Phi-features and the Modular Architecture of - UMR 7023 - CNRS

)movement (Nichols 2001, cf. chapter 5). As a result of the movement, EA and O
end up differentiated in structural prominence according to their phi-features,
rather than according to their base-generated arrangement EA > O. The result of
the movements is usable by syntax, interpretation, and morphology. The argument
that ends up highest may then be the one to raise to a special CP layer where
cross-clausal obviation or agreement occur, or the one first seen by a postsyntactic
top-down spell-out algorithm. Two more tools are needed. First, in order
to account for direct-inverse morphemes, there must be some way to distinguish
direct contexts, where the EA occupies the highest phi-layer, e.g. 1EA→3O, and inverse
ones, where the O crosses over the EA, 3EA→1O. A technical solution is to
attribute the EA a feature like Adger and Harbour's (2007: 21f.) [control]. Direct
morphology is then used if the highest argument has [control]. Second, during
movement to the appropriate phi-layers, arguments sometimes interact according
to their phi-features. For instance, in some languages 1/2EA→2/1O combinations
are direct while 3EA-1/2O inverse, indicating that a 1 st /2 nd person O moves over a
3 rd but not a 2 nd /1 st person EA (cf. Table 3.1). Such phi-interactions are suitably
modelled by feature-relativized locality, whereby arguments of the same phifeature
class like 1 st /2 nd person cannot cross each other, and thus retain the basegenerated
EA > O order (cf. Bianchi 2006, Béjar and Rezac 2009).
To drive argument movement to the appropriate layers, feature-checking or
specifier-head criteria have been proposed (Bianchi 2006). They are analogous to
those for left-peripheral movements, like focus and wh-movement (Rizzi 1997):
1 st /2 nd person checking beside wh-checking. The latter movements have been usually
grounded in interpretive requirements such as wh-scope. Phi-driven movements
may perhaps be so as well. The Mapping Hypothesis of Heim (1982),
Diesing (1992) has provided one interpretive motivation for the movements in
(97), elaborated in Jelinek (1993), Diesing and Jelinek (1995), Jelinek and Carnie
(2005), Rice and Saxon (1994). According to the Mapping Hypothesis, the clause
is divided into the interpretive layers in (98).
(98) a. [Presupposed (C') 1/2:EA [Nuclear (vP) tEA … 3:O …]] direct (1/2→3)
b. [Presupposed (C') 1/2:O [Nuclear (vP) 3:EA … tO …]] inverse (3→1/2)
Highest is a quantifier layer, next a layer that maps into the restrictor of the
quantifiers and associated with presupposed (topical, old) information, and lowest
a nuclear scope layer associated with new information. The way to integrate phifeatures
into this theory is to associate them with grammaticalized presuppositionality.
In a language with 1/2 > 3 person hierarchy, 1 st /2 nd person are grammaticalized
as presuppositional, and 3 rd persons are not. Interpretation will then require
that all and only presuppositional information, 1 st /2 nd but not 3 rd person, end up in
the presuppositional layer of the clause. Other theories discussed in chapter 6 posit
commensurable interpretive motivations, such as the need for 1 st /2 nd person to
move to functional heads that relate the utterance to context. Cross-linguistic
71