Not Moving Clauses

Connectivity in Clausal Arguments

Bibliographic Data

ID4238299
AuthorsKeir Moulton (0000-0001-8087-9040, Simon Fraser University Department of Linguistics 8888 University Drive Burnaby BC V5A 1S6 Canada, corresponding author)
Year2013
Volume16
Issue3
Pages250-291
Publication date2013-09-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueSyntax (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1368-0005 • E-ISSN: 1467-9612
PublisherWiley (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1111/synt.12007
OpenAlexW2081769872
LanguageEN
Citations received19
References cited29

Novel reconstruction data is introduced which argues that clauses do not move leftward, thus contributing to a long-standing debate about sentential subjects and topics (Koster 1978, Alrenga 2005). Although fronted clauses appear to reconstruct for variable-binding purposes, I offer several arguments that these bound-variable interpretations are only apparent. First, left-dislocated CPs do not exhibit the kinds of reconstruction interactions that hold of other moved constituents, as discovered by Lebeaux (1991). Second, we find apparent bound variables in left-dislocated CPs that can be shown to have no movement source that would provide a site for reconstruction. I will then provide a detailed analysis that marshals the semantics ofde repronouns to explain why covariation without reconstruction is available in these dislocated CPs. Aside from offering a detailed syntax-semantics for clausal complementation, I make the case that there must be syntactic derivations of sentential subjects and topics that do not involve movement and that a parsimonious theory rules out movement of clausal arguments altogether

Argument (complex analysis · Aside · Linguistics · Movement (music · Programming language · Semantics (computer science · Syntax · Variable (mathematics · Computer Science · Linguistics and Discourse Analysis · Mathematics · Philosophy · Syntax, Semantics, Linguistic Variation

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