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Abstract:
German is one of the languages in which a wh-phrase may move
to the specifier position of an embedded clause and yet take
scope over the entire sentence ("partial movement"). This is
accomplished by means of a wh-expletive occurring in the
specifier posi tion of clauses superordinate to the partially
moved wh-phrase ("wh-scope marking").
Two theoretical approaches have been proposed to account for
this phenomenon. In one, wh-scope marking is assimilated to
long-distance movement: the scope marker is base-generated in
specifier position and coindexed with the real, partially moved
wh-phr ase (van Riemsdijk 1983, McDaniel 1989). In the other
approach, wh-scope marking consists of multiple instances of
clause-internal wh-movement: both the real wh-phrase and the
wh-expletive(s) move from clause-internal positions to the
specifier position of their own clause (Dayal 1994, Horvath
1997).
We ran an ERP experiment on 16 native speakers of German with
240 sets of the following stimuli.
Was meinst du,
what think you
| (1) |
hat |
__? |
| (2) |
was der umsichtige Physiker auf eine Diskette
gespeichert |
hat? |
| (3) |
?dass |
hat? |
|
|
has |
|
|
what the cautious physicist onto a diskette stored |
has |
|
|
that |
has |
The marginally grammatical condition with a "dass"
complementizer (3) was included as a separate manipulation.
We reasoned that if wh-scope marking consists of one partial
movement coindexed with base-generated scope markers, it should
be processed as a single long-distance dependency. In that case
(2) should pattern at least with the grammatical long-distance wh
-question (1). If on the other hand wh-scope marking consists of
multiple instances of separate movement, then each instance
should be processed as a separate dependency. In that case (2)
should differ from both long-distance wh-questions, (1) and (3).
We predicted that this would be the case, and, based on prior
research, expected the scope-marking condition (2) to elicit a
slow negative potential relative to (1) and (3) throughout the
embedded clause.
Instead, although (2) briefly elicited more left anterior
negativity than (1) at the beginning of the embedded clause
("was" vs. "hat"), the two immediately realigned for the duration
of the sentence. (3) diverged from both (1) and (2) in eliciting
a slo w negative potential with a left anterior maximum
throughout the embedded clause.
These data, while unexpected, are in any case consistent with
the hypothesis that at least in German, wh-scope marking is
treated like long-distance movement. Horvath (1997) concedes that
this may in fact be the correct analysis for this language.
Dayal, V. (1994). Scope marking as indirect wh-dependency.
Natural Language Semantics,
2, 137-170.
Horvath, J. (1997). The status of "wh-expletives" and the
partial wh-movement construction of Hungarian.
Natural Language and Linguistic Theory,
15 (3), 509-572.
McDaniel, D. (1989). Partial and multiple wh-movement.
Natural Language and Linguistic Theory,
7, 565-604.
Riemsdijk, H. van (1983). Correspondence effects and the Empty
Category Principle. In Yukio O., H. van Riemsdijk, K. Inoue, A.
Kamio, and N. Kawasaki (eds.),
Studies in Generative Grammar and Language Acquisition: A
Report on Recent Trends in Linguistics,
5-16. Tokyo, JP.
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