L-Syntax and S-Syntax

Abstract

In this chapter, I look more closely at the domain of phrase structure below and above the E projection. What I have been creating below the E projection is an articulated VP, which encodes parts of the verb meaning that are often not independently realized. For instance, while in Tagalog the intransitive verb tumba (‘fall down’) and the transitive verb pagtumba (‘knock down’) are distinguished through morphology, in English they are not. One of the questions that can arise, then, is whether this is a matter of syntax or something that should be kept in the lexicon. In particular, we will see that many of the phenomena discussed above are quite idiosyncratic in their application, suggesting that, indeed, they are part of the idiosyncrasies of the lexicon rather than part of the computational system of syntax.