammar. The structure we end up with is used both to express the logical relations between participants and to pronounce the structure. • (And of course it has to be that way, since how a sentence sounds is tied to what it means). Pronounce the sentence pro nou Interpret the sentence We’ve mainly been concentrating on the pronunciation part (getting the words into the order we hear them), but the structure is also assumed to be the basis for interpreting the sentence as well. Lexicon CP DP i k TP Pat meet tk]] Tell me (a person) x such that is Pat met x is true. we need to get to a logical structure like Tell me (a • Ifperson) x such that Pat met x is true, then it may well be that this is what wh-movement is for. The trace serves as the x variable, the moved wh-phrase sets the domain. that moving a wh-phrase (leaving a trace) is • Suppose necessary for interpretation as a wh-question. • • • • The wh-typology English: One wh-word moves to the front. What did Bill give to whom? Japanese: No wh-words move to the front. Taroo-ga dare-ni nani-o ageta no? T-nom who-to what-acc gave Q ‘What did Taroo give to whom?’ Bulgarian: All wh-words move to the front. Kakvo na kogo Ivan dade? what to whom Ivan gave ‘What did Ivan give to whom?’ French: One wh-word or no wh-words move to the front. Qui as-tu vu?! ! Tu as vu qui? Who have-you seen! ! You have seen who ‘Who did you see?’! ! ‘Who did you see?’ • • • • Merge, Adjoin Workbench • Who bought what? me a (person) x and tell me a (thing) y • Tell ! such that x bought y is true. • Who gave what to whom? me a (person) x and tell me a (thing) y and tell • Tell me a (person) z ! such that x gave y to z is true. • How do we interpret those other wh-words? The wh-typology in all of these languages, the meaning of • Yet What did Bill give to whom? is the same… me a (thing) x and tell me a (person) y • Tell ! such that Bill gave x to y. if the ‘tell me an x…such that…x…’ • So, meaning arises from wh-movement (and, in fact, we can see the wh-movement in Bulgarian), it stands to reason that even in English and Japanese there is wh-movement for each wh-word—we just can’t always hear it. et pr er int Wh-movement and interpretation A word about interpretation did Pat meet? • Who [ [ who] T +C [ nce Phases again • • Remember that what’s supposed to be true of phases is when they are “committed,” we have locked in the pronunciation and interpretation. But what if we lock in the pronunciation first, move a little bit more, and then lock in the interpretation? • • • • • • • • [CP whati Tk+C [TP Pat tk give ti to whom ]]? • [CP whomm whati Tk+C [TP Pat tk give ti to tm ]]? • • Pros, cons LF movement If we imagine that there can be this type of “covert movement” we gain a strong benefit: • When syntacticians talk about this kind of “covert movement” at parties, they sometimes speak of it as LF movement. • That is, movement that happens in order to construct the logical form of the sentence but doesn’t affect the pronunciation. But it raises a number of issues as well: • • • We must assume that once you covertly move something, you’ve left the phonological features behind—any further movement will also have to be covert. We must assume that all wh-words accumulate in SpecCP (some covertly) but without losing the explanation of wh-island violations (there is only one SpecCP). Covert movement seems not to obey islands: Strong features can’t see inside committed phases, but others seem to be able to. Nonstrong features won’t affect the pronunciation, though—it’s ok when the pronunciation is locked. Wh-phrases binding pronouns is an interesting property of the kind of • There operator-variable formation that we can see in whmovement. • Who likes his roommate? • Pick the x such that x likes x’s roommate. • Who [ t likes his roommate] i TP i i that it is possible to have a pronoun bound • Notice by a wh-word. • And it is binding, like the binding we spoke of wrt Binding Theory. It’s assignment of reference, both to the trace and to his, matching the reference of who. Lock in interpretation Viewed in light of different “timing” for locking in pronunciation and interpretation, we could now say that strong features need to be checked before locking in pronunciation. But since the system is lazy, it will wait until after that to check any remaining (weak) features. Lock in interpretation All languages have basically the same structure for the purposes of interpretation. Even if they seem to differ in terms of what visibly moves. Lock in pronunciation We said before: Strong features (generally) require movement because the strong feature must be local to the feature that checks it. Lock in pronunciation [CP whomm whati Tk+C [TP Pat tk give ti to tm ]]? • Why would we lock in pronunciation first? This will sound like: What did Pat give to whom? • • [CP whati Tk+C [TP Pat tk give ti to whom ]]? • Phases again • We will not really