Article contents
An expectation-based account of subject islands and parasitism1
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 09 November 2012
Abstract
Subject phrases impose particularly strong constraints on extraction. Most research assumes a syntactic account (e.g. Kayne 1983, Chomsky 1986, Rizzi 1990, Lasnik & Saito 1992, Takahashi 1994, Uriagereka 1999), but there are also pragmatic accounts (Erteschik-Shir & Lappin 1979; Van Valin 1986, 1995; Erteschik-Shir 2006, 2007) as well as performance-based approaches (Kluender 2004). In this work I argue that none of these accounts captures the full range of empirical facts, and show that subject and adjunct phrases (phrasal or clausal, finite or otherwise) are by no means impermeable to non-parasitic extraction of nominal, prepositional and adverbial phrases. The present empirical reassessment indicates that the phenomena involving subject and adjunct islands defies the formulation of a general grammatical account. Drawing from insights by Engdahl (1983) and Kluender (2004), I argue that subject island effects have a functional explanation. Independently motivated pragmatic and processing limitations cause subject-internal gaps to be heavily dispreferred, and therefore, extremely infrequent. In turn, this has led to heuristic parsing expectations that preempt subject-internal gaps and therefore speed up processing by pruning the search space of filler–gap dependencies. Such expectations cause processing problems when violated, unless they are dampened by prosodic and pragmatic cues that boost the construction of the correct parse. This account predicts subject islands and their (non-)parasitic exceptions.
- Type
- Research Article
- Information
- Copyright
- Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2012
Footnotes
I am very grateful to the three anonymous Journal of Linguistics referees for their suggestions and criticism, as well as to the audience of the ‘Linglunch’ meeting at the Université Paris Diderot – Paris 7. I wish to acknowledge my gratitude to Jeruen E. Dery for his collaboration on related experimental research that has helped shape my views of the phenomena under discussion. Finally, I must also thank Jillian K. Pugliese for her assistance and support. None of the above is to blame for the views expressed here however, or for any remaining errors and omissions.
References
REFERENCES
- 24
- Cited by