Short Answers: Ellipsis, Connectivity, and Island...

Short Answers: Ellipsis, Connectivity, and Island Repair

Taisuke Nishigauchi Tomohiro Fujii

Kobe Shoin Graduate School University of Maryland

February 13, 2006

Running head: Short Answers: Ellipsis, Connectivity, and Island Repair

Article type: Theoretically oriented work on syntax and syntax-semantics in-terface, comparative syntax

Correspondence: Taisuke NishigauchiKobe Shoin Graduate School1–2–1 Shinohara-Obanoyama, Nada-ku, Kobe 657–0015 JapanPhone: +81–(0)78–882–8762 • Fax: +81–(0)78–882–5032

[email protected]

Tomohiro FujiiDepartment of Linguistics1401 Marie Mount Hall, University of MarylandCollege Park, MD 20742–7505Phone: 301–405–7002 • Fax: 301–405–7104

[email protected]

1

Short Answers: Ellipsis, Connectivity, and Island Repair

Abstract

The theme of the present article is the nature of short answers. On this analysis,

short answers are derived from the result of focus movement, followed by deletion

of everything except the focus. Various aspects of connectivity associated with short

answers are captured in terms of focus movement. This analysis also shows that the

derivation of short answers involve ellipsis. On the other hand, not all short answers

exhibit properties related with movement and ellipsis: We show that short answers have

another source, which we will call the bare-copular frame. However, functional answers

and pair-list answers cannot be derived from the latter source and exhibit connectivity

and diagnostics of ellipsis, MaxElide in particular.

Issues of wh-questions involving (apparent) violations of the relative clause island

constraint will be re-examined at length. It is shown that short answers to such wh-

questions derive from focus constructions which indeed involve the relevant violations

but are saved by island-repair due to ellipsis. Functional answers provide compelling

evidence for this analysis.

1 Introduction

The theme of the present article is the nature of short answers. By ‘short answers’ we mean

answers to questions exemplified by (1b), as opposed to full sentential answers like (1a).

(Merchant 2004 uses the term ‘fragment answers’.)

(1) A. Where did John buy the book?

B. a. He bought it in Washington DC.

b. In Washington DC.

We are going to show that at least some species of short answers exhibit properties

associated with a complete sentence fully reflecting the syntactic and semantic properties

of the question sentence purporting to solicit the answer. In this sense, we proceed on the

premise that there is a significant parallelism between question and answer both in structure

and meaning.

1 Introduction 3

Thus, one subtheme of the nature of short answers must be captured by the notion of con-

nectivity. While the notion of connectivity has been discussed in a variety of contexts, we will

be exclusively concerned with this notion in the sense that Higgins (1973), Akmajian (1970),

among others, discussed it in their analyses of specificational (pseudo-)cleft constructions.

Using Hiraiwa and Ishihara’s (2002) analysis as theoretical apparatus, in which specificational

clefts can be subsumed under focus constructions, our analysis captures various aspects of

connectivity in terms of focus movement.

On this analysis, short answers are derived from the result of focus movement, followed

by deletion of everything except the focus.

(2) XPi [ . . . ti . . . ]︸��︷︷��︸

⇓∅

In this light, our conception of short answers is that they involve movement and ellipsis. But

does this process really show the properties of movement and ellipsis?

We will provide several crucial arguments in favor of the supposition that short answers

are derived by movement and ellipsis:

1. Case-matching phenomena

2. Quantifier scope

3. Binding phenomena

4. MaxElide

5. Island repair

In this connection, discussion of the covert syntax of wh in-situ languages is very impor-

tant. On the one hand, these languages allow the occurrence of a wh-phrase inside a relative

clause, which is universally considered to form an island. If covert movement applies in such

a way as to move this wh-phrase outside the relative clause, it must be free from the relative

clause island effect, as was claimed by Huang (1982). Consider the following example from

Japanese.

4 Short Answers: Ellipsis, Connectivity, and Island Repair (February 13, 2006)

(3) Minna-ga [Akira-ga doko-de tor-ta syasin]-o mi-ta ka osiete.

all-Nom Akira-Nom where-at take-Past picture-Acc see-Past Q tell me

‘Lit. Tell me: Everyone saw a picture that Akira had taken where?’

