Ángel L. Jiménez-Fernández

Deconstructing the subject condition in terms of cumulative constraint violation

Abstract Chomsky (1973) attributes the island status of nominal subjects to the Subject Condition, a constraint specific to subjects. English and Spanish are interesting languages for the comparative study of extraction from subjects, because subjects in English are predominantly preverbal, whereas in Spanish they can be either preverbal or postverbal. In this paper we argue that the islandhood of subject DPs in both English and Spanish is not categorical. The degradation associated with extraction from subjects must be attributed to the interplay of a range of more general constraints which are not specific to subjects. We argue that the interaction of these constraints has a cumulative effect whereby the more constraints that are violated, the higher the degree of degradation that results. We also argue that some speakers have a greater tolerance for constraint violations than others, which would account for widespread inter-speaker judgment variability.

What information structure tells us about individual/stage-level predicates

The goal of this paper is to explore the lexical-syntactic structure of copulative constructions and argument small clauses within the framework proposed by Gallego & Uriagereka (2011) for the Individual-Level/Stage-Level distinction (Carlson 1988, Kratzer 1995) and implement their theory by claiming that there is a crucial correlation between IL/SL constructions and their information structure. I argue that IL subjects are topics (and hence this is a categorical construction, following Kuroda 1972, Milsark 1977 and Raposo & Uriagereka 1995), whereas in SL constructions the topic may either be the subject or a silent spatiotemporal argument (their construction being thetic). I show the topic nature of IL subjects in contexts of specificity and subextraction. I ultimately derive the IS of IL/SL constructions from their lexical-syntactic structure and identify the type of topic here as an Aboutness-Topic (in the sense of Frascarelli & Hinterholzl 2007, Lambrecht 1994, Erteschik-Shir 1997). Keywords: individual-level/stage-level predicates, copulas, small clause, central-coincidence/terminal coincidence prepositions, topic, specificity, subextractionThe goal of this paper is to explore the lexical-syntactic structure of copulative constructions and argument small clauses within the framework proposed by Gallego & Uriagereka (2011) for the Individual-Level/Stage-Level distinction (Carlson 1988, Kratzer 1995) and implement their theory by claiming that there is a crucial correlation between IL/SL constructions and their information structure. I argue that IL subjects are topics (and hence this is a categorical construction, following Kuroda 1972, Milsark 1977 and Raposo & Uriagereka 1995), whereas in SL constructions the topic may either be the subject or a silent spatiotemporal argument (their construction being thetic). I show the topic nature of IL subjects in contexts of specificity and subextraction. I ultimately derive the IS of IL/SL constructions from their lexical-syntactic structure and identify the type of topic here as an Aboutness-Topic (in the sense of Frascarelli & Hunterhölzl 2007, Lambrecht 1994, Erteschik-Shir 1997).

On subject properties of datives in psych predicates: A comparative approach

In this work, we show that in Spanish and Polish, the distribution of dative Experiencers in the sentence is influenced by factors pertaining to argument structure as well as to information structure. From an argument-structure point of view, they are claimed to be generated in VP, in a position higher than the nominative subject, and hence it is the closest candidate to move to spec-TP and satisfy the EPP under T. From an information-structure perspective, dative Experiencers occur first only in two situations, namely when they are part of the broad focus that the whole sentence performs or when they function as topic. However, different tests will tear Spanish and Polish DEs apart with respect to their “subject” properties, which will ultimately be derived from the syntactic position they target when they are used in all-focus sentences.

When discourse met null subjects

In this paper a novel view of the distribution of null subjects in Spanish is explored in which the discourse category which the antecedent of pro is analysed. Implementing Frascarelli’s (2007) work, I propose that the crucial condition to meet is for the null subject to be coreferential with an Aboutness-Shift Topic, which must be either an explicit or null copy in the local domain where pro is inserted. When null, this antecedent can refer back to any type of discourse category. The analysis is supported by an experiment run among native speakers of Spanish.

Extraction from gerunds and the internal syntax of verbs

Abstract This paper provides an analysis of transparent gerunds in Spanish, as in ¿Qué llegó [silbando qué] Juan? ‘What arrived [whistling what] Juan?’, using a decomposition of Aktionsart in a series of syntactic heads. A traditional analysis of these secondary predicates as adjuncts would undermine well-established syntactic principles restricting movement and extraction. We argue that these transparent gerunds should be analyzed as syntactic constituents merged as part of the syntactic projections associated with Aktionsart. More precisely, they qualify as RhemePs – assuming Ramchand’s First Phase Syntax system – thus allowing their arguments to be extracted. Well-attested differences between Spanish and English gerunds will be explained in our analysis by proposing that the Spanish gerund projects as PathP (given it carries a path preposition), whereas English gerunds are simply RhemeP (lacking any sort of preposition).