seriously deal with LF movement in this class. We will not draw it in our trees. But it’s worth having heard about it. WCO • But now consider this: • Who does his roommate like? this mean the same thing as • Can Whose roommate likes him? • *Who does his roommate like t ? i i i • How is this different from • Who t likes his roommate? • [Whose roommate] t likes him ? i i i i i i Weak Crossover • *Who does his roommate like t ? • Who t likes his roommate? i i i i i i difference lies in the fact that the wh-phrase had to • The cross over the coindexed pronoun on its way to SpecCP. This appears to be impossible, and we can state this as follows: Crossover (WCO): A coindexed pronoun • Weak cannot intervene between an operator and its variable. WCO • We can also see this effect with wh-in-situ: • • Who introduced her advisor to whom? • • Which girl told his parents to visit which boy? Quantifiers Who introduced whom to her advisor? Which girl told whose parents to visit him? Quantifiers • We interpret Bill saw everyone as • For every person x, Bill saw x. • Every boy hates his roommate. that each boy hates a different • Notice roommate, the roommates are specific • This is the meaning. This is the logical form • For every boy x, x hates x’s roommate. means that every boy doesn’t just • This mean the group of boys; rather it goes to each boy. of the sentence Bill saw everyone. In the notation of formal logic, this is written as !x. Bill saw x ‘For all x (x a person), Bill saw x.’ through the set of boys and says something about each of them individually. Quantifiers • These phrases which don’t refer to specific people/things in the world but rather seem to do things to sets of people/things (like state generalizations) are quantifiers. Examples: • • • • • most students twelve angry men fewer than half of the members some custodian nobody in their right mind QP • What is the category of a quantifier like most students? • Well, it goes basically in all the same places a DP goes. Like which student or what or who. • So, like what we said for whphrases, quantifier phrases are really DPs with an extra property (they’re quantificational). Sometimes people write QP, but they mean ‘a quantificational DP’. DP D NP every student Restrictions • To reiterate, quantifiers are used to say something about individuals in a set. • • Most students like syntax. • This says that, if you check all of the students individually to see if each likes syntax, you’ll find that most (more than half) of the students you checked do. • Quantifiers write the logical form (meaning) of a sentence • To with one of these, you put the quantifier first, and replace where it came from with a variable: The set (sometimes, restriction) is the set of students. students eat at Taco Bell. • Most For most students x, x eats at Taco Bell administrators eat at Taco Bell. • No For no administrator x, x eats at Taco Bell likes every flavor of ice cream. • Mary For every flavor of ice cream x, Mary likes x For each x in students, does x like syntax? Did we answer “yes” for most of the ones we checked? Binding • A quantifier is said to bind its variable. That is, the reference of the variable is assigned by the quantifier. • Bill read every book. For every book x, Bill read x • Is this true? Well, let’s go through the books. Moby Dick. Did Bill read Moby Dick? Yes. Ok, War and Peace. Did Bill read War and Peace? Yes. Ok, … Scope • A student read every book There is a student x such that ! for every book y, x read y or For every book y, there is a student x ! such that x read y • It matters which quantifier comes first in the logical form. Scope • A student read every book. • When is this true? •Mary, it turns out, has read all of the books. Nobody has read everything, but Mary read •half of the books and Bill read the other half. Every book was read by a student. are two meanings here, the sentence is • There ambiguous between two logical forms. Scope • This is perfectly logical. A quantifier takes a set of individuals and checks to see if something is true of the individual members of the set. • A student read every book. (Namely, Mary) • In the set of students, we find that it is true that for at least one student x: x read every book. • In the set of students, we find that it is true that for at least one student x: In the set of books, we find that it is true that for each book y, x read y. • • There is a student x such that for every book y, x read y. " x # students : ! y # books: x read y. Scope • A student read every book. (The books were all covered, though not necessarily by one student) LF • • In the set of books, we find that it is true that for each book x: a student read x. • In the set of books, we find that it is true that for each book x: In the set of students, we find that it is true that for at least one student y, y read x. • • • For every book x, there is a student y such that y