Extraction from subjects: Differences in acceptability depend on the discourse function of the construction.
In order to explain the unacceptability of certain long-distance dependencies - termed syntactic islands by Ross (1967) - syntacticians proposed constraints on long-distance dependencies which are universal and purely syntactic and thus not dependent on the meaning of the construction (Chomsky, 1977...
| Publicado en: | Cognition Vol. 204 |
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| Autores principales: | , , , |
| Formato: | research Journal Article |
| Publicado: |
Elsevier B.V.
Nov2020
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| Acceso en línea: | Ver este registro en EBSCOhost |
| fields | @attributes: recordID: 1 pdfLink: plink: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=ccm&AN=145699011&site=ehost-live header: @attributes: shortDbName: ccm uiTerm: 145699011 longDbName: CINAHL Complete uiTag: AN controlInfo: bkinfo: dissinfo: jinfo: jid: 00100277 3H9 jtl: Cognition issn: 00100277 maglogo: N pubinfo: dt: Nov2020 vid: 204 pid: 1004 pub: Elsevier B.V. artinfo: ui: 145699011 145699011 NLM32731004 145699011 10.1016/j.cognition.2020.104293 NLM32731004 145699011 ppct: 1 formats: tig: atl: Extraction from subjects: Differences in acceptability depend on the discourse function of the construction. aug: au: Abeillé, Anne Hemforth, Barbara Winckel, Elodie Gibson, Edward affil: LLF, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Université de Paris, France sug: subj: Language Study Design Human Poultry Animal Studies Comparative Studies Multicenter Studies Evaluation Research Validation Studies ab: In order to explain the unacceptability of certain long-distance dependencies - termed syntactic islands by Ross (1967) - syntacticians proposed constraints on long-distance dependencies which are universal and purely syntactic and thus not dependent on the meaning of the construction (Chomsky, 1977; Chomsky, 1995 a.o.). This predicts that these constraints should hold across constructions and languages. In this paper, we investigate the "subject island" constraint across constructions in English and French, a constraint that blocks extraction out of subjects. In particular, we compare extraction out of nominal subjects with extraction out of nominal objects, in relative clauses and wh-questions, using similar materials across constructions and languages. Contrary to the syntactic accounts, we find that unacceptable extractions from subjects involve (a) extraction in wh-questions (in both languages); or (b) preposition stranding (in English). But the extraction of a whole prepositional phrase from subjects in a relative clause, in both languages, is as good or better than a similar extraction from objects. Following Erteschik-Shir (1973) and Kuno (1987) among others, we propose a theory that takes into account the discourse status of the extracted element in the construction at hand: the extracted element is a focus (corresponding to new information) in wh-questions, but not in relative clauses. The focus status conflicts with the non-focal status of a subject (usually given or discourse-old). These results suggest that most previous discussions of islands may rely on the wrong premise that all extraction types behave alike. Once different extraction types are recognized as different constructions (Croft, 2001; Ginzburg & Sag, 2000; Goldberg, 2006; Sag, 2010), with their own discourse functions, one can explain different extraction patterns depending on the construction. pubtype: Academic Journal doctype: research Journal Article ougenre: Article language: English refInfo: holdings: @attributes: islocal: N |
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