A short answer like (4) apparently supports this idea.

(4) Tokyo(-de) desu.

Tokyo-at Cop

‘(In) Tokyo.’

However, in Nishigauchi (1990) and subsequent work, it has been shown that these languages

have a strategy, called (Large Scale) LF-pied-piping (LFPP), which moves the entire relative

clause as if it were a wh-constituent. Nishigauchi (1990) points out the acceptability of the

following type of answer as an argument for this claim.

(5) (Kare-ga) Tokyo-de tor-ta {syasin / no}(-o) desu.

he-Nom Tokyo-at take-Past picture / one Cop

‘The picture/one that he had taken in Tokyo.’

If such a strategy exists, the conclusion that the covert syntax of wh in-situ is free from the

relative clause island constraint is not warranted.

A substantial portion of the present article is devoted to a re-examination of this issue.

We suggest that there is a possibility that the acceptability of (4) is due to island-repair, a

hallmark of ellipsis. However, a short answer like (4), involving an individual name, might

have some other sources and derivations, which are independent from connectivity and

ellipsis.

Functional answers eliminate such indeterminate factors. These answers must derive

from focus constructions and show genuine properties of ellipsis.1 The behavior of functional

answers indeed presents very important evidence that the acceptability of (4) is backed by

island repair, which implies that wh-movement in covert syntax is free from the relative

clause island constraint.2

1Pair-list answers also require strict connectivity. We discuss pair-list answers at length in our other owrk[reference suppressed].

2In our other article [reference suppressed] it is shown that some processes in LF are in fact subject to theconstraint in question.

2 Focus and connectivity 5

The present article is organized as follows. First, in section 2 we will discuss the syntax

of focus and cleft constructions using Hiraiwa and Ishihara’s (2002) analysis, which plays

a very important role as analytical machinery. After that, in sections 3 through 5, we will

attempt to demonstrate the two subthemes of the nature of short answers: connectivity and

ellipsis. That is to say, we will show the various aspects of connectivity exhibited by short

answers, and then try to establish that ellipsis is indeed involved in the derivation of short

answers. MaxElide plays an important role here. In sections 6 and 7, we discuss various

issues having to do with the relative clause island and LFPP, showing that island-repair plays

a crucial role.

2 Focus and connectivity

The main claim of this article is that derivation of short answers involves focus movement

(which underlies cleft formation) and ellipsis, drawing on relevant data from Japanese. As a

preliminary to this goal, we discuss focus and cleft constructions in this section.

2.1 Focus and cleft constructions

In the analysis of short answers that we will present here, the analysis of focus and cleft con-

structions proposed by Hiraiwa and Ishihara (2002) plays a very important role as analytical

machinery.

Hiraiwa and Ishihara (2002) claim that cleft constructions are one species of focus con-

structions. On this analysis, cleft constructions are derived from what they call ‘No da’ in-situ

focus constructions, sentences ending in the nominalizer (or complementizer) no followed

by the copula da, with one or more of their constituents receiving focus interpretation (both

semantic and phonological).

(6) Taro-ga kono ringo-o kaw-ta no da.

Taro-Nom this apple-Acc buy-Past C Cop

‘It is that Taro bought this apple.’ or ‘It is this apple that Taro bought.’

Hiraiwa and Ishihara (2002) are not specific on this matter, but we assume that the focused

element carries the feature [+Foc], which has obvious consequences in PF, although our

attention in the present article is focused on its nature in the narrow syntax.


Assuming Rizzi’s (1997) theory of articulated CP architecture, Hiraiwa and Ishihara

(2002) consider the complementizer no as the head of the Fin(ite) projection, and copula

da as the head of the Foc(us) projection. Cleft constructions are derived from ‘No da’ in-

situ constructions via the following two steps. First, the focused constituent is moved to

SpecFocP.

(7) TopP

(Topic)

FocP

(Focus)

FinP

TP

. . . XP[+Foc] . . .

