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This paper reports the results of two acceptability judgment experiments that examine the effect of PP remnants with mismatching correlates in the antecedent clause (either a PP, with a distinct preposition, or an NP) on the acceptability of pseudogapping as well as non-elliptical controls. Across both experiments, three novel findings emerge: First, utterances with mismatching PPs across the ellipsis clause and its antecedent were consistently degraded relative to their preposition-matched counterparts. Second, this mismatch penalty arose for elliptical and non-elliptical variants alike with only minor differences between the two. Finally, a significant portion of the mismatch penalties was explained away by the degree of semantic similarity between the thematic relations established by the mismatching prepositions with respect to the antecedent verb which was measured in a separate norming experiment. We examine the consequences of these new empirical results for current theories of pseudogapping, namely (i) the remnant-raising analysis, according to which the remnant XP is raised leftward out of the VP prior to VP ellipsis, licensed under identity with its antecedent; and (ii) the direct generation analysis, under which auxiliaries are verbal proforms that recover their referent anaphorically without the need for remnant movement or syntactic identity between the verb and its antecedent. We conclude that the data are more naturally accounted for under the direct generation approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In their recent paper on pseudogapping in Construction Grammar/HPSG, Kim and Runner (Kim, Jong-Bok & Jeffrey T. Runner. 2022. Pseudogapping in English: A direct interpretation approach. The Linguistic Review. https://doi.org/10.1515/tlr-2022-2094) suggest that the analysis of pseudogapping in Hybrid Type-Logical Grammar (Hybrid TLG) presented in Kubota and Levine (Kubota, Yusuke & Robert Levine. 2017. Pseudogapping as pseudo-VP ellipsis. Linguistic Inquiry 48(2). 213–257) does not explain certain complex patterns of pseudogapping for which their own proposal does offer an account. Though Kim and Runner's (2022) remarks on Kubota and Levine (Kubota, Yusuke & Robert Levine. 2017. Pseudogapping as pseudo-VP ellipsis. Linguistic Inquiry 48(2). 213–257) leave room for interpretation, we take it to be reasonably clear that they simply mean that it is difficult to see how such data could be formally accounted for in Kubota and Levine's proposal. The primary goal of our response is to refute Kim and Runner's claim on this interpretation. After refuting their claim on this interpretation, we consider a different interpretation of their remarks, one which merely questions the conceptual plausibility of Kubota and Levine's (2017) broader theoretical architecture. This latter discussion leads to some interesting and important cross-theoretical comparison of different approaches to ellipsis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Keywords: context; inheritance network; pseudogapping; question-under-discussion; VP ellipsis EN context inheritance network pseudogapping question-under-discussion VP ellipsis 457 494 38 09/06/22 20220901 NES 220901 1 Basic properties As illustrated in (1a) and (1b), gapping elides a finite verb in the non-initial conjunct of a coordinate structure while VPE (VP ellipsis) deletes a whole VP after an auxiliary. As we have seen in the analysis of VPE, the auxiliarihood of the head in the construction reflects the simple fact that VPE and pseudogapping are both sensitive to the presence of an auxiliary. (76) HT

The authors suggest that pseudogapping and VPE both belong to the same meso-construction of auxiliary-sensitive ellipsis, but each has its own constructional constraints. This form/meaning mismatch usually implies, on the one hand, an "incomplete" syntax (i.e. the material which is necessary for the interpretation is missing in the syntactic structure), and, on the other hand, a context dependency (i.e. the missing material is generally recovered from an antecedent in the context). Keywords: corpus studies; ellipsis; experimental studies; fragments; gapping; pseudogapping; sluicing; VPE EN corpus studies ellipsis experimental studies fragments gapping pseudogapping sluicing VPE 335 340 6 09/06/22 20220901 NES 220901 1 Ellipsis issues Ellipsis constitutes a challenge to the Saussurean definition of the I linguistic sign i (which associates a form - I signifiant i - with a content - I signifié i ), since in elliptical constructions we get an interpretation in the absence of form ( I significatio ex nihilo i ). Ellipsis, experimental studies, corpus studies, fragments, gapping, pseudogapping, sluicing, VPE. [Extracted from the article]

Ellipsis refers to a phenomenon that involves the omission from a clause of one or more words that are nevertheless understood in the context of the remaining elements. The key question for its analysis is then how to license such correspondences between incomplete syntax and complete semantics. There have been two main strands: deletion-based and direct interpretation-based. The former derives elliptical structures from clausal sources such that there is no mismatch between the syntax and the semantics of ellipsis. Meanwhile, the latter countenances non-correspondences at syntax but derives sentential semantics from structured discourse information. This position paper discusses a direct interpretation perspective on ellipitcal constructions as represented by HPSG. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, we propose an analysis of pseudogapping in Hybrid Type-Logical Categorial Grammar (Hybrid TLCG; Kubota 2010; Kubota and Levine 2012). Pseudogapping poses a particularly challenging problem for previous analyses in both the transformational and the nontransformational literature. We argue that the flexible syntaxsemantics interface of Hybrid TLCG enables an analysis of pseudogapping that synthesizes the key insights of both transformational and nontransformational approaches, at the same time overcoming the major difficulties of each type of approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On the basis of an asymmetry between VP-deletion and pseudogapping, Merchant (2008a) concludes that ellipsis is conditioned by syntax. This article demonstrates that both pseudogapping and VP-deletion potentially allow voice mismatch. The unacceptable cases of voice mismatch in these constructions are attributed to a discourse factor (Kehler 2000, 2002). Nevertheless, since sluicing does not allow voice mismatch (Merchant 2001, 2007) even in the same context that allows voice mismatch in VP-ellipsis, Merchant's (2007, 2008a) conclusion is still valid. A syntactic condition on ellipsis is proposed, based on a semantic condition from Takahashi and Fox 2005. Kehler's discourse explanation is phrased in a revised format. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pseudogapping is often treated as a combination of movement and ellipsis in current generative work. After reviewing a number of arguments against this type of analysis, I argue for an interpretive approach to pseudogapping, following Miller (1990). On the basis of corpus data and informant judgments, I then proceed to outline two factors, syntactic context and remnant type, which affect the acceptability of pseudogapping. The effects of the two factors are gradient and cumulative, in the sense of Keller (2000). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Procrastinate (Chomsky 1993) favors covert movement; therefore, when movement is overt, it must have been forced to operate ''early'' by some special requirement, one that Chomsky codes into ''strong features.'' I compare Chomsky's three successive theories of strong features and argue that two ellipsis phenomena, pseudogapping and sluicing, provide evidence bearing on the nature of strong features. I argue that movement or ellipsis can rescue a derivation with a strong feature, and I conclude that PF crash is relevant either directly, as in Chomsky 1993, or indirectly, as in the theory presented in Chomsky 1995a augmented by the multiple-chain theory of pied-piping (especially as interpreted by Ochi (1998)). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]