Exceptional Movement from/into the Criterial Position
Mayumi Hosono
direct link: http://ling.auf.net/lingbuzz/003324
February 2017
In this paper, I discuss exceptional movement from/into the Criterial Position within the framework of Labeling Algorithm (Chomsky 2013, 2015). I argue, contra Chomsky (ibid.), that a category raised into the Criterial Position should not be able to move up further in the derivational system of Labeling Algorithm. In Scandinavian Object Shift (Holmberg 1986), the object pronoun can exceptionally move out of the Spec of R, which is the Criterial Position for objects in the unmarked case in which they complete the valuation of their unvalued Case feature. In Icelandic Stylistic Fronting (Holmberg 2000), the categories that do not have any feature(s) in which they should agree with T can exceptionally move to the Spec of T, which is a typical Criterial Position claimed in the literature (Rizzi 2015). On the basis of the literature (Hosono 2013, Holmberg 2000), I propose that these kinds of exceptional syntactic movement from/into the Criterial Position in which a raised category does not have any unvalued feature(s) (in which it should agree with a head in a raised position) can occur only when it is required from phonology. I also suggest that a sentential element without any unvalued feature(s) can merge (either externally or internally) to a lower position/Spec of a head the projection of which has already been labeled: when a higher syntactic object is already labeled, a syntactic object inside it does not need a new label, with a sentential element merged (either externally or internally) to a lower position/Spec unnecessary to agree with any head.