Instructor: Norvin Richards
Room: 32-D461
Time: Tuesday 10-1
In Minimalist approaches to syntax, movement operations are sometimes said to
occur in order to satisfy requirements imposed by the interfaces. In this
class we will try to develop explicit theories of some of these requirements,
on the PF side. We will take as our starting point the theory developed in
Richards (2006, in press), which attempts to predict the distribution of overt
and covert wh-movement by allowing syntax to make direct reference to prosodic
structure.
We will spend the semester applying this general way of thinking to a variety of
traditionally posited parametric differences between languages, eventually
attempting to develop explanations of cross-linguistic differences in
A-movement, the EPP, and head-movement that are rooted in observable
differences between languages. Time permitting, we will then go on to consider
phenomena such as scrambling and head direction (attempting to derive the
effects of the Final-over-Final Constraint). Along the way, we will develop
new answers to a variety of traditional and not-so-traditional questions (why
is PRO always null? why is French participle agreement only possible with
objects that undergo movement? why do some languages, but not others, allow
nominative subjects in infinitives (Szabolcsi 2007)? why can languages like
Chichewa optionally leave wh in situ in all positions except for preverbal
subjects, which must overtly move via clefting? why do some languages (e.g.,
Niuean, Chol) perform phrasal fronting of their predicates? why is
extraposition to the right of the verb in German possible just when the VP has
been topicalized (Haider’s puzzle)?)
The class will thus have two major goals: we will try to deepen our explanations
for a variety of syntactic phenomena, and to improve our general understanding
of the relationship between syntax and phonology. We will also do some general
reading of current work on the prosody-syntax interface.
Registered students will be asked to do in-class presentations (either of
relevant readings or of the student’s own research), and to hand in a (possibly
very rough draft of a) final paper.