Emphatic Polarity and C in Spanish - Lear

M. LLUÏSA HERNANZ
(15)), this movement being required by the FOCUS-criterion (see Rizzi
(1997)). 49 The hypothesis that the FOCUS-criterion is at work in the case
under study is supported by the fact that bien-sentences have a distinctive
emphatic caracter, 50 which suggests that the focus layer of the left periphery
is indeed activated.
In accordance with the view that bien moves from PolP to FocusP on the
left periphery, the facts illustrated in (55)-(68) follow in a rather natural way.
Let us examine this issue in some detail. Consider, first, subject inversion,
illustrated in (55)-(57). I suggest that the impossibility of (55), similarly to
the ill-formedness of (56)-(57), comes from a violation of the FOCUScriterion,
which has to be satisfied by moving the finite verb to the head of
FocP, in order to create a specifier-head configuration between the EMPHfeature
on T 51 and the focus operator. 52 This movement yields the adjacency
effect between bien and V observed above.
As for the distribution of bien with respect to topics, it seems plausible to
postulate that the paradigm discussed in (58)-(62) follows from the ordering
constraints holding for Topic and Focus in the left periphery (see Rizzi
(1997:297)).
Finally, going back to the examples in (63)-(65), the contrasts between
(a) and (b) can be accounted for by claiming, as suggested above, that the illformedness
of the examples in (b) is the result of a collision between two
quantified elements: that is, the [+ EMPH] feature competes with the [+Wh-]
feature in Spec of Focus—see Rizzi (1997:325). 53
The partial structure for bien-sentences is given in (74): 54
49
Following Rizzi (1997:325), I assume that “All instances of preposing to the left periphery
must be triggered by the satisfaction of a Criterion”. The FOCUS-criterion is conceived in
Rizzi (1997:299) as comprising both the Wh-criterion and the NEG-criterion (see Haegeman
(2000:23)).
50
See Gutiérrez-Rexach (2001), among others, for a similar claim with respect to
exclamative sentences.
51
Transposing the standard analysis for negative sentences (and wh-sentences) to the
constructions under study, I assume that the quantificational feature conveying the emphatic
positive import in bien-sentences is generated under T, which gives rise to V-to-C movement.
See Rizzi (1997), and Haegeman (2000), among other authors.
52
Alternatively, one could opt for a reformulation of this analysis within the framework of
Chomsky (1995) and subsequent works. I leave the question open, as it is not crucial for the
purposes of this study.
53
For reasons of space, I do not address the analysis of the postverbal subject in biensentences.
In line with the proposal presented in Belletti (2004), a possible approach may be
that the postverbal subject fills a Topic position in the low IP area.
54
On the basis of the preceding discussion, I tentatively assume that the analysis given in
(74) also holds for emphatic affirmative sentences with sí. Given that bien, unlike sí, encodes
a presuppositional import (see (15)), it might be the case, as I suggested in a previous work
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