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The adjunct condition and the nature of adjuncts

  • Thomas Ernst EMAIL logo
Published/Copyright: January 5, 2022
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Abstract

This paper proposes a Minimalist analysis of the Adjunct Condition. It shows that extraction from adverbial adjuncts is common, and it reviews and extends (Truswell, Robert. 2011. Events, phrases, and questions. Oxford: Oxford University Press analysis), which holds that extractions are grammatical when the adjunct and matrix predicates together constitute a macro-event. Syntactically, a UI feature (representing “unintegration”) on adjuncts must be active at either LF or PF; where it is active ill-formedness results. However, if a macro-event is possible, UI is inactivated at LF, allowing extraction; and though an active UI at PF normally causes ill-formedness, this is repairable by sluicing. This analysis improves on existing analyses by accounting for possible extractions, island repair by sluicing, and the basic conception of adjuncts as relatively unintegrated phrases.


Corresponding author: Thomas Ernst, Northampton, MA 01060, USA; University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA, USA; and Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH, USA, E-mail:

Acknowledgments

For discussion, I am grateful to Rajesh Bhatt, Seth Cable, James Huang, Kyle Johnson, Jim McCloskey, Jason Merchant, Rob Truswell, Juan Uriagereka, and Lindsay Whaley; audiences at University of Minnesota and the University of Massachusetts, Amherst; and two anonymous reviewers. Regardless, all errors remain my own.

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Published Online: 2022-01-05
Published in Print: 2022-02-23

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