In situ mixed <i>wh</i>-coordination and the argument/adjunct distinction

Abstract

One of the most important results of syntactic inquiry has been a detailed empirical and, to some extent, theoretical understanding of the argument/adjunct distinction, which underlies a wide array of superficially different phenomena. Therefore, any phenomena that appear to challenge the argument/adjunct distinction deserve scrutiny. This squib investigates an almost unremarked-upon phenomenon of just that type: apparent in situ mixed wh-coordination (ISMW: Mary ate what and when to impress Sue?!), in which argument and adjunct wh-phrases are apparently coordinated in situ. Two analyses of ISMW are compared: the Wh-Coordination Analysis, on which the conjuncts are the wh-phrases, and the VP-Coordination Analysis, on which the conjuncts are VPs whose head Vs undergo across-the-board head movement to v. The squib argues for the VP-Coordination Analysis on conceptual and empirical grounds. Conceptually, the VP-but not the Wh-Coordination Analysis is compatible with our understanding of the argument/adjunct distinction, and involves an unremarkable derivation that it would take a stipulation to rule out; hence, the VP-Coordination Analysis is preferable. Empirically, the VP-but not the Wh-Coordination Analysis makes several correct predictions: (a) that ISMW should be impossible with obligatorily transitive verbs; (b) that adverbs should be able to follow the first wh-phrase in ISMW that cannot follow it in the left periphery; and (c) that there should be apparent in situ coordination of argument wh-phrases with different θ-roles. That ISMW involves VP-coordination rather than wh-coordination indicates that it in fact does not threaten the argument/adjunct distinction, contrary to initial appearances, a theoretically welcome result.

A compositional intersective account of Heterofunctional Coordination

“…Almost all previous formal work on HC is limited to the syntax of constructions with wh-phrases (e.g., Browne 1972, Grimshaw 1978, Kazenin 2001, Lipták 2003, Gračanin-Yüksek 2007, Skrabalova 2007, Zhang 2007, Gribanova 2009, Raţiu 2011, Sinopoulou 2011, Tomaszewicz 2011, Bîlbîie & Gazdik 2012, Citko 2013, Citko & Gračanin-Yüksek 2013, Larson 2013, Ishii 2014, Kasai 2016, Merchant 2017, Melchin & Toivonen 2018, Jung 2018, Zyman 2020, Kwon 2021, Potter & Frazier 2021. 15 Some (e.g., Gribanova 2009 andMerchant 2017) invoke Quantifier Absorption (Higginbotham & May 1981) to explain why questions involving HC of wh-phrases, unlike ordinary multiple wh-questions, seem to only have the single-pair (and not the pair-list) interpretation.…”