Improper case
Ethan Poole
August 2021 

This paper argues that case assignment is impossible in configurations that parallel generalized improper-movement configurations. Thus, like improper movement, there is "improper case". The empirical motivation comes from (i) the interaction between case and movement and (ii) crossclausal case assignment in Finnish. I propose that improper case is ruled out by the Ban on Improper Case: a DP in [Spec, XP] cannot establish a dependent-case relationship with a lower DP across YP if Y is higher than X in the functional sequence. I show that this constraint falls under a strong version of the Williams Cycle (Williams 1974, 2003, 2013; van Riemsdijk and Williams 1981) and is derived under Williams’s (2003, 2013) analysis of embedding.

Format:	[ pdf ]
Reference:	lingbuzz/004148 (please use that when you cite this article)
Published in:	Natural Language & Linguistic Theory, to appear
keywords:	case, williams cycle, locality, finnish, syntax
previous versions:	v2 [July 2020] v1 [August 2018]
Downloaded:	1509 times

 

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