Anti-Pied-Piping

Abstract

Anti-pied-piping is a widespread but understudied phenomenon where a language targets a proper subpart of the logical focus for focus morphosyntax: for example, focus particle placement or focus movement. We show that anti-pied-piping is attested in over sixty languages from over forty distinct language groups. We present a theory of focus particle syntax/semantics that involves severing the pronounced position of a focus particle and the logical position of its corresponding semantic contribution, which successfully accounts for both anti-pied-piping and pied-piping behavior. Constraints on attested anti-pied-piping behavior and its interaction with movement show that particle placement takes place at particular, punctuated points in the derivation, in a cyclic model of syntactic structure building. We also discuss the relation of particle placement to other processes such as linearization and stress assignment.

Morphological focus and its agreement features in Kakabe

“…Moreover, in the case of DP/IP focus syncretism, it is the subject, the structurally higher DP that hosts the focus marker. This pattern is discussed as 'anti-pied-piping' by Branan and Erlewine (2019).…”

“…In the cases of IP focus and subject focus, a particle lé follows the subject (Schwarz 2007: 131). See Assman et al (2019) and Branan and Erlewine (2019) for more examples of languages that have the pattern of morphological focus marking characterized by object/VP and subject/IP syncretism. This pattern find in our analysis is attributed to the existence of the D-feature on the focus operator.…”