Abstract
In this paper, I make critical use of certain word order and semantic properties of ditransitive expressions to develop an argument for the LF-copy theory of argument ellipsis (Oku in A theory of selection and reconstruction in the minimalist perspective, University of Connecticut, Storrs, 1998; Saito in Lang Res 43:203–222, 2007; in: Shibatani, Miyagawa, and Noda (eds) Handbook of Japanese syntax, Mouton de Gruyter, Berlin, 2017; Sakamoto in J East Asian Linguist 25:243–274, 2016; Escape from silent syntax, University of Connecticut, Storrs, 2017). Firstly, I summarize and extend Sakamoto’s (in: Paper presented at the 148th Annual Meeting of the Linguistic Society of Japan, Hosei University, Tokyo, 2014; 2016; 2017) argument based on rigid ditransitive idioms and show that the possible ellipsis of a non-idiomatic argument to the exclusion of the idiom chunks and the ditransitive verb is best accounted for in terms of argument ellipsis. Secondly, I point out a hitherto unnoticed observation, that no internal constituent within ditransitive figurative expressions may undergo ellipsis without losing a non-literal, metaphorical interpretation associated with its containing VP, and I demonstrate how this observation presents critical evidence in favor of the LF-copy theory of argument ellipsis over its competing PF-deletion alternative.
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Notes
Saito (2007) assumes that LF-copy takes place after radical reconstruction. One may wonder whether this rule ordering is permissible within the current minimalist framework. This technical issue won’t arise if we adopt Saito’s (2003) updated minimalist rendition of radical reconstruction. Under this view, radical reconstruction results from the derivational interpretation of scrambling chains via the deletion of the D-feature from the landing site. Consequently, the scrambled object in (2) is derivationally interpreted in its base position, with only its phonetic features being evaluated at the landing site. Then, LF-copy may target the embedded CP in (4) without incurring the ordering issue raised above, but the result still ends up being ill-formed, as shown in (5), due to a θ-theoretic violation.
One might also argue that the ellipsis patterns in (11) and (12) would be amenable to the VVPE analysis if we assume that the dative/accusative idiom chunks and the verb form a complex predicate, which will then undergo V-to-T movement, followed by VP-ellipsis. See Sakamoto (2014, 2016: 248–249, 2017:60–62), however, for convincing arguments against this particular alternative based on grammatical examples involving focus particles, genitive modification and discourse particles intervening between the idiom chunks and the verb.
The grammaticality of the examples in (16b, d, e) shows that scrambling can be interpreted with reconstruction. In particular, (16b) has an important implication for the proper analysis of VP-scrambling. Here, the scrambled phrase must be interpreted with reconstruction, a result that runs counter to the observation (see Mahajan 1990, Nemoto 1993, and Tada 1993, among others) that VP-internal scrambling does not reconstruct, as illustrated by the Condition (C) effect in (i).
(i)
*Yoichiro-ga
[DP1 otagai-o]i
[DP2
Hikari-to
Megumi]i-ni
tDP1
syookaisita.
Yoichiro-nom
each.other-acc
Hikari-and
Megumi-dat
introduced
Intended: ‘Yoichiro introduced Hikari to Megumi and Megumi to Hikari.’
I would like to come back to this intriguing issue in my future research. Thanks to the JEAL editor for pointing this out to me.
I consulted eight native speakers of Japanese, all advanced undergraduate students of linguistics who are familiar with basic tenets of the acceptability judgment task adopted in generative grammar, about the acceptability of the ellipsis/pronominal options in (19). Six speakers reported that the ellipsis option is very marginal whereas the pronominal option is acceptable. The most typical reaction expressed by this group of speakers when they read and attempted to parse the elliptical clause was that the clause was felt to be somehow incomplete due to the lack of an overt object of the verb. As one of the consultants put it, “I feel the clause is semantically incomplete; I mean, what did Mr. Suzuki show to his competitor company?” The relevant speakers also noted that the ellipsis in (19) is unacceptable under any interpretation, strict (where Sato and Suzuki revealed the same secret to their respective parties) or sloppy (as reflected in the free Japanese translation). The remaining two speakers found both options acceptable under either interpretation.
An anonymous reviewer points out that examples such as (19) appear to improve in acceptability when the verb in the second clause is changed to involve negation, along with some other minor changes that accompany the insertion of negation, as shown in (i) below:
(i)
Sato-kun-wa
ukkari
raibarutasya-ni
tenouti-o
Sato-tit-top
inadvertently
competitor.company-to
palm.of.hand-acc
misetesimatta-kedo,
Suzuki-kun-wa
issai
dare-ni-mo {*eDP/sore-o}
misenakatta.
showed-but
Suzuki-tit-top
absolutely anybody-to-mo
it-acc
didn’t.show
‘Mr. Sato inadvertently showed his secret plan to his competitor company, but Mr. Suzuki didn’t show his secret plan to anybody.’
