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SUMMARY:The role of semantic and structural constraints in ellipsis - Klau
 s Abels\, UCL
DTSTART:20140220T170000Z
DTEND:20140220T183000Z
UID:TALK47977@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Alison Biggs
DESCRIPTION:One of the two central puzzles in the study of ellipsis is to 
 determine whether there is regular syntactic structure present at the elli
 psis site and\, if so\, what form it takes. The syntax of sluicing\, a wh-
 question where everything but the wh-phrase is elided\, (1)\, is particula
 rly puzzling.\n\n(1) Joe met someone on the train last night. Guess who!\n
 \nSluicing is puzzling\, since it provides us with ample\, convincing evid
 ence that there is syntactic structure present at the ellipsis site. This 
 evidence has given rise to the idea that the hidden syntax at the ellipsis
  site is structurally isomorphic to its antecedent.  But sluicing also pro
 vides equally ample and convincing evidence that the structure at the elli
 psis site is not in all cases identical to the structure of the antecedent
  of ellipsis.\n\nI will review some of the central evidence for and agains
 t structural isomorphism\, paying particular attention to the two rightly 
 most famous properties of sluicing\, namely\, that (i) sluicing appears to
  repair island violations and (ii) that the overt wh-phrase must match its
  correlate in the antecedent sentence in case.\n\nI will argue that the ab
 ility of sluicing to repair island violations is only apparent\, which str
 engthens the case for the presence of regular syntactic structure at the e
 llipsis site but\, at the same time\, also requires us to allow substantia
 l syntactic mismatches between antecedent and ellipsis site. The threateni
 ng paradox is resolved by assuming a dual theory with a semantic component
  along the lines of Merchant's eGIVENness and a syntactic component. The s
 yntactic aspect of the analysis demands that the elided structure be a str
 uctural alternative to the overt antecedent sentence in the sense of Katzi
 r (2007)\, Fox and Katzir (2011) and that the overt correlate of the wh-ph
 rase be a structural alternative to the wh-phrase again in the sense of Ka
 tzir and Fox and Katzir.
LOCATION:GR06/7 English Faculty\, Sidgwick Site
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