No abstract

This paper outlines a semantic approach t o w eak islands, a phenomenon that has traditionally been thought o f as purely syntactic. Weak islands are environments that allow some, but not all, wh-phrases to extract:(1) a. Which man didn't you invite? b. * H o w didn't you behave?(2) a. Which man do you regret that I invited? b. * H o w d o y ou regret that I behaved?We propose that at least in a signi cant set of the cases the violation is semantic in nature. In agreement w i t h E. Kiss (1992) and de Swart (1992), we informally characterize the role of interveners as follows:(3) Weak island violations come about when an extracted phrase should take s c o p e o ver some intervener but is unable to.

No abstract

No abstract

This paper outlines a semantic approach t o w eak islands, a phenomenon that has traditionally been thought o f as purely syntactic. Weak islands are environments that allow some, but not all, wh-phrases to extract:(1) a. Which man didn't you invite? b. * H o w didn't you behave?(2) a. Which man do you regret that I invited? b. * H o w d o y ou regret that I behaved?We propose that at least in a signi cant set of the cases the violation is semantic in nature. In agreement w i t h E. Kiss (1992) and de Swart (1992), we informally characterize the role of interveners as follows:(3) Weak island violations come about when an extracted phrase should take s c o p e o ver some intervener but is unable to.