X-bar parameters CAS LX 522 n Many (most?) languages of the world have Syntax I something like a basic word order, an order in which words come in in “neutral” sentences. n English: SVO n Akira ate an apple. Week 5. Head movement n Japanese: SOV n John wa ringo o tabeta. n John top apple acc ate n ‘John ate an apple.’ X-bar parameters X-bar parameters n These two word n Notice that in English, orders work nicely TP TP both V and T are TP TP with X-bar theory head-initial, and in as it stands; the DP T¢ DP T¢ Japanese, both V and DP T¢ DP T¢ difference can be T are head-final. In Akira T VP John VP T Akira T VP John VP T stated in terms of a -ed -ta fact, languages tend to -ed -ta simple parameter V¢ V¢ be consistent in their V¢ V¢ which headedness: differentiates V DP DP V n Japanese has V DP DP V languages as to eat tabe postpositions, C comes eat tabe an apple ringo o after TP in embedded an apple ringo o whether they are clauses… head-initial or n English has prepositions; head-final. C comes before TP in embedded clauses… X-bar parameters X-bar parameters n By changing the order of the TP specifier and the X¢, we can get n There are also languages in which the VOS order, and by changing the T¢ DP basic word order is VOS, although they order of both (with respect to are few in number. English) we can get OVS order. T VP ny vehi- [PAST] vavay TP n Malagasy: VOS V¢ n Malagasy: VOS T¢ DP n Nahita ny mpianatra ny vehivavay. n Nahita ny mpianatra ny vehivavay. V DP VP T bïrye- n saw the student the woman n saw the student the woman nahita [PAST] komo n ‘The woman saw the student.’ ny mpia- n ‘The woman saw the student.’ natra V¢ n Hixkaryana: OVS n See how we might generate an X-bar n Kana yanïmno bïryekomo DP V structure of this? n Fish caught boy yanïmno n ‘The boy caught a fish’ kana 1 The problem of VSO X-bar parameters languages n There are quite a number of languages, n So by changing the parameters of head- however, for which the basic word order complement order and specifier-X¢ is VSO. Irish, Welsh, and Arabic are order we can generate the following basic word orders: among them. n SVO (spec-initial, head-initial) (English) n Try as we might, there is no way to set the n SOV (spec-initial, head-final) (Japanese) X-bar parameters to get VSO order—we n VOS (spec-final, head-initial) (Malagasy) have a specifier (the subject) between the n OVS (spec-final, head-final) (Hixkaryana) verb and its complement. n And that’s all… French French n In French the sentence is n TP TP French presents a n Je mange souvent des pommes. similar problem; DP T¢ n I eat often of.the apples DP T¢ consider the English n ‘I often eat apples.’ I I T VP n T VP sentence [PRES] The adverb souvent appears [PRES] between the verb and its n I often eat apples. V¢ complement; there is no place to V¢ AdvP V¢ put it in this tree. AdvP V¢ n The adverb often is an n Moreover, it should be basically often V DP in the same place as in English, often V DP adjunct, attached at V¢, eat eat apples given the structural similarity apples as seen here. and the sameness of meaning. X-bar theory: A sham? Movement n Consider English yes-no questions… n So is X-bar theory not up to the task of being a universal principle of phrase n To form a question from a statement like: structure, despite its initial promise in n Bill should eat his peas. English (and Japanese and Malagasy n We prepose the modal should to the front and Hixkaryana)? Should we scrap it of the sentence, before the subject. and start over? n Should Bill eat his peas? n Where is should in this sentence? n Answer: No… There is a way we can salvage all the good stuff we’ve gotten from X-bar theory so far… 2 Movement Movement n All of this suggests that the way to look at n Should Bill eat his peas? this is that we start with the sentence… n There is one position in our sentence structures so far that is to the left of the subject, the one where the n Bill should eat his peas complementizer that goes (C): n …as usual, and if we’re forming a yes-no n I said that Bill should eat his peas. question, we follow this up by moving n This is where we expect should to be. It is, after all, a modal, of category T. It is not a complementizer. should to the position of C. If we can’t move it (in an embedded question, there’s n Also notice that if we embed this question, should stays after the subject, and if is in C: already something in C: if), it stays put. n I wonder if Bill should eat his peas. Movement French n Given that things do seem to move around n Jean mange souvent des pommes. TP in the sentence (that is, they start where n Jean eats often of.the apples DS we’d expect them to but we hear them n ‘Jean often eat apples.’ DP T¢ somewhere else), this gives us a way we n If we suppose that the French sentence starts out just like the Jean T VP might “save X-bar theory” from Irish and English sentence, we have the [PRES] French. underlying DS (deep structure) V¢ representation shown here. n Let’s go back and look at French with this AdvP V¢ in mind… souvent PP n What needs to happen to get the V mange correct surface word order? des pommes French Why does this happen? n Jean mange souvent des pommes. n Jean eats often of.the apples n ‘Jean often eat apples.’ TP n Why would a language need to move its verb up to n Of course—the V (mange) moves SS tense? DP T¢ up to the T position. n In French, verbs are marked for tense and n This always happens in French Jean agreement—past tense verbs look different from Vi+T VP with a tensed/agreeing verb. mange+[PRES] present tense verbs, which look different from This generally doesn’t happen in V¢ future tense verbs. If the tense information is in T English. ([PRES]), and the verb reflects this, somehow the n Hence, the difference in “adverb AdvP V¢ verb needs to get together with T. position” (really, of course, it’s n French does this by moving the verb to T. verb position) souvent ti PP n English does this by moving T (-ed) to the verb. des pommes 3 Pondering about T Features n In the DS of every matrix sentence (French or English or anything) there is a TP. n In general, as far as syntax is concerned, we can think of the things at the terminal nodes in our tree as being “bundles of features” or “collections of properties.” n In the example Jean mange souvent des pommes, n The T node has (by definition) the feature “is of the tense marked on the verb is present tense. So, category T” for one. Terminal nodes have categorial we suppose that T was present, which we can features, like [T]. mark as being [PRES], i.e. having the feature for n The T node also has features indicating what kind of “present” on tense. The present tense morpheme tense it is ([PRES], [FUT], [PAST], [-FIN]). in French is Ø, so writing the feature is clearer. n The V node has features indicating its theta-grid, and so forth. Projections Projections n When we say the category of the head of an X-bar phrase determines the category of the phrase as a n One consequence of modeling category this way whole (i.e. an N heads an NP, a D heads a DP, and is that an XP node doesn’t have a category so forth), we sometimes refer to this as projection of feature intrinsically, it essentially inherits it from the category feature (property). its head. n A DP is a DP because the [D] feature of its head n For this reason, an XP (a phrase, a projection) projects up to the phrase level (and through the must always have a head. intermediate bar-levels as well). n For similar reasons, we also assume that an XP n For this reason, XPs are sometimes referred to as can’t have two heads—only one head projects its “projections (of their head)”. features to the XP. What happens when What happens when V moves to T? V moves to T? n If we think that V moves to TP n The T and V must fuse in TP T in order to get the verb SS some way, retaining the SS together with the tense DP T¢ features of T, since the tense DP T¢ feature, then certainly V feature of T is why the verb Vi+T VP Vi+T VP cannot replace T. T must still mange+[PRES] needed to move up there.