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Ling 110 Section 4

C-command and Wh-movement
March 3, 2006

HW #4 (4.3, 4.9, 4.10) Due at 9am on Tuesday (3/7)

Hints
(4.3.) Construct examples in simple past tense to avoid any potentially
confounding factors. (See fn.1 on p.252-3 of G12)

(4.9.) Treat no one as an unanalyzable DP. No one as a whole is a NPI

licensor.

(4.10.) Note that there is a typo. Example (5ii) should not have a * in front of
it. The sentence is well-formed.

Quiz #1 (covering Chapters 2, 3, 4, and 6) on Wednesday (3/8)

1. c-command and Binding Principle A

(1) A node α c-commands a node β

iff (i) the first branching node that dominates α also dominates β
and (ii) α does not dominate β and β does not dominate α.

(i) a quasi-formal definition of c-command:

A node α c-commands its sisters and their descendants.

(ii) a more informal, MBTA definition of c-command:

A node α c-commands β if you can go from α to β by this: take an uptown-bound train and
go one stop and then transfer to a downtown-bound train.

(2) Johni respects himselfi.

(3) *Himselfi respects Johni.
(4) *Johni’s sister respects himselfi.
(5) *Johni believes that his sister respects himselfi.

Binding Principle A
(6) Anaphors must be bound (= c-commanded & co-indexed)
within the mininal CP that contains them (“ The Clausemate Requirement”)
.
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2. Negative Polarity Items

(1) *Portia saw anything.

(2) Portia did not see anything.
(3) Portia never saw anything.
(4) Nobody saw anything.
(5) a. The boy who liked Portia did not see anything.
b. *The boy who did not like Portia saw anything.
(6) John does not believe that Portia respects anyone.
(7) Nobody believes that Portia respects anyone.

Licensing Condition on NPIs

(8) A sentence containing an NPI is well-formed only if this NPI is c-commanded by
negation or a negative DP

Exercise:
1. Construct a minimal pair of sentences to show that “ever” is an NPI.

2. Construct a minimal pair of sentences to show that “ever” obeys the NPI licensing rule.

3. Wh-movement

(1) [TP John [VP sent a book to Mary by snail mail yesterday because she needed it]]
(a) (b) (c) (d) (e) (f)

Excerise: How would you ask a question when you don't know the identity of the underlined
portion in senetnce (1)?

(2) a. Who sent a book to Mary by snail mail yesterday because she needed it?
b.
c.
e.
f.
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Moved phrases leave a trace in their launching site.

(3) What did John send t to Mary by snail mail yesterday because she needed it?

Why couldn't we simply say that there is no movement and all the phrases are generated at the
position where they surface? How can we reason that phrases are moving? Which principle of
syntax we know forces us to posit movement? Below are some hints. Try to construct an
argument for the existence of movement based on them.

(4) Movement and Theta Theory (How? Continue the explanation)

Theta roles are assigned locally by sisterhood.

Movement and Binding Principle A: What does the following sentence tell us about movement?
Try to come up with an argument for movement using this data.

(5) Which pictures of himself does John like most?

One more source evidence if time permitting: Movement and wanna-contraction

(6) a. I want to leave. (7) a. John wants to leave.

b. I wanna leave. b.*John wanna leave.

Wanna-contraction
(8) want to Æ wanna if there is nothing between want and to.

(9) Who do you want to leave the party?

(10) *Who do you wanna leave the party?

What does this contrast teach us?

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Exercise:

Draw the tree diagrams for the following sentences. If movement has occurred,
specify the path of movement with an arrow.

(a) Do you love jazz?

(b) Who(m) will you meet tomorrow?

(c) I wondered if his theory would work.