Anti-repair effects under ellipsis
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Andrés Saab
Abstract
This paper centers on the nature of clitic doubling in River Plate Spanish. We present some novel empirical observations regarding clitic doubling and its relation with extraction and ellipsis. Concretely, we show that clitic doubling ameliorates some island effects. However, this repair effect disappears under ellipsis. We claim that this anti-repair effect follows if clitic doubling is a PF operation (in the sense of Distributed Morphology) that is blocked under ellipsis. Crucially, anti-repair effects are not observed in contexts of clitic left dislocation. We propose then that this is because clitic left dislocation is a purely syntactic phenomenon and, as expected, is not affected by ellipsis. One important consequence that follows from our analysis is that Kayne’s Generalization (i.e. the fact that clitic doubling is dependent on differential object marking) has to be seen as a purely PF-phenomenon, an idea in consonance with Bobaljik’s (2008) recent findings on the relation between case and agreement. Keywords: clitic doubling; focus fronting; island repair; ellipsis; PF-resumption
Abstract
This paper centers on the nature of clitic doubling in River Plate Spanish. We present some novel empirical observations regarding clitic doubling and its relation with extraction and ellipsis. Concretely, we show that clitic doubling ameliorates some island effects. However, this repair effect disappears under ellipsis. We claim that this anti-repair effect follows if clitic doubling is a PF operation (in the sense of Distributed Morphology) that is blocked under ellipsis. Crucially, anti-repair effects are not observed in contexts of clitic left dislocation. We propose then that this is because clitic left dislocation is a purely syntactic phenomenon and, as expected, is not affected by ellipsis. One important consequence that follows from our analysis is that Kayne’s Generalization (i.e. the fact that clitic doubling is dependent on differential object marking) has to be seen as a purely PF-phenomenon, an idea in consonance with Bobaljik’s (2008) recent findings on the relation between case and agreement. Keywords: clitic doubling; focus fronting; island repair; ellipsis; PF-resumption
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Foreword vii
- From Romance clitics to case 1
- Contextual conditions on stem alternations 21
- State nouns are Kimian states 41
- ‘I know the answer’ 65
- Stressed vowel duration and stress placement in Italian 87
- Serial prosodification and voiced stop geminates in Catalan 115
- Interfacing information and prosody 135
- VP Ellipsis 155
- Anti-repair effects under ellipsis 177
- On the argument structure of the causative construction 203
- Index 221
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Foreword vii
- From Romance clitics to case 1
- Contextual conditions on stem alternations 21
- State nouns are Kimian states 41
- ‘I know the answer’ 65
- Stressed vowel duration and stress placement in Italian 87
- Serial prosodification and voiced stop geminates in Catalan 115
- Interfacing information and prosody 135
- VP Ellipsis 155
- Anti-repair effects under ellipsis 177
- On the argument structure of the causative construction 203
- Index 221
