Jaume Solà i Pujols - Departament de Filologia Catalana ...

(83) a. PRO estant malalt, a en Joani, l'anirem a veure
being ill to the J. him-we'll-go to see
'Since he's ill, we'll visit Joan'
b. PRO estant malalt, l'anirem a veure
being ill him-we'll-go to see
'Since he's ill, we'll visit him'
c. ?*PRO estant malalt, anirem a veure EN JOAN
being ill we'll-go to see the J.
'*Since he's ill, we'll visit JOAN'
Both 0.a) and (b.) cluster together as opposed to the non-dislocated Focus object, which
triggers WCO. The only difference between this paradigm and Rizzi's paradigm is that the
object, as opposed to the postverbal subject, need not be Focus (so that 0.c) improves if en Joan
is not Focus.
So the paradigm adduced by Rizzi proves irrelevant for the position of null subjects: in
0.b) we could not claim there is a preverbal empty object c-commanding the gerund.
In fact there are cases where pre-verbal subjects have co-reference restrictions which do
not cluster with null subjects. Consider:
1