Head movement and ellipsis in the expression of Russian polarity focus

Abstract

This paper argues, based on the interaction of head movement and ellipsis possibilities in Russian, that certain types of head movement must take place in the narrow syntax. It does so by examining a variety of Russian constructions which are unified in several ways: they express some type of polarity focus; they involve head movement of the verbal complex to a high position (Pol), resulting in discourse-marked vso orders; and some of them involve ellipsis (of either vP or TP). Investigation of the interaction of the head movement and ellipsis possibilities of the language yields three of four logically possible patterns. I argue that the unattested pattern should be explained using reasoning that invokes MaxElide (Merchant 2008)—a principle normally used to explain why the larger of two possible ellipsis domains must be chosen if Ā-movement has occurred out of the ellipsis site. Extending this logic to the interaction of head movement and ellipsis requires that we take head movement to be a syntactic phenomenon.