Basic English Syntax with Exercises

subject movement

5.2.1 Unaccusative verbs

The position to which the subject moves is typically a nominative position and so we might assume that the movement has something to do with placing this argument in a Case position. The reason why these verbs are called ‘unaccusative’ is because unlike with transitive verbs, which share the possibility of having theme arguments, the theme of the unaccusative cannot normally remain inside the VP to receive accusative Case.

6.1 The structure of IP

A phrasal position to the left of a head could be taken to be its specifier. Clearly the subject is a phrase and it always precedes the inflection at S-structure and hence we might assume that the position to which the subject moves, when it leaves the VP, is the specifier of the IP:

6.3 Movement to Spec IP

Up to this point we have been assuming that the subject of the clause originates fairly low in the clause, inside the VP or a vP just above it. We have said this DP will move from its original position to the specifier of IP to get Case and thus avoid a Case Filter violation which would render the sentence ungrammatical. Two aspects of this analysis are in need of elaboration. First it must be accounted for that the subject’s original position is a Caseless one and second it must be established exactly where in the complex clause structure we have been arguing for the subject moves to and why this is a Case position.

6.3 Movement to Spec IP

Let us now turn to the landing site of the movement. The subject moves to a position to the left of a modal and so the obvious place to assume as its landing site is the specifier of IP:

7.3.5 Subject questions

As a structure this is straightforward. It contains a wh-element in the specifier of CP so that the whole clause can be interpreted as an interrogative. Moreover it has something in the C position for the wh-element to agree with. If we accept this as basically correct, we then have (68a) to account for: why can the verb not move to C when anything but the subject moves to spec CP? The answer would appear to have to do with the subject: when this does not move to spec CP the main verb cannot move past I.

7.3.5 Subject questions

We have seen restrictions like this before. The adverb, for example must be above the verb and the negation must be above the verb but below the tense. It seems that the verb must be below the subject and hence when the subject is in spec IP the verb can be no higher than I. However, when the subject moves to spec CP the verb can move to C and still remain lower than the subject. When the verb cannot move from I to C there is no choice other than to insert the auxiliary do. However, it appears that the dummy auxiliary is not enough by itself to provide the wh-element with something to agree with, thus the auxiliary must be inserted in to tense and move from there to I and from there to C to provide enough semantic content to support the agreement. The verb stays behind in the VP:

8.1.2 Clauses without IP

Stowell has countered the argument that the predicate part of the small clause is a full phrase by claiming that it only seems to behave like a phrase as the subject moves out of the subject position before the predicate itself moves. Thus the derivation of a sentence like (37) would follow the steps indicated below:

8.1.2 Clauses without IP

The debate continues and we will not attempt to put an end to it here. Stowell’s analysis does seem to be able to address the problematic issue of the selection of small clause complements, but his analysis of how the predicate can appear to behave like a phrase rests on the validity of the suggested subject movement, and it is not at all clear that there is a well motivated position for the subject to move to, even assuming a more articulated structure of the vP.

8.2.1 Raising

In this way, each clause is provided with a subject, the trace, and hence the EPP can be satisfied. The ungrammaticality of (63) demonstrates that when a subject raises, it cannot actually be moved too far. Looking at what is possible and what is not possible with such movements, there is something similar about the restriction to the restriction we have noted concerning head movement. Recall that he Head Movement Constraint demands that heads do not move over the top of other heads. It appears that the restriction on subject movement is that it cannot cross over the top of another subject. A general way to express both these restrictions is to claim that a moving element cannot move over the top of a like element. This principle, known as Relativized Minimality, was introduced by Rizzi (1990) as a way of accounting for locality conditions on movement. The following diagram might help to make clear how the principle works: