Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-j824f Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-05T09:53:18.082Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Verbless predicative structures across Romance1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 June 2015

NICOLA MUNARO
NICOLA MUNARO*
Affiliation:
Università Ca’ Foscari – Venezia
*
Author’s address: Dipartimento di Studi Linguistici e Culturali Comparati, Ca’ Bembo, Dorsoduro 1075, 30123 Venice, Italy[email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This article develops an analysis of a verbless predicative structure attested throughout Romance: in this type of reduced clause the predicate linearly precedes the subject and is separated from it by a clear intonational break, while the missing verb is interpreted as a silent copula. I argue that this structure should be viewed as the result of three movement steps: the first step is to be identified with predicate inversion, that is, extraction of the predicate from the complement position of the predicative small clause to a higher specifier position thanks to phase extension, followed by raising of the predicate to the specifier of SubjP to check the EPP feature, and finally to the specifier of the left-peripheral projection FocusP in order to check a focus feature. The present analysis is based on the crucial, and independently motivated assumption, that the process of phase extension, produced by raising of the small clause internal relator R° to a higher functional head F°, is limited to small clauses associated with individual-level predicates. The verbless predicative structure is then compared to an analogous construction in which the preposed predicate is preceded by a wh-item, arguing that, despite their apparent similarity, the two structures should be clearly distinguished.

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Linguistics , Volume 52 , Issue 3 , 01 November 2016 , pp. 609 - 637
Check for updates
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2015 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Adger, David & Ramchand, Gillian. 2003. Predication and equation. Linguistic Inquiry 34, 325–359.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Alonso-Cortés, Angel. 1999. Las construcciones exclamativas. La interiección y las expresiones vocativas. In Bosque, Ignacio & Demonte, Violeta (eds.), Gramática descriptiva de la lengua española, vol. III: Entre la oración y el discurso – Morfologia, cap. 62, 3993–4050. Madrid: Espasa Calpe.Google Scholar
Baker, Mark. 2003. Lexical categories: Verbs, nouns and adjectives. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Benincà, Paola. 1995. Il tipo esclamativo. In Renzi, Lorenzo, Salvi, Giampaolo & Cardinaletti, Anna (eds.), Grande grammatica italiana di consultazione, vol. III: Tipi di frase, deissi, formazione delle parole, 127–152. Bologna: Il Mulino.Google Scholar
Benmamoun, Elabbas. 2008. Clause structure and the syntax of verbless sentences. In Freidin, Robert, Otero, Carlos P. & Zubizarreta, Maria Luisa (eds.), Foundational issues in linguistic theory, 105–131. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Benveniste, Emile. 1966. Etreet Avoir dans les leurs fonctions linguistiques. Problèmes de linguistique générale. Paris: Editions Gallimard.Google Scholar
Bochnak, Ryan, Grinsell, Timothy & Yu, Alan C. L.. 2011. Copula agreement and the stage-level/individual-level distinction in Washo. In Black, Alexis & Louie, Meagan (eds.), 16th Workshop on the Structure and Constituency of Languages of the Americas (WSCLA 16; University of British Columbia Working Papers in Linguistics), Vancouver, 1–10.Google Scholar
Bowers, John. 1993. The syntax of predication. Linguistic Inquiry 24, 591–656.Google Scholar
Cardinaletti, Anna. 2004. Towards a cartography of subject positions. In Rizzi, Luigi (ed.), The structure of CP and IP, 115–165. New York & Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chomsky, Noam. 2001. Derivation by phase. In Kenstowicz, Michael J. (ed.), Ken Hale: A life in language, 1–52. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Cinque, Guglielmo. 1993. A null theory of phrase and compound stress. Linguistic Inquiry 24, 239–297.Google Scholar
Cinque, Guglielmo. 1999. Adverbs and functional heads: A crosslinguistic perspective. New York & Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
den Dikken, Marcel. 2006. Relators and linkers: The syntax of predication, predicate inversion, and copulas. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Giorgi, Alessandra & Longobardi, Giuseppe. 1991. The syntax of noun phrases: Configuration, parameters and empty categories. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Gonzàlez-Rivera, Melvin. 2011. On the internal structure of Spanish verbless clauses. Ph.D. dissertation, The Ohio State University.Google Scholar
