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Overt PRO in Romance

Towards a unification of PRO and pro

Abstract

Several types of infinitives in Spanish, Italian, and Catalan can have overt nominative subjects. These elements are morphologically pronominal although they are syntactically anaphoric in Obligatory Control contexts and pronominal in Nonobligatory Control contexts. The data will be taken as evidence for a unification of PRO and pro to an externally merged D head with fully variable phi-features (in the spirit of Sigurðsson’s (2008) notion of ‘reference variable’), whose status with respect to Binding Theory is determined by interpretable features on T, implementing a version of Borer’s (1989) and Landau’s (2000, 2004) anaphoric AGR. In this approach, overt subjects in infinitives are the result of post-syntactic realization of D[φ:_], triggered by discourse-related rather than Case-related needs.

Abstract

Several types of infinitives in Spanish, Italian, and Catalan can have overt nominative subjects. These elements are morphologically pronominal although they are syntactically anaphoric in Obligatory Control contexts and pronominal in Nonobligatory Control contexts. The data will be taken as evidence for a unification of PRO and pro to an externally merged D head with fully variable phi-features (in the spirit of Sigurðsson’s (2008) notion of ‘reference variable’), whose status with respect to Binding Theory is determined by interpretable features on T, implementing a version of Borer’s (1989) and Landau’s (2000, 2004) anaphoric AGR. In this approach, overt subjects in infinitives are the result of post-syntactic realization of D[φ:_], triggered by discourse-related rather than Case-related needs.

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. Preface vii
  4. Introduction xi
  5. Part I. Theoretical and descriptive approaches
  6. No superiority, no intervention effects 3
  7. Overt PRO in Romance 25
  8. The semantics and pragmatics of andar and venir + gerund 49
  9. Sequence of tenses in complementation structures 69
  10. Fue muerto 89
  11. Temporal and spectral dependencies in the processing of Spanish and English stop consonant voicing 113
  12. Segmental and prosodic conditionings on gradient voicing assimilation in Spanish 127
  13. Part II. Language acquisition
  14. The sum is more than its parts 147
  15. Does agreement affect the syntax of bare nominal subjects in Russian–Spanish bilinguals? 169
  16. Perfecting the past 191
  17. The protracted acquisition of past tense aspectual values in child heritage Spanish 211
  18. Part III. Language contact and language variation
  19. Morphological adjectival intensifier variation in Lima, Peru 233
  20. An experimental approach to hypercorrection in Dominican Spanish 251
  21. Dialect identification and listener attributes 269
  22. Sociophonetic analysis of young Peninsular Spanish women’s voice quality 293
  23. A sociophonetic analysis of trill production in Panamanian Spanish 313
  24. Index 337
Hispanic Linguistics at the Crossroads
This chapter is in the book Hispanic Linguistics at the Crossroads
https://doi.org/10.1075/ihll.4.02her

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. Preface vii
  4. Introduction xi
  5. Part I. Theoretical and descriptive approaches
  6. No superiority, no intervention effects 3
  7. Overt PRO in Romance 25
  8. The semantics and pragmatics of andar and venir + gerund 49
  9. Sequence of tenses in complementation structures 69
  10. Fue muerto 89
  11. Temporal and spectral dependencies in the processing of Spanish and English stop consonant voicing 113
  12. Segmental and prosodic conditionings on gradient voicing assimilation in Spanish 127
  13. Part II. Language acquisition
  14. The sum is more than its parts 147
  15. Does agreement affect the syntax of bare nominal subjects in Russian–Spanish bilinguals? 169
  16. Perfecting the past 191
  17. The protracted acquisition of past tense aspectual values in child heritage Spanish 211
  18. Part III. Language contact and language variation
  19. Morphological adjectival intensifier variation in Lima, Peru 233
  20. An experimental approach to hypercorrection in Dominican Spanish 251
  21. Dialect identification and listener attributes 269
  22. Sociophonetic analysis of young Peninsular Spanish women’s voice quality 293
  23. A sociophonetic analysis of trill production in Panamanian Spanish 313
  24. Index 337
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