The Structure of Coordination: Conjunction and Agreement Phenomena in Spanish and Other Languages

192 Pages·2003·3.25 MB·English

by  José Camacho (auth.)

THE STRUCTURE OF COORDINATION
Studies in Natural Language and Linguistic Theory
VOLUME 57
Managing Editors
Marcel den Dikken, City University ofN ew York
Liliane Haegeman, University of LiZle
Joan Maling, Brandeis University
Editorial Board
Guglielmo Cinque, University ofVenice
Carol Georgopoulos, University of Utah
Jane Grimshaw, Rutgers University
Miehael Kenstowiez, Massachusetts Institute ofTechnology
Hilda Koopman, University of California, Los Angeles
Howard Lasnik, University of Connecticut at Storrs
Alee Marantz, Massachusetts Institute ofTechnology
John J. MeCarthy, University of Massachusetts, Amherst
lan Roberts, University of Cambridge
The titles published in this series are listed at the end ofthis volume.
THESTRUCTURE
OF COORDINATION
Conjunction and Agreement Phenomena
in Spanish and Other Languages
by
JOSE CAMACHO
Rutgers University,
New Brunswick, U.S.A.
SPRINGER -SCIENCE+BUSINESS MEDIA, B.V.
A C.I.P. Catalogue record for this book is avai1ab1e from the Library of Congress.
ISBN 978-1-4020-1511-3 ISBN 978-94-010-0119-9 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-94-010-0119-9
Printed an acid-free pap er
AlI Rights Reserved
© 2003 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht
OriginalIy published by K1uwer Academic Publishers in 2003
Softcover reprint ofthe hardcover lst edition 2003
No part of this work may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted
in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, microfilming, recording
or otherwise, without written permission from the Publisher, with the exception
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CONTENTS
Acknowledgements vu
Preface
IX
Introduction
What arethePropertiesofCoordination? 3
The Structure ofCoordination 33
CoordinationandAgreement 91
CoordinationofLargerPhrases 151
References 173
Index 179
v
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This book sterns from work for my dissertation (Camacho 1997). Many people
have been very generous with their time and support. Their names are scattered
throughout the book, but here I will highlight some ofthem: for help with difficult
judgements, ideas, references, comments: Pablo Albizu, Alfredo Amaiz, Lina
Choueiri, Mary Dalrymple, Arantzazu Elordieta, Gorka Elordieta, Jane Grirnshaw,
Marcello Modesto, Liliana Paredes, Liliana Sanchez, Roger Schwarzschild, Barry
Schein, German Westphal and two anonymous reviewers. For all kinds ofsupport:
Mercedes Orosco, Laura Reiter, Liliana Sanchez, The Kluwerstaffand series editor:
Jacqueline Bergsrna, Iris Klug and Liliane Haegeman. This book is dedicated to
Liliana, Yesicaand Lucia.
vu
PREFACE
This book analyzes the structure of coordination from two perspectives: the
symmetricalpropertiestheconstructionimposesonitsconjuncts,andhow conjuncts
interact with other categories outside coordination with respect to agreement and
othergrammaticalphenomena.Asubstantialamountofdatarepresented inthisbook
are taken from varieties ofSpanish. Unlike English, Spanish has a rich pattern of
overt agreement between the subject and the verb, between nouns and adjectives,
and also between clitics and lexical DP objects and indirect objects. Spanish
agreement paradigms reveal very interesting patterns of agreement mismatch that
provideimportanttheoreticalinsights.Unlessotherwisespecified,itcanbe assumed
thatnon-EnglishexamplesarefromSpanish.
IX
CHAPTER #1
INTRODUCTION
Although coordination has figured more or less steadily in the Generative
tradition beginning with Chornsky's (1957) Conjunction Transformation (later
known as Conjunction Reduction), until recently, the two prevailing areas of
research had been ellipsis (see, for example, Van Oirsouw 1987) and the semantic
interpretation ofconjuncts.' The internal structure ofcoordination was usually left
unanalyzed,orassumedtobeternarybranching,asin(I).
(1) XP
~
XP and XP
Beginning inthe 1990s,thesituationstartedtochange.Severalanalyses beganto
address issues regarding the internal structure ofcoordination. In this book, I will
review the most important contributions fromrecent analyses ofcoordination, and I
will make a proposal that builds on important insights provided by those analyses,
but which departs from them in several respects. The proposal claims that
coordination should satisfy two basicproperties, presented inchapter 2: c-command
asymmetry and licensing symmetry. The first property argues that one of the
conjuncts c-commands the other(s), as argued by several researchers (cf., for
example, Munn (1993)). Most recent proposals on the structure of coordination
capture this property (cf. Munn 1993, Johannessen 1993, 1998 Zoerner 1995,
Camacho 1997). However, unlike those proposals, I will argue that coordination
