Comparative Syntax of the Balkan Languages (Oxford ... - Cryptm.org

106 ILIYANA KRAPOVAterms of binding relations. Complements of, for example, volitionals in MGrk(and Blg, as we shall see) allow but do not require their (null) subjunctive subjectto be coreferent with the matrix subject, thus voiding the familiar obviationeffect characteristic of Romance subjunctive clauses (Ib). On the other hand,verbs like try select a control complement in which the (null) embedded subjectis strictly anaphoric and may be interpreted only through a local antecedent inthe matrix clause. 4This contrast in referential behavior, which is reminiscent of the distinctionbetween nonobligatory and obligatory control, as proposed by Williams (1980),is due, but only in part, to the individual lexicosemantic properties of thecomplement-selecting predicates. I will show that there are syntactic aspects ofcontrol that cannot be accounted for by any theory that considers control (andmood selection) to be a purely semantic matter (see Joseph 1992, Farkas 1992a,among others). In this essay, I will try to attain a generalization regarding thesyntactic conditions that require a particular null subject in a particular environmentand, ultimately, to establish a correlation between types of empty categories(ecs) and properties of clauses that license these ecs.Varlokosta and Hornstein (1993) argue on the basis of an earlier proposalby latridou (1993) that MGrk subjunctives do not constitute a uniform class butshould rather be divided into two subsets, and that each subset can be identifiedthrough the type of null subject that it takes—pronominal pro versus anaphoricPRO. The discussion of the Bulgarian data (in section 2) will confirm the essentialcorrectness of this proposal. Once the distribution of pro and PRO in Big andMGrk subjunctive clauses is captured, it will be shown that the two types ofcontexts are mutually exclusive and can be defined through a correlation with themorphological content of subjunctive tense in terms of feature strength (section3). Thus, my analysis will lead to the conclusion that optional and obligatorycontrol of the null subjunctive subject in cases like (la) versus (2a) does notresult from properties intrinsic to pro or PRO" but is rather a consequence of thedistribution of tense features and ultimately an instantiation of feature checkingin the relevant configurations (section 4).I will adopt the Minimalist approach of Chomsky (1993) with some insightsfrom Chomsky (1995.chap. 4) concerning the motivation and the conditionsof (overt and covert) movement as driven by feature-checking considerations.I will assume the standard view that pro has nominative Case, which ischecked by the strong features of finite tense. With respect to PRO, I will adoptthe Case-theoretic account of its distribution, as proposed by Chomsky andLasnik (1993), who argue that PRO is the minimal Case-marked DP that checksnull Case against a minimal Infl. "Minimal" Infl is identified with the weak featureof nonfinite tense (i.e., [-tense]) typically associated with control infinitivals,for instance, in English. For MGrk and Blg, however, which do not exhibitany finite/nonfinite distinctions in their subjunctive complements, thecorrect identification of tense features in terms of strength is still not fullyunderstood.I will assume that the structure that corresponds to MGrk and Blg subjunctivecomplements is as in (3). I will adopt the view (of Chomsky 1995.chap. 4)