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The Labeling Algorithm and Kirundi Inversion Structures
Author(s) -
Selvanathan Nagarajan
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
studia linguistica
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.187
H-Index - 28
eISSN - 1467-9582
pISSN - 0039-3193
DOI - 10.1111/stul.12124
Subject(s) - inversion (geology) , spec# , transitive relation , computer science , verb , position (finance) , algorithm , syntax , linguistics , argument (complex analysis) , mathematics , artificial intelligence , philosophy , combinatorics , programming language , geology , paleontology , biochemistry , chemistry , finance , structural basin , economics
Moro (2009) proposes that Italian inversion structures provide evidence for one of the predictions of the Labeling Algorithm ( LA , Chomsky 2013, 2015). This is that in structures in which labeling is ambiguous, one of the constituents must be moved to a higher position, instantiated in Italian inversion as an intermediate focus position. However, Italian provides little independent evidence for movement to such a position and the evidence it does provide is limited to symmetrical structures containing two DP s. In this paper, I argue that Kirundi Object‐Verb‐Subject ( OVS ) inversion structures and transitive expletive constructions ( TEC s) (Ura 1996, Ndayiragije 1999) provide more direct evidence for the type of movement that Moro proposes for Italian. Because of a confluence of Kirundi idiosyncrasies, Kirundi shows unambiguously that when the external argument does not move to Spec, TP , it cannot stay in Spec, vP . Importantly, this ban on remaining in Spec, vP cannot be accounted for by appealing to relativized minimality (Rizzi 1990). Kirundi thus instantiates a key prediction of the LA.