Robert D. Levine

Stylistic inversion in English : A reconsideration

We argue that the phenomenon described and discussed in the literature as locative or stylistic inversion in English is actually a conflation of twoquite different constructions: on the one hand, light inversion (LI), inwhich the postverbal NP element can be phonologically and structurallyextremely simple, possibly consisting of a single name, and on the otherhand heavy inversion (HI), where the postverbal element is heavy in thesense of Heavy NP Shift.1 We present evidence that the preverbal PP in LI patterns with subjects but the PP in HI is a syntactic topic, usinga variety of tests which distinguish A-positions from Ā-positions.Other significant differences between HI and LI, such as the classesof verbs which support these two constructions respectively, and thedifferential behavior of HI and LI with respect to adverbial placement,provide support for interpreting HI as a case of Heavy NP Shiftapplying to subject constituents.

Gapping as like-category coordination

We propose a version of Type-Logical Categorial Grammar (TLCG) which combines the insights of standard TLCG (Morrill 1994, Moortgat 1997) in which directionality is handled in terms of forward and backward slashes, and more recent approaches in the CG literature which separate directionality-related reasoning from syntactic combinatorics by means of Ł-binding in the phonological component (Oehrle 1994, de Groote 2001, Muskens 2003). The proposed calculus recognizes both the directionality-sensitive modes of implication (/ and \) of the former and the directionality-insensitive mode of implication tied to phonological Ł-binding in the latter (which we notate here as |). Empirical support for the proposed system comes from the fact that it enables a straightforward treatment of Gapping, a phenomenon that has turned out to be extremely problematic in the syntactic literature including CG-based approaches.

Formal Grammar: Theory and Implementation

The second volume in the Vancouver Studies in Cognitive Science series, this collection presents recent work in the fields of phonology, morphology, semantics, and neurolinguistics. Its overall theme is the relationship between the contents of grammatical formalisms and their real-time realizations in machine or biological systems. Individual essays address such topics as learnability, implementability, computational issues, parameter setting, and neurolinguistic issues. Contributors include Janet Dean Fodor, Richard T. Oehrle, Bob Carpenter, Edward P. Stabler, Elan Dresher, Arnold Zwicky, Mary-Louis Kean, and Lewis P. Shapiro.

Phrase Structure Grammar: the next generation

Head-driven Phrase Structure Grammar represents the fruits of a decade of research in feature-based syntactic theory. It belongs to a select company of linguistic monographs which are both monumental and intensely provocative, including among their number Chomsky (I965, I98I), Ross (1967) and Gazdar et al. (I985). Like other works in this elite group, Pollard & Sags book addresses simultaneously a wide variety of grammatical phenomena and a set of fundamental questions about the nature of syntactic representations which have shaped the direction of theoretical work by investigators throughout the field, leading to hundreds of papers and new hypotheses, including, inevitably, challenges and counterproposals to the analyses proposed by the authors. There is, in addition, a second domain in which Head-driven Phrase Structure Grammar has had major impact in linguistics the field of computational implementations, where the framework proposed by the authors that gives their book its name has rapidly become the theory of choice, a fact particularly evident in the European computational scene. The books organization can be understood in terms of the syntax/ semantics dichotomy, and, within the syntactic discussion that takes up the first half of the book, the application of the technology outlined in the first chapter to progressively less local grammatical dependencies, insofar as locality was understood in the early generative era. Thus, after the first chapter, in which the feature-logic formalism of the theory is lightly sketched and the major constraints which the theory comprises are stated, or at least alluded to, we are given in chapter 2 a discussion of agreement. Chapter 3 is explicitly devoted to issues of subcategorization and complementation.

The Revolution Maximally Confused

Once again we would like to thank our critics for replying to our comments and continuing the discussion of the issues that we raised in our original Topic-Comment piece. We feel that this debate is important as it touches on fundamental questions concerning the scientific status of linguistic theories and the way in which they are accepted. We will take up their main points in turn and then offer some concluding remarks.

On the disunity of unbounded dependency constructions

Since Noam Chomskys 1977 paper ‘On wh-movement’, syntactic theorists almost universally have assumed that tough/too/enough constructions are to be treated by the same formal mechanism as wh-extraction constructions, in spite of well-known syntactic divergences between the two types. We argue that these divergences reflect a real dichotomy between unbounded dependencies with fillers in A(rgument) positions, e.g. tough constructions, and those whose fillers occupy non-argument (A-bar) positions, e.g. topicalization. We first show that strong external evidence exists supporting the GPSG-internal prediction of full syntactic connectivity between Aposition fillers and their gap sites, but that this result seems contradicted by the existence of case conflict between the filler and gap. To overcome this contradiction, we introduce a new gap-licensing feature GAP, and show how a number of other divergences between A- and A-bar filler/gap constructions follow as a consequence.

Determiner Gapping as Higher-Order Discontinuous Constituency

We argue that an approach to discontinuous constituency via prosodic lambda binding initiated by Oehrle (1994) and adopted by some subsequent authors (de Groote, 2001; Muskens, 2003; Pollard, 2011) needs to recognize higher-order prosodic variables to provide a fully systematic treatment of two recalcitrant empirical phenomena exhibiting discontinuity, namely, split gapping involving determiners and comparative subdeletion. Once we admit such higher-order prosodic variables, straightforward analyses of these phenomena immediately emerge. We take this result to provide strong support for recognizing such higher-order prosodic variables in this type of approach. We also touch on the more general issue of alternative approaches to discontinuity in categorial grammar, and suggest that an approach that recognizes (possibly higher-order) prosodic functors like the one we propose here leads to a more principled treatment of certain interactions between phenomena exhibiting complex types of discontinuity than competing approaches.

Pseudogapping as Pseudo-VP-Ellipsis

In this article, we propose an analysis of pseudogapping in Hybrid Type-Logical Categorial Grammar (Hybrid TLCG; Kubota 2010; Kubota and Levine 2012). Pseudogapping poses a particularly challenging problem for previous analyses in both the transformational and the nontransformational literature. We argue that the flexible syntax-semantics interface of Hybrid TLCG enables an analysis of pseudogapping that synthesizes the key insights of both transformational and nontransformational approaches, at the same time overcoming the major difficulties of each type of approach.

Pseudogapping as Pseudo-VP Ellipsis

In this article, we propose an analysis of pseudogapping in Hybrid Type-Logical Categorial Grammar (Hybrid TLCG; Kubota 2010; Kubota and Levine 2012). Pseudogapping poses a particularly challenging problem for previous analyses in both the transformational and the nontransformational literature. We argue that the flexible syntax-semantics interface of Hybrid TLCG enables an analysis of pseudogap-ping that synthesizes the key insights of both transformational and non-transformational approaches, at the same time overcoming the major difficulties of each type of approach.

Auxiliaries: To 's company

In a 1982 paper in the journal Glossa , Pullum outlined a set of arguments for treating English infinitival to as a defective auxiliary verb. Twenty years later, in his entry on infinitival constructions in The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language ( CGEL , 2002), Huddleston argues that several distributional facts about auxiliaries fit poorly with this hypothesis. He proposes, on the basis of significant structural parallels, that to is a subordinator (complementizer). I show that Huddlestons arguments constitute a flawed analysis in CGEL s otherwise superb coverage of English descriptive grammar, and that the facts run strongly counter to his claims, often falling out independently from generalizations about auxiliaries that Huddleston overlooks. Several of these points were anticipated in Pullums paper, but recent research on an idiosyncratic auxiliary-specific pattern of English nonrestrictive relative clause formation provides a powerful new argument in support of the auxiliary claim. In this respect, as in all others, the assignment of to to the class of auxiliaries provides the simplest and broadest account of its syntactic behavior.