Fin(-no)

Foc(-da)

Top

This is obviously to check the [+Foc] feature associated with XP. If we stop the derivation

here, we obtain the following focus construction.

(8) Kono ringo-o Taro-ga kaw-ta no da.

this apple-Nom Taro-Nom buy-Past C Cop

‘This apple, Taro bought.’

This is indistinguishable from a sentence which has undergone scrambling. Alternatively, the

following, in which the constituent fronted by focus movement is marked by the nominative

ga, which also serves as the focus marker, can be thought of as the output of focus movement.3

3For some reason which we do not fully understand, the complementizer /nominalizer -no is not congenialhere, although it does not lead to full ungrammaticality. A nominal expression like mono ‘thing’ is much preferred.

(i) Kono ringo-ga Taro-ga kaw-ta mono da.this apple-Nom Taro-Nom buy-Past thing Cop‘It is this apple that Taro bought.’

Hiraiwa and Ishihara (2002) exclude this type of construction, where the presupposition portion is headed by anelement other than no, from their domain of focus constructions. However, sentences like the following showthe property of connectivity, a hallmark of specificational statements.


(9) Kono ringo-ga Taro-ga kaw-ta no da.

this apple-Nom Taro-Nom buy-Past C Cop

‘It is this apple that Taro bought.’

Then, the remnant of the FinP, headed by -no, is moved to SpecTopP. Although Hiraiwa and

Ishihara (2002) do not mention this, we take it that the copula -da, the head of FocP, is raised

to Top prior to the movement of FinP to SpecTopP — this makes SpecTopP equidistant to

SpecFocP with respect to FinP. This operation yields the presupposition portion of a cleft

sentence.

(10) TopP

(Topic)

FocP

(Focus)XP FinP

TP

. . . tXP . . .

Fin(-no)

Foc(-da)

Top

Thus, we get the following cleft sentence, with (6) as the source.

(11) Taro-ga kaw-ta no wa kono ringo(-o) da.

Taro-Nom buy-Past C Top this apple-Acc Cop

‘It is this apple that Taro bought.’

Given this analysis, the second part of the procedure is only necessary to derive a ‘regular’

cleft construction, one kind of focus constructions.

(ii) Zibun(zisin)-no syasin-ga Taro-ga ki-ni-it-te iru (yuitu-no) mono da.self-Gen photo-Nom Taro-Nom fond be only thing Cop‘A photo of himself is the (only) thing he likes.’

We will discuss this aspect of focus constructions shortly.


2.2 Binding connectivity

We can make several empirical arguments that cleft formation involves Focus movement,

i.e. focalized material starts off inside the TP and moves to SpecFocP, and not, for example,

that the process involves base-generation of the focused element in the focus position. Here

we present two observations (see Hiraiwa and Ishihara 2002 for other arguments). First, the

cleft construction displays connectivity related with binding.

One nice consequence of the analysis portrayed in the previous subsection, not mentioned

by Hiraiwa and Ishihara (2002) themselves, is that it captures straightforwardly the two

salient properties of the specificational (pseudo-)cleft constructions (Akmajian 1970, Higgins

1973): Connectivity and reversibility .

One of the important properties of cleft constructions often discussed in the literature

since Akmajian (1970), Higgins (1973), among others, is that sentences like the following are

ambiguous, having the specificational interpretation and the predicational interpretation.

(12) a. What John is is important.

b. What John ate for supper was the cat’s food.

On the predicational reading, (12a) means that John is a certain X (he has a position or

occupation, etc.) and that X or being X is important. On the specificational interpretation,

this is a statement about John, not about the position or occupation he has, and it simply

says that John is important. On the predicational reading of (12b), John might have eaten a

tuna steak for supper, whose leftover was fed to the cat. On the specificational reading, John

opened a can and ate the cat’s food for supper.

It has been noted since Akmajian (1970), Higgins (1973), among others, that reversing the

(surface) subject-predicate portions of (12) yields only the specificational interpretation.

(13) a. Important is what John is.

b. The cat’s food was what John ate for supper.

These sentences can only mean John is important and John ate the cat’s food for supper,

respectively.


