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Discourse, sentence grammar and the left periphery of the clause

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Further Advances in Pragmatics and Philosophy

Part of the book series: Perspectives in Pragmatics, Philosophy & Psychology ((PEPRPHPS,volume 18))

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Abstract

The term left periphery refers to that area on the left of the subject, in the syntactic representation of a clause, where the relationships with the context are encoded. In this work I propose a syntactic analysis that goes beyond mere sentence grammar and integrates prosodic and discourse features as well. On the one hand, this move accounts for some observations previously not fully understood, such as the anomalous syntactic properties of Clitic Left Dislocation and Hanging Topic, their differences with respect to Focus and their similarities with parentheticals. On the other, it aims at providinga theory of grammar able to encode the relationships between sentence grammar, context and bigger units such as discourses.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    I adopt here a very simple definition of topic as ‘given information’. This notion however is very rough and does not capture all the possible occurrences of such phrases. However, it is impossible to fully discuss this issue in this work and I refer the reader to Krifka (2007).

  2. 2.

    These are to be understood as abstract properties, universally represented, even if languages might differ in the way they realize them.

  3. 3.

    X-bar theory was firstly proposed in the 70’s, see among the others Chomsky (1970) and Jackendoff (1977). In this work I will not discuss the arguments in favor, or against, this syntactic representation. Let me just point out that more recently, several aspects of X-bar theory have been deeply revised, to account for further empirical observations, see the anti-symmetrical proposal by Kayne (1994).

  4. 4.

    the first position can be occupied by whatever phrase, even and adverb, as in the following example:

    1. i.

      Gestern hat der Hans einene Apfel gegessen

    • Yesterday has Hans an apple eaten

    • ‘Yesterday Hans ate an apple’

    For further discussion, see Holmberg (2015).

  5. 5.

    In the literature, corrective focus is represented in capital letters, precisely to distinguish it from topics.

  6. 6.

    In subsequent work Rizzi (2001) shows that the complementizer se (if) introducing embedded questions occupies an intermediate position, immediately on the left of focus. I will not discuss this issue here, since it is not relevant to the following discussion.

  7. 7.

    On the differences between the two topic positions see also Benincà e Poletto (2004).

  8. 8.

    In Italian and English the focus head is always empty. In some languages, such as Gungbe, the focus head is lexically realized, see Aboh (2007). In other ones, such Armenian, the focus head can host the tensed verb, giving rise to Verb Second structures, See Giorgi and Haroutyunian (2016).

  9. 9.

    See for a discussion of this point Samek-Lodovici (2015) and references cited there.

  10. 10.

    See for a discussion of this and related issues Frascarelli (2000).

  11. 11.

    See among the others Cinque (1990), Frascarelli (2000), Frascarelli and Hinterhölzl (2007), Giorgi (2015).

  12. 12.

    Languages such as Spanish and Catalan instantiate clitic doubling, whereas Hebrew exhibits resumptive strategies.

  13. 13.

    Hebrew is such a language, see for instance Sharvit (1999) and Shlonsky (1992).

  14. 14.

    Gaps in adverbial clauses such as the ones introduced by senza are ungrammatical:

    1. i.

      *Quale libro hai scritto l’articolo senza leggere e ?

    • Which book did you write the article without reading?

    However, it is possible to rescue them, by introducing and additional gap, on which they can be parasitical:

    1. ii.

      Quale libro hai recensito e senza leggere e?

    • Which book did you review without reading?

    Sentence (ii) is much better than (i), because the additional gap in the object position of hai recensito (you have reviewed) creates a dependency, which is syntactically permitted. In some languages, as in Hebrew for instance, the role of this gap can be played by a clitic, but not in Italian, as shown in the text.

  15. 15.

    The principle of Full Interpretation, formulated by Chomsky (1986), requires that every element of Phonological Form or Logical Form must receive an appropriate interpretation, that is, must be licensed in the some way.

  16. 16.

    The first proposal concerning weak crossover appears in Postal (1971), see also Chomsky (1976). The literature on these phenomena in various languages is nowadays very rich, see Safir (to appear) for a discussion and references.

  17. 17.

    The effect is called weak, because the ungrammaticality of the construction is not severe. There is also a strong crossover effect – see Postal (1971) – which is not relevant to the present discussion.

  18. 18.

    The literature on this issue is very rich and it is impossible to summarize the relevant discussion in this work. See among the many others, Sportiche (2007) and references cited there.

  19. 19.

    For a discussion of condition C and CLLD in Italian see Cecchetto and Chierchia (1999), Frascarelli and Hinterhölzl (2007).

  20. 20.

    See also Giorgi (2015, 2016).

  21. 21.

