A syntactic typology of topic, focus and contrast

Abstract

IntroductionAs is well-known, topics and foci have dedicated positions in a variety of languages. This paper is concerned with the question of what this fact can tell us about the typology of information-structural notions and their mapping to the syntax. We argue that the data support two conclusions, both of which can be shown to clash with a cartographic outlook on sentence structure (for a general overview of the cartographic framework, see Cinque 2002, Rizzi 2003, and Belletti 2004. The first is that there are no fixed landing sites for topic and focus movement. The second is that there are cross-cutting generalizations over topics, over foci, and over contrastive elements. These jointly motivate the following four-way typology:

The syntax of information structure and the PF interface

“…So, both can be attracted to IFoc 14 I agree with Cruschina's (2011) analysis that it is the contrastive character of the Italian left-peripheral focus that is responsible for its displacement, but I do not think it is necessary or helpful to assume a designated syntactic position to host the contrastive element. An alternative to the cartographic treatment of contrast-related movement was proposed by Neeleman et al (2009) (see also Horvath 2010Neeleman & Vermeulen 2012). They propose that [contrast] and [focus] (and also [topic], but that is not relevant for the present paper) are "discourse notions" that can be "targeted by mapping rules operating between syntax and information structure" (Neeleman & Vermeulen 2012: 5).…”

“…Cruschina (2011) proposed different types of focus positions for new information focus (IFoc 0 ) and contrastive focus respectively (CFoc 0 ). While languages with an active middle field, such as Dutch, were shown to necessitate a whole series of focus positions, if analysed in the cartographic approach (Neeleman et al 2009). On first blush, this is perhaps not so problematic.…”

“…There are only two possibilities: (i) one identifies a subtle, yet distinct interpretative effect for all these positions, or (ii) one has to weaken the cartographic assumption to allow for a many-to-one mapping between position and interpretation. Neeleman et al (2009) argue extensively that for the Dutch middle field, the first option is not tenable because of the existence of multiple possible landing sites (see also Samek-Lodovici 2015 for a similar argument for Italian). But the second option is certainly a fatal blow to the cartographic endeavour, as it would make it devoid of any content.…”

“…adverbials), the more the potential landing sites. The movement serves to mark the scope of the contrastive element: the sister of the moved element is what Neeleman et al (2009) and Neeleman & Vermeulen (2009) call its "domain of contrast", as shown in (25). For ease of exposition, let us assume that the scope, or domain of contrast of a contrastive element XP is all the material in YP except for XP itself.…”

“…to mark its domain of contrast. The movement is licensed because it facilitates a simple mapping between syntax and information structure, according to Neeleman et al (2009) and Neeleman & Vermeulen (2012). As a result of the movement operation, there are syntactic constituents corresponding to the contrastive element and to its scope.…”