Gutiérrez-Rexach, Javier. 2001. Spanish exclamatives and the interpretation of the left periphery. In D’Hulst, Yves, Rooryck, Johan & Schroten, Jan (eds.), Romance languages and linguistic theory 1999, 167–194. Amsterdam & Philadelphia, PA: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
Hazout, Ilan. 2010. Verbless sentences and clause structure. Linguistic Inquiry 41, 471–485.Google Scholar
Hernanz, Maria Lluïsa. 2001. ¡En bonito lío me he metido! Notas sobre la afectividad en español. Moenia7, 93–109. Santiago de Compostela: Universidade de Santiago de Compostela, Servicio de publicacións.Google Scholar
Hernanz, Maria Lluïsa & Suñer, Avellina. 1999. La predicación: la predicación no copulativa. Las construcciones absolutas. In Bosque, Ignacio & Demonte, Violeta (eds.), Gramática descriptiva de la lengua española, vol. II: Las construcciones sintácticas fundamentales – Relaciones temporales, aspectuales y modales, cap. 39, 2525–2560. Madrid: Espasa Calpe.Google Scholar
Heycock, Caroline. 1994. The internal structure of small clauses. The North East Linguistic Society (NELS) 25, 223–238. Amherst, MA: GLSA.Google Scholar
Kayne, Richard S. 1989. Facets of Romance past participle agreement. In Benincà, Paola (ed.), Dialect variation and the theory of grammar, 85–103. Dordrecht: Foris.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kayne, Richard S. 1994. The antisymmetry of syntax (Linguistic Inquiry Monographs). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Kratzer, Angelika. 1995. Stage-level and individual-level predicates. In Carlson, Gregory N. & Pelletier, Francis Jeffry (eds.), The generic book, 125–175. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Kreps, Christian. 1994. Another look at small clauses. UCL Working Papers in Linguistics 6, 149–177.Google Scholar
Laurens, Frédéric. 2008. French predicative verbless utterances. In Müller, Stefan (ed.), 15th International Conference on HPSG, 152–172. Stanford, CA: CSLI Publications.Google Scholar
Milner, Jean-Claude. 1978. De la syntaxe à l’interprétation. Quantités, insultes, exclamations. Paris: Seuil.Google Scholar
Moro, Andrea. 1997. The raising of predicates: Predicative noun phrases and the theory of clause structures. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Moro, Andrea. 2000. Dynamic antisymmetry. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Munaro, Nicola. 2006. Verbless exclamatives across Romance: Standard expectations and tentative evaluations. University of Venice Working Papers in Linguistics 16, 185–209.Google Scholar
Munaro, Nicola. 2010. Criterial conditions for wh-structures: Evidence from wh-exclamatives in Northern Italian dialects. In D’Alessandro, Roberta, Ledgeway, Adam & Roberts, Ian (eds.), Syntactic variation: The dialects of Italy, 292–311. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Obenauer, Hans-Georg. 1994. Aspects de la syntaxe A-barre: Effets d’intervention et mouvements des quantifieurs. Ph.D. dissertation, Université de Paris VIII.Google Scholar
Park, Myung-Kwan. 1997. Small clauses in English and the stage-level and individual-level predicate distinction. Studies in Generative Grammar 7, 255–292.Google Scholar
Paul, Ileana. 2006. Great coffee, that Maxwell House! Presented at the 37th Meeting of the North East Linguistic Society, University of Illinois, Urbana–Champaign.Google Scholar
Paul, Ileana & Stainton, Robert. 2006. Really intriguing, that Pred NP! In Gurski, Claire & Radisic, Milica (eds.), The 2006 Canadian Linguistics Association Annual Conference, 1–11.Google Scholar
Rizzi, Luigi. 1997. The fine structure of the left periphery. In Haegeman, Liliane (ed.), Elements of grammar, 281–337. Dordrecht: Kluwer.Google Scholar
Sibaldo, Marcelo Amorim. 2013. Free small clauses of Brazilian Portuguese as a TP-phase. In Amaro, Jennifer Cabrelli, Lord, Gillian, Pérez, Ana de Prada & Aaron, Jessi Elana (eds.), 16th Hispanic Linguistics Symposium, 324–337. Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Proceedings Project.Google Scholar
Stowell, Timothy Angus. 1981. Origins of phrase structure. Ph.D. dissertation, MIT.Google Scholar
Svenonius, Peter. 1996. Predication and functional heads. West Coast Conference on Formal Linguistics (WCCFL) 14, 493–507.Google Scholar
Tanaka, Tomoyuki & Yokogoshi, Azusa. 2010. The rise of a functional category in small clauses. Studia Linguistica 64.3, 239–270.Google Scholar
Vinet, Marie-Thérèse. 1991. French non-verbal exclamative constructions. Probus 3.1, 77–100.Google Scholar
Williams, Edwin. 1975. Small clauses in English. In Kimball, John (ed.), Syntax and semantics, vol. 4, 249–273. New York: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Zanuttini, Raffaella & Portner, Paul. 2003. Exclamative clauses: At the syntax–semantics interface. Language 79.1, 39–81.Google Scholar