Comparative syntax of argument ellipsis in languages without agreement

A case study with Mandarin Chinese

Bibliographic Data

ID10140890
AuthorsYosuke Sato (0000-0003-3631-379X)
Year2018
Volume55
Issue3
Pages643-669
Publication date2018-10-11
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of Linguistics (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0022-2267 • E-ISSN: 1469-7742
PublisherCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/s0022226718000403
OpenAlexW2896984039
LanguageEN
Citations received5
References cited23

This paper investigates the cross-linguistic distribution of argument ellipsis (AE) with an emphasis on Chinese, an Asian language well-known for its lack of overt morphological agreement. It is observed in the literature that Japanese permits AE in both null subject and null object positions whereas Chinese permits it in null object positions, but not in null subject positions. Adopting Saito’s (2007) hypothesis that the presence of $\unicode[STIX]{x03C6}$ -feature agreement associated with v or T blocks AE, Miyagawa (2013) and Takahashi (2014) argue that the absence of subject AE in Chinese follows from abstract subject agreement. After presenting three empirical arguments against this analysis from the Chinese literature, I propose that the distribution of AE is better predicted by topichood and link this proposal to Saito’s (2017) recent analysis of AE developed for Japanese, whereby AE, analyzed as LF Copy, cannot apply to an operator–variable configuration. My analysis is supported by the novel observation that the null subject position in Chinese actually allows AE when it is not linked to the topic position, as in hanging topics, relative clauses and conditional clauses

Argument (complex analysis · Comparative linguistics · Ellipsis (linguistics · Linguistics · Mandarin Chinese · Null (SQL · Object (grammar · Pragmatics · Sociology · Subject (documents · Syntax · Theoretical linguistics · Computer Science · Linguistics and Discourse Analysis · Mathematics · Natural Language Processing Techniques · Philosophy · Syntax, Semantics, Linguistic Variation

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