read x. • " x # books: ! y # students: y read x. QR movement again: the quantifier moves to a • Covert position above the sentence, so there is then a direct mapping between the structure and the logical form. But only after the pronunciation has been fixed. i TP Sue read ti ]. Quantifiers and binding • Every girl aced her exams. • [Every girl] [ t aced her exams] • For every girl x, x aced x’s exams i i • (either Mary was in the house or the dog was) This (above) is a syntactic ambiguity, depending on where the PP in the house is attached. If there are two different interpretations, there are two different structures. Two different LFs. QR read every book. • Sue For every book x, Sue read x. • [every book] [ We think about this kind of ambiguity in much the same way we think about Mary heard a dog bark in the house. read every book. • Sue For every book x, Sue read x. • [every book] [ i TP with wh-movement, the trace is the variable • As at logical form—moving quantifiers is a way to establish a quantifier-variable structure. movement is called Quantifier Raising • This (QR), and it happens to every quantifier before LF. Quantifiers and binding • i only the trace of QR, but also • Not pronouns, can be bound by the quantifier, their referent determined by the quantifier. Sue read ti ]. [Every girl]i [ ti aced heri exams] • Binding (assigning reference) is subject to ccommand. A quantifier can only assign reference to a variable (its trace and possibly other pronouns) which it c-commands. • • Her brother said that every girl aced her exams. • Quantifiers can only bind variables in their scope. The things which a quantifier c-commands are said to be in its scope. WCO • Now, let’s look at weak crossover again. • Every girl likes her roommate. • For every girl x, x likes x’s roommate. • Her roommate likes every girl. • For every girl x, x’s roommate likes x. • Why can’t the second sentence have this meaning? WCO • • [Every girl]i [TP ti likes heri roommate]. • • [Every girl]i [TP heri roommate likes ti ]. • Answer: WCO again. But WCO is about moving a quantifier over a variable—so if WCO rules out this meaning, there must have been movement. There must have been QR. A movement we couldn’t see. For every girl x, x likes x’s roommate. For every girl x, x’s roommate likes x. ACD VP ellipsis • Mary bought a record and Bill bought a tape. • Here’s another reason to believe in QR, antecedent contained deletion. This one’s kind of complicated, so hang on tight. • First, we need to talk about VP ellipsis. • • Mary bought a record, and Bill did too. interpret this, you need to use the content • To of the preceding VP. [TP Mary -ed [vP buy a record]] and [TP Bill -ed [vP buy a record]] too. bought a record and Bill did (buy a • Mary record) too. " Mary bought a record and Bill did too. ellipsis is allowed when a preceding VP is • VP identical. VP ellipsis VP ellipsis will consider the process of VP ellipsis to be • We one of deletion under identity. • Underlyingly: -ed [ Mary sleep] and -ed [ vP vP Bill sleep] too. deletion: • Before Mary -ed [ t sleep] and Bill -ed [ t sleep] too • Pronunciation: Mary -ed [ t sleep] and Bill -ed [ t sleep] too vP vP Mary slept and Bill did too vP vP as long as two VPs in sequence look • So, identical (where traces of movement look identical to one another—they sound the same), we are allowed to pronounce the second one very quietly. an extreme case of • Like Mary bought a record and ! ! Bill bought a record too. VP ellipsis • • • Note that identity is actually fairly abstract. • Before deletion: John -ed [vP t sleep] and Mary will [vP t sleep] too VP ellipsis with relative clauses • Now, consider a DP with a relative clause: • the record [Op that Mary bought t ]. i i John slept and Mary will too. John slept and Mary will • sleep • Bill too. likes the record that Mary bought and Sue • Bill does too. likes the record that Mary bought and Sue • Bill does (like the record that Mary bought) too. The inflectional features of v don’t matter for identity; the verb doesn’t inherently have a tense suffix. ACD • • • • • • Bill likes every book Mary does. Bill [vP likes every book Opi Mary [vP likes ti ]]. vP: likes [every book Op Mary likes t ] vP: likes t Those aren’t the same. VP ellipsis shouldn’t work, but yet it does. The deleted VP is contained in the antecedent VP (antecedent-contained deletion) likes [the record that Mary bought]. QR and ACD • But now let’s consider what QR would do. • Every book that Mary likes is a quantifier. have to move up past the subject by • Quantifiers LF. • Bill likes every book Mary does. (before covert movement): • Pronunciation Bill [ likes [every book Op Mary [ likes t ]]]. j vP • j vP LF: [every book Opj Mary [vP likes tj ]]i Bill [vP likes ti ]. • But now the VPs are identical. So QR allows us to explain ACD in a natural way. Where do quantifiers go? • Every student left. • [Every student] [ t left ] • We need a variable in subject position, so i TP i QR must be moving the quantifier out of TP, to somewhere higher then TP. • Believe me that it is also moving somewhere lower than CP. Adjunction to TP • In order to accommodate this, we need to formulate a new position to which quantifiers move. TP QP TP subj • This position is going to be adjoined to TP. T! T vP Adjunction to TP • Adjunction to TP we could say that moving to Spec is • So, something that happens if the moving One difference between QR (adjunction to TP) and movement to SpecTP is in the motivations. TP • • Moving to SpecTP or moving to SpecCP is motivated by some need of T (EPP: T needs a DP in its specifier) or C ([Q] C needs a [+WH] in its specifier). QP Moving a quantifier (QR) is required because the quantifier needs to get out of the TP (for interpretation). TP itself has no need for quantifiers. TP subj T! T vP thing is pulled (T is pulling up a subject to satisfy its own needs, not the needs of the moving subject) or pushed (quantifiers move to satisfy their own needs, not the needs of the T). clause or embedded) is in relative clauses. •The book which I read •The woman who(m) I met consist of a head noun (book, woman) • These and then what appears to be a wh-question that further specifies the referent of the head noun. Relative clauses structure of a • The relative clause: CP [clause-type:Rel, uwh*] is • Aadjoined to the NP, like an adjective, or a PP modifier. meaning is essentially “the man with the property of • The being the answer to ‘Who did I meet?’ ” see in a moment that C [Rel] can be pronounced as • We’ll either Ø or as that. QP • An XP that is pulled up goes into Spec. • An XP that is pushed up adjoins. Relative clauses place where we see wh-movement, • Another besides in explicit questions (either in the main TP TP subj T! T vP Relative clauses • Relative clauses serve to modify the head noun. • Kind of like adjectives, or PP modifiers. • The unhappy students. • The students from Vancouver. • The students who solved the problem. • So where would you put them? Differences between questions and relative clauses • The “question” inside a relative clause has a couple of odd properties, not shared with regular main clause or embedded questions. • • • • • *The problem what I solved. The problem which I solved. The problem which I will solve. The problem I solved. The problem that I solved. • • Which/that/Ø • The book which Mary read We can also say • • • Op In addition to being able to say The book that Mary read • and The book Mary read the book [CP whichi Mary read ti ] the book [CP Opi Mary read ti ] • • The Doubly-Filled COMP filter is the traditional “explanation”: It is also possible to pronounce that with Op, giving us: • the book [CP Opi that [TP Mary read ti ]] • You can’t pronounce both a wh-word and C at the same time. Thus: • • Why can’t we pronounce that with which? *the book [CP whichi that [TP Mary read ti ]] of Op? Is there really wh-movement of • Skeptical Op, a silent wh-phrase? • I read the book [ whichi [TP Mary said [CP that [TP Bill bought ti ]]]]. CP • *I read the book [ CP whichi [IP Mary wonders [CP who [TP bought ti ]]]]. • I read the book [ Opi (that) [TP Mary said [CP that [TP Bill bought ti ]]]]. CP • *I read the book [ ! That is, the book which Mary read and the book Mary read are really exactly the same except that in one case you pronounce the wh-word, and in the other, you don’t. • Op ! • Doubly-Filled COMP filter Op ! The secret to these last two kinds of relative clauses is Op, the silent wh-word. • • And they all mean the same thing. So we expect that they would all have basically the same structure (they all have a question adjoined in the nP)—so where is the wh-word in the last two? ! • Opi (that) [TP Mary wonders [CP who [TP bought ti ]]]]. CP Doubly-Filled COMP filter: *[CP wh-word if/that/for…] • • • • the book [CP Opi [TP Mary read ti ]] the book [CP Opi that [TP Mary read ti ]] the book [CP whichi [TP Mary read ti ]] *the book [CP whichi that [TP Mary read ti ]] Op we have a silent wh-word, why can’t we ask • Ifquestions with it? Where did Mary buy this book t ? • The place [Op Mary bought this book t ] • When did Mary buy this book t ? • The time [Op Mary bought this book t ] • Why did Mary buy this book t ? • The reason [Op Mary bought this book t ] • How did Mary buy this book t ? • The way [Op Mary bought this book t ] • *Op did Mary buy this book t ? • • See why? i i i i i i i i i i i i i i i i i i Op • Recoverability condition:The content of a null category must be recoverable. • the place [Op (that) Mary bought that book t ] • the day [Op (that) Mary bought that book t ] • the reason [Op (that) Mary bought that book t ] • the way [Op (that) Mary bought that book t ] i i i i i i i i • In each case, we can tell what the wh-phrase is by looking at the head noun.

Syntax CNP (Complex Noun Phrase) Islands