The distinction between the predicational and specificational uses of cleft constructions is

reflected on the various phenomena related to connectivity, such as binding, agreement, and

a host of other syntactic and semantic properties. Simply put, specificational constructions

exhibit many if not all of the properties associated with connectivity, while predicational

constructions do not show connectivity.

Thus, the following sentences, with the indicated coindexation, do not show the ambigu-

ity in question.

(14) a. What Johni is is important to himselfi. (Specificational)

b. What Johni is is important to himi. (Predicational)

These binding phenomena suggest that specificational cleft sentences involve some syntactic

operations on a ‘source’ structure Johni is important to himselfi to account for the connectivity of

binding, while the predicational sentences are essentially what they look like on the surface,

with a ‘headless relative clause’ in the subject position.

Since the sentences in (14) are unambiguous, reversing the (surface) subject-predicate

order yields different results.

(15) a. Important to himselfi is what Johni is.

b. *Important to himi is what Johni is.

Now, Hiraiwa and Ishihara’s (2002) analysis of focus constructions can be utilized to

account for the syntactic properties of cleft constructions involving connectivity and re-

versibility of specificational cleft constructions. We will show how.

Let us start out with the FinP of the form: John is important to himself, where the bold

faced portion bears the feature [+Foc(us)]. Restricting ourselves to its nature in the narrow

syntax, the constituent bearing [+Foc] can be moved to SpecFocP to check the feature of its

head. Since FocP is a layer of the CP domain, movement occurring in this domain will have

the A′-properties, among them being successive cyclic. Thus, this constituent will move, first

to SpecFinP (via adjunction to VP and/or vP), and then to SpecFocP.


(16) FocP

(Focus)

FocCopula

FinP

←(what) IP

John is important to himself[+Foc]︸��︷︷��︸

This is how we get (15): Important to himself is what John is. We assume, as a possibility, that

what in SpecFinP is a spell-out of the copy left by movement of the focused constituent along

the way to SpecFocP. (Similarly, for -no in Japanese.)

We may choose to stop the derivation here, yielding the ‘reverse’ pseudo-cleft construction

(15), or choose to move on. If we choose to move on, what we can do is to move the remnant

of FinP, let us assume that this is marked for a topichood feature, to SpecTopP.

(17) TopP

(Topic)

Top FocP

(Focus)

important to himself[+Foc]

FocCopula

FinP

(what) IP

John is t[+Foc]

While this movement is not to the closest possible landing site, viz. SpecFocP, movement of

Copula to the head of TopP makes SpecTopP equidistant to SpecFocP. Thus this movement

is legitimate in light of the MLC.


This analysis is close in spirit to Heggie (1988), who takes the ‘reverse’ cleft as the source

structure for the ‘regular’ cleft: We regard the ‘reverse’ cleft construction as closer to the

source structure than the ‘regular’ cleft, for our analysis says that the derivation of the reverse

cleft involves only one syntactic operation, viz. Focus movement, while the derivation of the

‘regular’ cleft involves additional movement of Topic.

The connectivity and reversibility properties also show up in focus constructions in

Japanese. Connectivity in cleft constructions has been discussed at length by Kizu (2005),

among others. This property is observed in sentences like the following.

(18) Minna-ga sonkei-si-teiru no wa zibun(-zisin)-no hahaoya(-o) da.

all-Nom admire-be-Pres C Top self-Gen mother-Acc Cop

‘{??What / the person} everyone admires is his or her mother.’

Although on the surface, the quantifier minna ‘all, everyone’ does not c-command the reflex-

ive zibun(-zisin), the latter can be coindexed with the quantifier.

In keeping with Hiraiwa and Ishihara’s (2002) analysis of focus constructions, we derive

(18) from the source sentence (19), in which the quantifier does c-command the reflexive

within the same clause.

(19) Minna-ga zibun(-zisin)-no hahaoya-o sonkei-si-teiru no da.

all-Nom self-Gen mother-Acc admire-be-Pres C Cop

‘It is that everyone admires his or her mother.’

With movement of the bold-faced constituent of (19) to SpecFocP, we obtain either of the

following. (See footnote 3 relating to the pre-copular element in (20b).)

