Workshop on Biolinguistics, University of the Balearic Islands.

Biolinguistic Investigations and the Formal Language Hierarchy, 105-132 The minimalist program (MP) assumes three factors for linguistic design. Two of these (genetic endowment and contingent variation) are customarily presupposed within generative grammar. The third factor involves general principles of computation and overall economy, which remain controversial in linguistics and relatively obscure within MP. This chapter […]

This paper discusses the nature of Huang’s (1982) Condition on Extraction Domains (CED) in the context of Chomsky’s (2005) Phase Theory. In particular, we address Chomsky’s (2005) analysis, which takes phase edges (ie, SPEC-v* and SPEC-C) to give rise to locality problems for sub-extraction. Concentrating on the Subject Condition subcase, we provide empirical evidence that […]

Alternatives to Cartography Goals: argue for the existence of a defective version of C; explore the connectivity effects of subjunctive dependents; provide an Agree-based account of long-distance obviation

The Complementiser Phase: subjects and wh-dependencies This chapter investigates Chomsky’s (2008) phase-based analysis of CED effects, which capitalizes on an opacity created by phasal specifiers (socalled ‘edges’). After reviewing different pieces of evidence, it is argued that an Agree/Activity Condition approach to islandhood phenomena is theoretically and empirically superior, a conclusion that is pushed to […]