The six native speakers of Japanese who found the ellipsis option very marginal in (19) (see note 4) failed to detect any noticeable effect of negation on the second clause, and reported that the pronominal option, but not the null argument option, is acceptable in both (19) and (i). In fact, they all pointed out to me that the contrast in acceptability between the two options is actually clearer in (i) than it is in (19).
As stated in the text, the example in (19) supports the AE analysis over the pro-analysis in accounting for the ellipsis pattern within a figurative ditransitive expression. This result in no way means that Japanese does not allow null pronouns elsewhere. As one reviewer points out, examples like (i) below are most likely to involve a null referential pronoun in subject position, not the AE option, because it is commonly assumed that AE requires a linguistic antecedent.
(i)
e
ochita-yo.
fell-prt
‘It fell.’
Takahashi (2008b) already pointed out the need for Japanese grammar to allow both options (AE and null pronouns) based on examples such as (iia, b), similar to (i), where the null subject and object may refer to some particular student prominent in the ongoing non-verbal situation.
(ii)
[Observing a student smoking in the classroom]
a.
Taroo:
e
haigan-de
sinu
kamosirenai.
lung.cancer-of
die
may
‘He may die of lung cancer.’
b.
Taroo:
Sensei-ga
e
sikaru
daroo.
teacher-nom
scold
will
‘The teacher will scold him.’
(Takahashi 2008b: 416)
The same reviewer asks what exactly the difference would be between the body part expression in (19) and anaphoric expressions such as zibun-zisin ‘oneself’ with respect to the possibility of AE because neither type of expression is meaningful unless it co-occurs with a particular acceptable ditransitive verb or an appropriate antecedent. As is well-known, the latter may undergo AE, as shown by the well-formedness of the second conjunct in (i) below with the sloppy interpretation (i.e., ‘Hanako didn’t criticize herself’).
(i)
Taroo-wa
zibun zisin-o
semeta-ga,
Hanako-wa
eDP
semenakatta.
Taro-top
oneself-acc
criticized-but
Hanako-top
didn’t.criticize
‘Taro criticized himself, but Hanako didn’t criticize herself.’
The critical difference between the body part and anaphoric expressions lies in their relative inherent lexical meaningfulness. As stated in the text, the body part expression tenouti ‘palm of hand’ itself literally does not mean anything in the figurative context under discussion unless it forms part of the complex predicate represented by the relevant syntactic treelet VP1 shown in (20). The anaphoric expression zibun-zisin ‘oneself’, on the other hand, has the lexically stored reflexive interpretation on its own; it is just that a suitable antecedent has to be found for the reflexive in a syntactic context. This relative independent meaningfulness, thus, has an effect on the AE potential of the anaphoric, but not the body part, expressions.
The same reviewer asks why the direct object DP part of the VP1 in (20) may undergo scrambling, as shown in (16b, c, e), when the same expression is not accessible to LF-copy, given that both scrambling and LF-copy are syntactic operations. I find this question ill-conceived. Both scrambling and LF-copy are indeed syntactic operations, but their derivational timing and target are different: scrambling applies to a syntactic constituent in an ongoing syntactic derivation (see note 1 for some pertinent discussion) whereas LF-copy targets an LF object created once the relevant derivation is completed. As such, by the time the VP structure in (20) is created, the erstwhile-independent DP object, which was still accessible to scrambling at a mid-derivational stage, will have become inaccessible to LF-copy
I thank the JEAL editor for the question.
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Acknowledgements
Earlier incarnations of this paper were presented at the linguistic colloquia and research meetings held at Tohoku University (September 2014), University of British Columbia (October 2014), Sogang University (November 2014), and Mie University (December 2014). I thank the JEAL editors and reviewers as well as Mike Barrie, Inkie Chung, Yoshi Dobashi, Mitcho Yoshitaka Erlewine, Kenshi Funakoshi, Nobu Goto, Yoshiaki Kaneko, Shin-Ichi Kitada, Satoshi Oku, Kachi Otaki, Myung-Kwan Park, Mamoru Saito, Yuta Sakamoto, Osamu Sawada, Etsuro Shima, Yasu Sudo, Koji Sugisaki, Kensuke Takita, Martina Wiltschko and Dwi Hesti Yuliani for helpful feedback. Special thanks go to Hideki Kishimoto, Masako Maeda and Daiko Takahashi for invaluable suggestions and questions at several critical junctures of this project and for moral support, as well as to my students in my advanced syntax seminar at Seisen University for the crucial idiom data and their judgments. This research has been supported by the following grants: the Singapore Ministry of Education Academic Research Fund Tier 1 (#R-103-000-124-112), the 2016 Humanities and Social Sciences Faculty Research Fellowship from the National University of Singapore, and the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C) (Project #:JP19K0056). All errors are my own.
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Sato, Y. Idioms, argument ellipsis and LF-copy. J East Asian Linguist 29, 259–278 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10831-020-09211-x
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10831-020-09211-x