mustbe symmetric withrespect to a licensinghead. In simple terms, each conjunct
should reflect the same structural properties as if it were in a simplex sentence.
Thus, if a conjoined constituent can be the subject of a sentence, each of the
conjuncts can usually also appear as a subject ofa sentence without coordination.'
Whateverstructuralproperty licensesaconstituentinasimplexsentence should also
license each ofthe conjuncts in the corresponding coordinated sentence. In some
sense,thisisthesimplesttheory,althoughwithimportantconsequences.
In addition to satisfying these two properties, my proposal for the structure of
conjunctionaccepts theunderlying ideabehindChornsky'sConjunction Reduction: I
willclaim that conjunction always involves asetofsentential functional projections
ISomeofthesubstantiveissues surroundingcoordinationarequiteold,asLasersohn (1995) documents.
2Thisproperty isnottrueforwhatJohannessen(1998)callsunbalanced coordination,seechapt. 2and3.
J. Camacho, The Structure of Coordination
© Kluwer Academic Publishers 2003
2 CHAPTER#1
(cf. also Schein 1997, 2001 for a semantic proposal that shares the same
assumptions).
In the second chapter I will review the different proposals concerning the
structure of coordination, and suggest what aspects of them should be maintained
and accounted for and which need to be modified. The third chapter presents the
bulk of my proposal. On the one hand, I will support the contention that
coordination is propositional innature; on the other, I willpresent evidence for the
structuralproperties ofconjoined constituents.Together, these two sets ofevidence
will leadto aproposal for the structureofcoordination where conjuncts are always
either specifiers of or complements to sentential functional (propositional)
projections.
Chapter4 willanalyze the consequencesofmyproposal foragreement systems.
Particular attention willbe paid tolanguagesthat displaypartial agreement systems
with conjunction. Chapter 5 will present cases where conjunction involves larger
structures,inparticularcaseswithgapping.
Throughoutthebook, Itake"propositional" and"sentential" tobe differentsides
ofthesamecoin.
CHAPTER #2
WHAT ARE THE PROPERTIES OFCOORDINATION?
Analyses of coordination did not consider the internal configuration of
coordinated constituents until the mid 80s (with the notable exception of Dik 1968),
when research into the internal structure of coordination began to yield important
insights. One of the areas of discussion in the literature had to do with the
relationship between conjuncts and heads that license them. In particular, when
conjuncts have conflicting features (i.e. sets of features that together do not match
those of an outside head with which they agree), which one prevails? What are the
conditions for cases where only one ofthe conjuncts triggers agreement or matches
case, etc.? Some of these issues, in turn, have direct impact on the structural
representation of coordination: a binary-branching representation may provide a
more principled explanation than a ternary structure as to why only one of the
conjuncts triggers agreement. In a ternary structure, both conjuncts have the same
structural position, whereas in a binary structure it is possible to define one conjunct
as structurally closer to a head than the other. Another important issue discussed is
whether coordination displays some kind of structural asymmetry: is one of the
conjuncts structurally higher than the other? Finally, an important issue in the
background of the discussions about the status of coordination involves how the
interpretation of conjoined phrases provides evidence for their structural
representation, etc. In this chapter, I will review each of these topics, presenting the
relevant proposals in turn. First, I will deal with peripherality, next I will turn to
structural symmetry, and finally I will present some general properties of
coordination.
I. LICENSING SYMMETRY
Some of the issues regarding licensing of conjuncts by an outside head include the
following: do conjuncts behave in the same way they would if they were in simplex
sentences? In what sense is a conjoined subject a subject? How is this reflected by
the structural representation? How are conjuncts licensed? I will frame the issue of
conjunct licensing by introducing the notion of licensing symmetry: a representation
complies with licensing symmetry if each conjunct is licensed in the same way as
they would be if they were not conjoined. Consider the following representation: the
Coordination Phrase is the one licensed with respect to 1°, so each conjunct is
licensed in a way that is different from the non-conjoined counterpart. Conj I is the
specifier of a different functional projection (CoordP vs. IP in the non-conjoined
counterpart); Conj2 isthe complementofadifferent projection.
3
J. Camacho, The Structure of Coordination
© Kluwer Academic Publishers 2003