Wide-focus subject-verb inversion in Ibero-Romance: A locative account

Abstract

This paper explores the hypothesis that wide-focus subject-verb inversion in Ibero-Romance is a type of locative inversion, involving a null locative argument. Ibero-Romance displays finegrained, systematic variation determined by verbal class and variety, offering evidence that Ibero-Romance neutral word order is SVO, rather than VSO as claimed by some null-subject accounts. It is proposed that 'locative' subject-verb inversion is a consequence of grammaticallyencoded deictic features correlating with the semantic properties of the verbs involved. The locative element, available unequally across Ibero-Romance, can surface in different positions in the left periphery, yielding the variation encountered. The data indicate that the licensing of these constructions depends neither on the null-subject parameter, since this type of inversion also occurs in non-and partial null-subject varieties, nor on the unaccusative/unergative division, though in both cases a degree of correspondence exists.

The silent argument of broad focus: Typology and predictions

“…Differently from (16a), (16b) is not speaker-oriented either in a locative way or in any other obvious sense. Thus, in agreement with Corr (2016), it could be assumed that the state-g serves as an SoP in this BFSI construction. We note, however, that the state-g is not an actant or a thematic argument of the verb, which can be projected to a syntactic position.…”

“…This, in Corr's view, explains the cross-linguistic variation in the verbs that are admitted in broad focus. Although Corr (2016) captures the cross-linguistic variation in BFSI in Ibero-Romance, her analysis, on a par with Pinto's, does not provide a principled explanation of the contrast between, say, 'die' (cf. (8b)) and 'become pale' (cf.…”

“…In addition, the claim that subject inversion, whether or not in the presence of an overt locative phrase, involves speaker orientation is too strong and ultimately untenable, as is suggested by the following examples, which are not oriented towards the speaker in any obvious sense. Another selectional analysis is that of Corr (2016), who claims that the deictic interpretation of BFSI is not derived from the context, but rather syntactically encoded.…”

“…Building upon Benincà (1988), several scholars have claimed that, in the absence of an overt locative or temporal phrase, broad focus subject inversion in Romance requires a null locative in preverbal position, thus being comparable to locative inversion (Pinto 1997;Tortora 1997;2001;Sheehan 2006;Corr 2016). The covert locative argument is said to give a deictic interpretation to the sentence, expressing spatial and/or temporal relatedness to the speaker.…”

Basic Word Order in Brazilian Portuguese: A Hybrid Extended Projection Principle (Epp) | a Ordem Básica De Palavras No Português Brasileiro: Um Princípio Da Projeção Estendido (Epp) Híbrido

“…How similar is this to BP word order? The basic word order in out-of-the-blue contexts in Italian is certainly SV(O) with transitive/unergative predicates (see BELLETTI & SHLONSKY, 1995 In Spanish, too, in out-of-the-blue contexts SVO is a basic word order (CORR 2012(CORR , 2016, though VSO is also permitted (ZUBIZARRETA, 1998), but only (usually) if some other XP topic surfaces in initial position (ORDÓÑEZ, 2000;GUTIÉRREZ-BRAVO, 2002, 2003, 2007 SI is melted the snow (PINTO, 1997, p. 20) Matters are more complex than this, of course, and a discussion of these issues goes beyond the scope of this paper (but see Sheehan 2016). Nonetheless, there are again deep similarities between these languages and BP when it comes to basic word order in out-of-the-blue contexts.…”