Spec, IP ou deslocado?: Prós e contras das duas análises dos sujeitos pré-verbais

Abstract

O objectivo deste artigo é apresentar argumentos que mostram que as duas análises dos sujeitos pré-verbais em Português Europeu, como movidos para Spec, IP ou deslocados à esquerda, não se excluem necessariamente. São apresentados vários argumentos mostrando que, em frases declarativas simples contextualmente não-marcadas, a análise tradicional, de acordo com a qual os sujeitos são deslocados para Spec, IP, não encontra alguns problemas identificados para a análise alternativa.

Preverbal subjects in null subject languages are not necessarily dislocated

“…As argued in Duarte (1987Duarte ( , 1996Duarte ( , 2001), Raposo (1997), Costa (1996bCosta ( , 1998Costa ( , 2001a and Costa & Gonçalves (1999), there are subject-topic asymmetries with respect to minimality effects. This fact is easily detectable in two types of contexts: embedded wh-questions and untensed complement clauses.…”

“…As emphasized by Costa (2001a), the existence of constructions in which the subject may be (clitic-)left-dislocated does not provide compelling evidence for analysing all preverbal subjects as (clitic-)left-dislocated. Instead, it is natural that, just like any other constituent, subjects may be left-dislocated or not.…”

“…Let us start by reviewing some of the arguments independently advanced in Costa (1996bCosta ( , 1998Costa ( , 2001a and Duarte (1997Duarte ( , 2001) for claiming that preverbal subjects in European Portuguese are in Spec, IP. These arguments simultaneously serve as arguments against the claim put forward by the authors cited in the introduction that preverbal subjects in all null subject languages are instances of (clitic-)left-dislocated XPs.…”

“…To further argue that this hypothesis makes wrong empirical predictions for European Portuguese, a null subject language (following up on Costa, 1996bCosta, , 1998Costa, , 2001aandDuarte, 1997, 2001).…”

Subjects, objects and intonational phrasing in spanish and portuguese*

“…The syntax of subjects in EP Let us first consider the syntax of subjects in European Portuguese. Currently there are two competing proposals for the syntactic analysis of EP subjects: Costa (1996Costa ( , 2001 and Costa & Duarte (2002), among others, have extensively argued that (one of) the argumental position for subjects in EP is Spec,IP, as shown in the representation in (10a); Barbosa (1995Barbosa ( , 2000, by contrast, has strongly claimed that preverbal subjects are Clitic Left Dislocated (CLLDed) constituents and are base generated as adjuncts either to CP or to IP, as shown in (10b), and, in general, do not occur in Spec,IP.…”