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QR Out of a Tensed Clause: Evidence from Antecedent‐Contained Deletion
Author(s) -
Syrett Kristen
Publication year - 2015
Publication title -
ratio
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.475
H-Index - 29
eISSN - 1467-9329
pISSN - 0034-0006
DOI - 10.1111/rati.12107
Subject(s) - antecedent (behavioral psychology) , ellipsis (linguistics) , non finite clause , linguistics , verb phrase ellipsis , raising (metalworking) , verb phrase , quantifier (linguistics) , coreference , relative clause , computer science , constraint (computer aided design) , covert , argument (complex analysis) , phrase , dependent clause , locality , verb , mathematics , artificial intelligence , psychology , philosophy , sentence , resolution (logic) , modal verb , noun phrase , developmental psychology , biochemistry , geometry , noun , chemistry
This paper presents an argument based on evidence from experiments featuring A ntecedent‐ C ontained D eletion ( ACD ) sentences situated in carefully‐manipulated discourse contexts, that covert movement is not grammatically constrained by tense. ACD is a form of V erb P hrase E llipsis in which ellipsis is embedded in its antecedent. Under an account appealing to Q uantifier R aising, the quantificational phrase containing the ellipsis site raises to a VP ‐external position, allowing the VP to become the antecedent. When ACD is embedded in a non‐finite clause, such sentences are ambiguous, since multiple VPs can serve as an antecedent. However, when ACD is embedded in a finite clause, the range of interpretations has been claimed to be restricted, because of an independent ‘clause‐bounded’ movement constraint on Quantifier Raising. However, there are exceptions to this generalization. I present evidence from an experimental investigation of finite‐clause‐embedded ACD sentences, relying on C ecchetto (2004), to demonstrate that under the right discourse conditions, the supposedly unavailable M atrix reading surfaces robustly, at a percentage that is surprising if the constraint were rooted in the grammar. I argue that these results call into question the source of this locality restriction, and propose that it has nothing to do with an arbitrary grammatical constraint on movement.