To the extent that the properties of the resulting system seem "interesting" or are congruent with data or shed light on an existing problem, the system can be further explored through future research. The answer lies in the nature of the representation passed to the interfaces. This section examines some of the properties of English actualization constructions as a tool to evaluate the linearization proposal made in the previous section.
In English embedded topical constructions, XP can be placed in the box immediately to the right of the complementizer to (9a, 10a). A generalization from the previous examples is that embedded actualization targets the specifier in the box to the right of the complementizer, while WH movement targets the specifier to the left of it. This two-tiered analysis is enforced by the LCA requirement that the specifications come before the headers.
This structure accounts for the relative linear orders of the complementizer, the WH shifted, and the actualized XPs. If WH movement and embedded actualization indeed target the same position, then it is predicted that the two types of movement should be highly correlated and that one will block the application of the other.
Blocking effects
Furthermore, if one assumes that the WH-word why in CP can be generated without movement (Ko 2006, Rizzi 1991), then Relativized Minimality should in principle be bypassed, leading to grammaticality. However, the data does not confirm this: in (20) a topic is that DP has been moved to SpecTopicP, while why in SpecCP is generated without having to cross the embedded topic, but the result is still ungrammatical. Culicover (1996) cites evidence showing that blocking effects can be circumvented in several ways, including the use of stress.
As Culicover notes, these exceptions are similar to those noted by Pesetsky (1987), where relativized minimality can be violated in WH-contexts. As such, Culicover's exceptions prove the rule, and his arguments against the dual CP model are similar in spirit to those presented here. In contrast, the assumption of only one SpecCP (15) predicts that WH extraction should not be possible in the context of topicalization, as the data suggest.
Stacking
That-trace effects
An explanation for the embedded topicalization paradox
- Deriving Spec-head order in a WH-construction
- Deriving head-Spec order in an embedded topicalization construction
- Tentative evidence for uTopic on DP
- Speculations on complementizer effects
- The Doubly Filled Comp effect
- That-trace effects
This may suggest that, given the ambiguous nature of the evidence, different languages may sometimes parameterize Subject as interpretable on the DP and uninterpretable on the complementizer or vice versa, giving rise to parametric variation. As far as I can tell, there is no intrinsic semantic reason to prefer uTopic to the Topic DP as opposed to Topic0. If one accepts the argumentation of Bošković (2007), then movement is conditioned by uninterpretable features on the moved constituent.
Applying this to actualization, it follows that there must be an uninterpretable feature on the moved subject. It is thus a fairly robust generalization that, in English, uninterpretable features often lead to PF manifestations on the categories that bear them17. To the extent that this is true, it may be evidence for uTopic features about the DP topic18.
A fourth and related argument is that languages that mark topichood with a morphological reflex tend to do so on the basis of the subject constituent rather than the complementizer. An example of such a language is Japanese, which shows a PF reflex on the subject in the form of a subject marker, e.g. Therefore, it is reasonable to suggest that English has an uninterpretable subject feature on the displaced constituent, while Italian places the uninterpretable subject feature on the complementizer.
This section is more speculative in character and attempts to shed some light on the double filled Comp effect, the effects of that tracking, and the ways in which plugins can interfere with the effects of that tracking. An open complement that will mark the subject in the field immediately following it as a subject. On the other hand, in actualization constructs, there are no imprecise properties in C, which means there is no linearization paradox and the complement can be written openly.
Long extraction of a topicalized topic in the presence of an overt that (27a) is also blocked on the reasonable assumption that long topicalization requires a uTopic feature on the moved DP.
Broader implications for English Spec-head relations
The linear orders of specifiers and heads in English
- SpecTP
- SpecVP
- SpecvP
- SpecPP
- Intermediate summary
Given that the adverb marks the left edge of the vP in the preceding sentences, the fact that the modality and the auxiliary are themselves to the left of the adverb indicates that these verbs are in T0, with the consequent implication that the subject is indeed in SpecTP. This derives the idea that the TP layer is actually composed, with the lower projection checking Case while the higher projection checking Agreement. This makes these constructs useful in ensuring that an object is in a certain position.
