Syntax II						Spring 2018

Assignment 9	Relative Clauses Some More		Due Monday, April 30


In assignment 8 you were asked to propose a structure for relative clauses.
I am anticipating that there was some disagreement about that structure.
This assignment is designed to help settle the issue.

I am assuming that we are all agreed that relative clauses are adjuncts,
but there is a question as to where they are adjoined.  The data in this problem
should help to answer that question.

I.  'one' Anaphora

There is an anaphoric process involving the element 'one':

(1)  I could choose any car I wanted, so I chose the red one.
(2)  We used to have a pretty simple theory of syntax, but now we have a complex one.
(3)  The youngest lawyer in the firm is better than the oldest one.
(4)  The senior lawyer in this firm is better than the one in that firm.
(5)  If you don't have one, you should go out and buy a big black beautiful cadillac
     with wire wheels.

'one' is called an anaphor, which just means that its interpretation is copied from
some other element in the structure, called its "antecedent".  Anaphors substitute for
particular kinds of constituent, which makes them useful as tests for constituent
structure.  So the question here is: what kind of constituent does 'one' substitute
for?

Example (5) might throw you off if you don't know this: there is a low-level
morphological rule that says that "a one" is pronounced "one".

II.  Based on your answer to part I, what must you conclude about the constituent
structure of the examples below?

(6)  I read the book that Juan recommended, but I didn't read the one that Maria recommended.
(7)  I didn't read the first book that Juan recommended, but I did read the second one.
(8)  If you don't have one, you should buy a cadillac that has wire wheels.

III. One fact about coordination is that only constituents can be coordinated:

(9) *One very and three somewhat happy raccoons were playing in the garden.

So consider:

(10) All books that are recommended by the Times and plays that are positively reviewed in
at least one national culture magazine will be eligible for the Fafnir prize.

(11) Every ant that bites me and bee that stings me will die.

(12) These privileges that you like and responsibilities that you hate define your life.

What do you conclude about the structure of relative clauses?

IV.  There is an ellipsis process called "NP Ellipsis":

(13) We need to adopt some theory of ellipsis, so why not Chomsky's?
(14) If we can't attend Jim's, maybe we can go to Maziar's open lecture on how to skin a frog.
(15) This way of doing things is better than that.

First, convince yourself that all of these and similar examples involve eliding an NP.
Then, consider the following:

(16) My own secret that nobody knows about is less disturbing than Marie's.

What does this tell you about the structure of relative clauses?

V.  Since you may have changed your theory by now (and even if you haven't)
can you still account for stacked relative clauses?  (There were some of these in assignment 8.)