Raising, unphased

Abstract

This paper investigates cross-linguistic variation in raising-to-subject constructions, proposing a unified account for the derivation of hyper-raising and standard raising. I argue that the presence or absence of these constructions in a given language can be determined without recourse to phases by independent properties of CP and TP in the language, including: (1) whether CPs or infinitival phrases are phi-goals in the language and (2) the presence of an EPP effect on T and (and how it can be satisfied). I show that variation in these factors can capture a number of different raising profiles found cross-linguistically, including the hyper-raising pattern found in Zulu and Uyghur, the absence of raising in Makhuwa and Matengo, and the more familiar pattern of English.