Nouns and Noun Phrases - University of Macau Library

(205) a. Jan heeft eri [één [ proi ]] meegenomen.
Jan has ER one with-taken
‘Jan has taken one of them with him.’
b. *Jan heeft [één [ proi ]] eri meegenomen.
Numerals and quantifiers 937
Example (206a) further shows that the noun phrase can be placed in clause-initial
position, and this also follows under the present analysis, given that the same thing
is possible in the case of reflexive pronouns; the topicalized phrase is
“reconstructed” into its original position (indicated by the trace tj) as far as its
binding properties are concerned.
(206) a. [Eén [ proi ]]j heeft Jan eri tj meegenomen.
one has Jan ER with-taken
b. [Voor zichzelf i]j heeft Jan ti een boek tj gekocht.
for himself has Jan a book bought
‘John bought a book for himself.’
Finally, when we assume that the binding relation between quantitative er and its
nominal associate is local in the same sense as the binding relation between a
reflexive pronoun and its antecedent, we also correctly predict that er and its
nominal associate must be part of the same clause: example (207) shows that
placing er in some higher clause leads to ungrammaticality.
(207) Jan vertelde mij dat hij [één [ proi ]] meegenomen had
Jan told ER me that he one with-taken had
‘Jan told me that he had taken one of them with him.’
Despite this descriptive success, the suggested analysis has at least two flaws. First,
it is not clear why the antecedent of pro must be er and cannot be some more
meaningful element that could also indentify the semantic content of pro. Second, it
is not clear how quantitative er itself is licensed; normally all elements in the clause
are licensed by being in a selection or modification relation with some other
elements in the clause, but this does not seem to hold for er, as it neither seems to
be assigned a thematic role nor to have an obvious modification function.
C. The interpretative gap is the result of movement
The two problems mentioned for the previous analysis are immediately solved in
the movement analysis, as proposed by Coppen (1991) and Barbiers (2009), where
quantitative er is claimed to pronominalize a certain part of the nominal structure.
This means that er is base-generated as part of the noun phrase and subsequently
moved into some NP-external position: eri ... [Num/Q [ ti ]]. That the movement is
obligatory can be attributed to the more general properties of discourse linked
pronouns: the examples in (208), for example, show that definite pronouns like ’m
are obligatorily scrambled to the left of °clause adverbs like waarschijnlijk
‘probably’. See Section 8.1.3 for more discussion.
(208) a. Jan heeft waarschijnlijk die blauwe auto/*’m gekocht.
Jan has probably that blue car/him bought
‘Jan has probably bought the blue car/it.’
b. Jan heeft die blauwe auto/’m waarschijnlijk gekocht.