‘Verb floating’ and VP-ellipsis: Towards a movement account of ellipsis licensing

Thoms, G. (2010) ‘Verb floating’ and VP-ellipsis: Towards a movement account of ellipsis licensing. Linguistic Variation Yearbook, 10, pp. 252-297. (doi: 10.1075/livy.10.07tho)

Abstract

In this paper I propose that ellipsis is licensed by overt movement. Examining variation in VP-ellipsis across English dialects, I show that movement is crucially implicated in whether or not a given element can license ellipsis. I discuss well-known restrictions on VP-ellipsis and present new data that shows that a movement-based account of these restrictions is superior to previous ones. I show that the proposed account can be extended to other cases involving A′ movement with empirical benefits, and I conclude by sketching the technical implementation of the theory, arguing that ellipsis is a ‘repair’ operation that prevents a linearization failure following non-deletion of a lower copy. I suggest that types of movement that are unable to spell out lower copies (i.e. A-movement) do not license ellipsis, thus explaining ellipsis licensing in terms of general conditions on copy deletion.

• Item Type: Articles
• Status: Published
• Refereed: Yes
• Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: Thoms, Dr Gary
• Authors: Thoms, G.
• College/School: College of Arts & Humanities > School of Critical Studies > English Language and Linguistics
• Journal Name: Linguistic Variation Yearbook
• Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
• ISSN: 1568-1483
• ISSN (Online): 1569-9900
• Published Online: 16 September 2011
• Copyright Holders: Copyright © 2010 John Benjamins Publishing
• First Published: First published in Linguistic Variation Yearbook 10:252-297
• Publisher Policy: Reproduced in accordance with the copyright policy of the publisher