1. Lecture 8: Verb Positions
Syntax
Lecture 8:
Verb Positions

2. The mobile verb
The verb is, of course, the head of the VP and so has a position inside the VP
He could [VP be a doctor]
The negative appears before the VP
He might not [VP be a doctor]
Sometimes the verb appears before the negative:
He is not [VP a doctor]
Therefore, in the last case, the verb is not inside the VP

3. The mobile verb
Moreover, sometimes the verb appears in front of the subject
is he a doctor
As the subject is the first element of the IP, in these cases the verb does not even appear to be inside the IP!
is [IP he a doctor]

4. VP external verb positions
When the verb is not inside the VP, what positions does it occupy?
There is a big difference between the verb inside and outside the VP:
He might not [VP be a doctor]
He is/was not [VP a doctor]
Inside the VP, the verb is in its non-finite form
Outside the VP, it is in a finite form (tensed)

5. VP external verb positions
As tense is in the inflection position, this suggests that in this case the verb is in the inflection position

6. A question
How can there be a VP with no V in it?

7. A possible answer
According to X-bar theory, there cannot be a VP that lacks a verb:
All phrases have heads
So the verb must be in the VP
But the verb is in the I position which is not inside the VP
So the verb is in two positions:
The verb position inside the VP
The inflection position outside the VP

8. A possible answer
The only way that something can be in two positions is by movement
So the verb moves from the V position to the I position

9. Why would the verb move?
The verb only moves to I when the inflection is a tense:
he might not [VP be a doctor]
... him to not [VP be a doctor]
he is not [VP -- a doctor]
We know that tense is different from other inflections in that it is a bound morpheme
Clearly the verb moves to I to ‘bind’ the tense inflection

10. V to I movement in detail
At D-structure the verb is in V and the tense is in I
As the I position is already filled, V cannot move into the same place
it must attach itself to the I
The structure we get is an adjunction of one head to another

11. Head Adjunction Head adjuncts are not unheard of E.g. Compound nouns
headed by nouns
have a noun or an adjective adjoined to them:

12. V to I movement and negation
Auxiliary verbs (be and have) can move in the presence of a negative:
He might not [VP be reading]
He is not [VP -- reading]
He should not [VP have gone]
He has not [VP -- gone]
So can main verb be:
He will not [VP be rich]
He is not [VP -- rich]
Possessive have can, in some dialects:
He might not [VP have any money]
He has n’t [VP -- any money]

13. V to I movement and negation
The majority of verbs cannot move in the presence of negation:
* he read not [VP -- the book]
* he loved not [VP -- Mary]
* he thought not [ -- about the problem]
Instead, there is a do in the inflection position:
He did not [VP read the book]
He did not [VP love Mary]
He did not [VP think about the problem]

14. Do insertion as a rescue remedy
What appears to be going on is:
The tense in I is a bound morpheme needing binding
The verb cannot move past the negation (for some reason)
So if the verb moves it is ungrammatical and if the verb does not move it is ungrammatical
Therefore a meaningless do is used to support the inflection

16. Movement Outside IP
When the verb precedes the subject it is in a head position outside the IP
We know that the first head position before the IP is the complementiser
We might suppose that the verb is in C in this case:
[CP is [IP he – [VP -- a doctor]]
Note:
The verb is finite (tensed)
The I position is empty and cannot be filled
* be he will [ -- a doctor]

17. Evidence that the verb is in C
The phenomena we are looking at is usually termed Inversion
There is one construction which either involves inversion or an overt complementiser:
if he had been a doctor, he would have cured himself
had he been a doctor, he would have cured himself
The overt complementiser and the inverted auxiliary are in complementary distribution
* if had he been a doctor ...

18. I to C movement
Given what we have said so far, it seems reasonable to assume that the verb moves to the C position after it has moved to the I position

19. I to C movement
Of course, the other thing that can move to C is an inflection

20. Why do verbs move to C?
One proposal is that, similarly to V to I movement, there is a bound morpheme in C:
This morpheme appears in interrogatives, so it seems to be a question particle
[CP Q [IP he is a doctor]]  [CP is-Q [IP he a doctor]]
Obviously this morpheme is phonologically empty
Some languages have overt question particles

21. No main verb inversion?
At first, it appears that main verbs (apart from copular be and possessive have) cannot invert:
is he a doctor
have you any money
* read you a book
* believe you in fairies
In these cases, we use do-insertion again:
did you read a book
do you believe in fairies
Note: do is finite, so it is inserted into I and then moved to C

22. No main verb inversion?
We also get inversion with Wh-movement and in most cases main verbs cannot move to C:
* what read you
what did you read
* where met you Mary
where did you meet Mary
But there is one case where we do not get do-insertion:
who read the book
* who did read the book

23. No main verb inversion? The obvious question is why
Three possible answers
The complementiser position is left empty:
[CP who – [IP – read-s [VP -- books]]]
The wh-phrase stays in subject position and nothing is in the CP:
[CP -- [IP who read-s [VP -- books]]]
The verb moves to the C position:
[CP who read-s [IP -- [VP -- books]]]

24. An empty complementiser?
But there doesn’t seem to be much difference between this interrogative and others?
So why should the complementiser be different?

25. No Wh-movement
Again, why is the complementiser different in this clause than others?
How is this clause interrogative if no wh-element moves to specifier of CP?

26. Main verb in C
In this case the C and CP are no different to other interrogatives
But we need to explain why the main verb can move to C here but not in other cases

27. Why can V move to C sometimes?
The big difference between the cases when V can and cannot move to C concerns the subject:
* read you the book
* what read you
* when read you the book
who read the book
In all the ungrammatical cases the subject follows the main verb

28. Why can V move to C sometimes?
General Principle
The English subject must precede the verb
Only when the subject moves to the specifier of CP can the verb be in C and still follow it
In all other cases the verb must stay behind the subject and C must be filled by an auxiliary

29. Conclusion There are 3 positions we find verbs in
The verb originates in V
It moves to I
If I is filled with a bound morpheme
It moves to C
If the clause is interrogative
Main verbs cannot move to I when there is a negation (do-insertion)
Main verbs cannot move to C
If they are not in I
If moving to C puts them in front of the subject