In this example, however, it is not at all clear that the DP object is in the specifier of VP since an adverb can intervene between the DP and the participle verb (46c). Additional evidence that the DP object in (46a,c) is not in SpecVP comes from extraction facts. This demonstrates that for the pseudo-causative, O-V order, the DP is in a derived position and is therefore very unlikely to be the specifier of the most deeply embedded VP.
This raises an interesting problem: Adverbial intervention and extraction facts show that the DP is not in the SpecVP, but since the DP follows the pseudo-causative verb, it cannot (according to LCA) be in the specifier of the pseudo-causative verb itself, but must be in the specification of a null (and unidentified) head. The result of all this is that there is little evidence that the specification of VP precedes V; The O-V order is obscured by subsequent movement25. The other possibility would be to argue that the class of verbs that allow existential constructions (i.e. unaccusatives) does not have an articulated vP shell, but rather simply consists of VP with DP as the complement (Alexiadou et al. 2004 ).
First, note that this analysis leaves the VP specifier mandatorily empty and thus provides no evidence that the specifier precedes the head. Thus, the PP domain also seems to provide no evidence for linear Spec-head classifications in English. Once again, the word order facts are consistent with RPA (3): P chooses a DP argument and iCase on P0 checks uCase on DP, which means that P determines its DP29 complement.
Thus, PPs could, under certain theoretical assumptions, be taken as evidence that the P head precedes its own specification, just as V precedes its specification.
Toward a theory of movement
Adjuncts
One context where a configuration like (6) can occur is in constructions where two adjuncts are attached to a single node. In examples (56a and b), the two PP adverbs of place are probably linked to the same node, probably at VP or vP level32.
Double-object constructions
The exact nature of the dependency relationship between helpers and their hosts remains an open question (ie which selects which) but for the sake of simplicity I will assume that these are also functional dependencies. 34 Presumably the assignment of Case to the direct object is by V, although if Case were assigned by the third V in the VP shell, the result of the proposed derivation in (61) would not be affected. This configuration is satisfied when IO is a PP and where the instance of IO DP is assigned by P, thus conforming to the configuration in (6).
Moreover, issues of constituent weight undoubtedly play a role in the relative ordering of ID and DO. However, it is important to note that if one compares the relative salience of (61b) and (63b), it is very clear that the latter is much less pronounced than the former. The analysis also predicts that if the direct object is a PP, only the word order IO > DO is allowed, since the case of the IO still needs to be checked by v.
In (65a), the paint is the direct object insofar as it is transferred from the paint container to the wall and thereby undergoes a change of state (compare with I gave John the book in (66a), where the direct object of the book is transferred from me to John and where in the process of changing ownership). The wall is IO as far as the patient is concerned and is affected by the splash event35. A full investigation of this issue is beyond the scope of this paper, but it is interesting to note that PF effects are implicated in the precise configuration implied by (6), namely the effects of heavy NPs in English.
35 The other side of the spray/load exchange can pattern with the instrumental construction, where PP is presumably a supplement. An analysis of these constructions in Afrikaans and Dutch is beyond the scope of this article, but it may be noted that an analysis of the PPs within the West Germanic intermediate field may take into account that these constituents move to AgrO, which precedes vP in these languages. 36 It is also worth noting that there are so-called "symmetrical" Bantu languages in which there is no preferred order between DOs and IOs.
Also note that this approach yields some word order effects in the appositive domain, such as P doubling (De Vos 2009a).
Conclusion
Paper delivered at the Theoretical Approaches to Disharmonic Word Orders Conference, 30 May–1 June 2009, Newcastle University, Newcastle. Head movement without movement: Head movement is an artefact of optimal solutions to linearization paradoxes. Presentation given at the LSSA/SAALA/SAALT Annual Meeting, 24-27 June 2014, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg.