    In this work, I will not analyze the inversion phenomena in these clauses, because the issue is not immediately relevant to the discussion. On these phenomena, see D’Alessandro (to appear) and references cited there.

  22. 22.

    On as-clauses, see the important work by Potts (2002, 2005).

  23. 23.

    On parentheticals see Dehé (2009), Dehé and Kavalova (2007), de Vries (2007) among the others. Note that there is ample debate about the actual phonological and phonetic realization of the comma pattern. On the intonation of different types of topics, see Frascarelli and Hinterhölzl (2007). According to Selkirk (2005), as I’m going to discuss in the text, a feature, specified for the value [+comma], is responsible for the comma intonation. In her view, Comma Phrases are then mapped into Intonational Phrases.

  24. 24.

    When the dislocated phrase occupies the position on the right we can speak of right dislocation.

  25. 25.

    As discussed in Giorgi (2015, 2016), FID parentheticals cannot be embedded, due to their particular semantic value.

  26. 26.

    Actually, according to Selkirk’s (2005) proposal, they are associated with two features, one for the parenthetical and another for the host sentence. I follow this theoretical proposal in the text.

  27. 27.

    This proposal provides a solution for the problems connected with parenthetical linearization, a complex issue that cannot be discussed here. I refer the reader to the cited references.

  28. 28.

    I will not discuss here the technicalities necessary to derive (62) and the other possible orders from the basic structure (61). The issue is quite complex, and would deserve a detailed analysis, which cannot be provided here.

  29. 29.

    The reader might have noticed that in the syntactic representation of CLLD only one head K appears. This is indeed the main difference between CLLD and parentheticals, which, as discussed in the text, share several properties, but still are two different phenomena. Simplifying somewhat, parentheticals such as the ones presented here are predicative structures, whereas CLLD is not, being just a phrase, in these cases a Noun Phrase or a Prepositional Phrase. In a way, therefore, the structure associated to CLLD is simpler with respect to the one associated to the parentheticals discussed in the text.

  30. 30.

    This implies that an accusative dislocated phrase, which is realized without the preposition, could be in principle be ambiguous between CLLD and HT. To avoid this problem, I will only use dative phrases in the examples.

  31. 31.

    See Samek-Lodovici (2015) and Brunetti (2004), for a discussion of the intonational issue.

  32. 32.

    I refer the reader to the relevant discussion of this point in Giorgi (2015).

  33. 33.

    Note that HT, even though it cannot be embedded itself, can be connected to an embedded clause, as in the following case:

    1. i.

      Gianni, Mario ha detto che gli daranno il passaporto

      • Gianni, Mario said that they to him-will give the passport

      • ‘Gianni-HT, Mario said they will give him his passport’

  34. 34.

    Note that in these cases the inversion of the subject in the parenthetical, the so-called quotative inversion, is the preferred option in Italian. In my Italian, the non-inverted sentence is also acceptable. The same is roughly true for English. I will not investigate this issue here, because it is not relevant for this discussion. Also, I will not discuss the differences between FID and Quotations and refer the reader to Giorgi (2016) and Sharvit (2004), Schlenker (2003, 2004), Guéron (2015) among the many others.

  35. 35.

    Italian, being a so-called pro-drop language, admits subject inversion much more freely.

  36. 36.

    Note that this sentence would be acceptable with the parenthetical intonation discussed above. It is not possible, however, to maintain the intonation associated to example (83) in (87) and (88).

  37. 37.

    For a proposal on (79), see Cinque (2008). Cf. also the discussion in Giorgi (2015).

  38. 38.

    Similarly, Cinque (2008) proposes the following structures:

    1. i.

      John is no longer here. He left at noon. (Cinque 2008, ex.59)

    2. ii.

      [HP CP [ H CP ] ] (ex.60)

    3. iii.

      A pink shirt? I will never wear any such thing in my life!

    4. iv.

      [HP DP [ H CP ] ] (Cinque 2008, ex.61).

    Cinque’s head H corresponds to my head DIS.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Ca’ Foscari University of Venice, Venice, Italy

    Alessandra Giorgi

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  1. Alessandra Giorgi
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Cognitive Science, University of Messina, Messina, Messina, Italy

    Alessandro Capone

  2. Dip. Scienze Umanistiche, Università di Palermo, Palermo, Italy

    Marco Carapezza

  3. University of Palermo, Palermo, Italy

    Franco Lo Piparo

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Giorgi, A. (2018). Discourse, sentence grammar and the left periphery of the clause. In: Capone, A., Carapezza, M., Lo Piparo, F. (eds) Further Advances in Pragmatics and Philosophy. Perspectives in Pragmatics, Philosophy & Psychology, vol 18. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-72173-6_8

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