A Critique of Phase Extension, With a Comparison to Phase Sliding

Theoretical Linguistics, 33, 65-74

1. Introduction

Den Dikken’s paper (henceforth DD) explores an interesting alternative to Chomsky’s conception of Phase Theory to account for different phenomena involving Predicate Inversion (PI). In particular, DD concentrates on cases of so-called copular, locative, and dative inversion (the respective instances in (1)):

a. The #1 best-seller in the country is this book.

b. On the president’s desk lay this book.

c. I gave my students this book.