2012 Fiscal Year Final Research Report
A Comparative Syntactic Study of Defocusing Phenomena
| Project/Area Number |
22520501
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| Research Category |
Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
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| Allocation Type | Single-year Grants |
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| Section | 一般 |
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| Research Field |
English linguistics
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| Research Institution | Yamaguchi University |
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Principal Investigator |
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| Project Period (FY) |
2010 – 2012
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| Keywords | 文法 |
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| Research Abstract |
In this study, I tried to capture common syntactic properties of various defocusing phenomena in English and other languages within the framework of the Phase Theory (Chomsky, N. (2000 et seq)). Under the Phase Theory, the elements which have moved to the edge of the verb phrase (vP) can be affected by the head of the clause (CP) right external to the vP. Assuming that this causes an important effect on the discourse interpretation of moved elements, we can get a plausible account of the positioning of defocused elements and the omissibility of the generic object NP in English, as well as the structural position and the semantic interpretation of the short-scrambled elements in other languages.
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