(20) a. Zibun(-zisin)-no hahaoya-o minna-ga sonkei-si-teiru no da.

self-Gen mother-Nom all-Nom admire-be-Pres C Cop

b. Zibun(-zisin)-no hahaoya-ga minna-ga sonkei-si-teiru {??no /hito} da.

self-Gen mother-Nom all-Nom admire-be-Pres C person Cop

Notice that these are the reversed versions of the cleft sentence (18), and they can be paralleled

by either of the following English sentences.


(21) a. It is his or her mother that everyone admires.

b. His or her mother is {??who / the person} everyone admires.

Thus, under Hiraiwa and Ishihara’s (2002) analysis of focus constructions, reversibility of

specificational cleft constructions comes with connectivity, simply by focus movement. The

cleft sentence (18) is obtained by movement of the remnant of FinP, the portion headed by

-no in (20).

2.3 Scope reconstruction

Scope reconstruction presents another set of facts indicating connectivity exhibited by fo-

cus/cleft constructions.

In (22), three songs can be interpreted as having narrow scope with respect to the subject

QP, so each of the boys might have sung different three songs from the other.

(22) Hutari-no syoonen-ga samba-o san-kyoku utaw-ta.

2-CL-Gen boy-Nom samba-Acc 3-CL sing-Past

‘(The) two boys sang three sambas.’

In this light, consider the cleft sentence (23).

(23) Hutari-no syoonen-ga utaw-ta no wa samba-o 3-kyoku desu

2-CL-Gen boy-Nom sing-Past C Top samba-Acc 3-Cl Cop

‘It is three sambas that (the) two boys sang.’

Sentence (23) allows the interpretation in which three sambas takes scope narrower than two

boys. The point is made clear when this sentence is contrasted with a sentence involving

head-external relativization. As pointed out by Hoshi (2004), head-external relativization in

Japanese does not allow scope reconstruction, (see also Bianchi 1999, Aoun and Li 2003).

(24) Boku-wa [hutari-no syoonen-ga utaw-u] samba-o 3-kyoku kiita.

I-Top 2-CL-Gen boy-Nom sing-Pres samba-Acc 3-CL hear-Past

‘I listened to (the) three sambas that the two boys sang.’

Sentence (24) does not allow the narrow scope reading of three sambas; that is, either the same

three sambas were sung by the boys or sung in chorus. If the scope interaction is determined

3 Short answers as ellipsis 13

by c-command at LF, the availability of the narrow scope reading of the object QP in (23)

strongly argues for a derivation that we are proposing. The focus material is reconstructed

into the TP at LF, which is possible because it has a trace somewhere below the subject at

some point of the derivation.

3 Short answers as ellipsis

3.1 The canonical case

In the present analysis, we consider short answers as concealed focus constructions, derived

by (i) focus movement of the constituent corresponding to the wh-phrase in the question —

the first step in the derivation of a cleft construction in Hiraiwa and Ishihara’s (2002) analysis,

and (ii) deletion of the clause headed by no, FinP in the articulated CP system, also following

Hiraiwa and Ishihara (2002). The idea that short answers derive from focus has also been

advocated by Kuwabara (1997) and Saito (2004), though our technical implementation of the

idea will differ from theirs.

(25)

⇓∅

(i)

(ii)

FocP

(Focus)

FinP

TP

. . . XP[+Foc] . . .

Fin(-no)

Foc(-da)

A similar analysis is adopted by Merchant (2004), with some difference in the phrase structure

organization.

There is a further possibility that deletion targets (the remnant of) FinP after it moves to

SpecTopP, thereby effecting a cleft construction, along the lines of Hiraiwa and Ishihara (2002).

We have no empirical reason to deny the possibility that movement to the SpecTopP applies

before deletion takes place. Intuitively, this literally means that short answers derive from

cleft constructions, as has been claimed by Saito (2004). We simply assume that movement of


FinP to TopP is optional, but it is worth stressing that the difference between the two possible

analyses is surprisingly small.

3.2 Identity in ellipsis

Consideration of the notion of identity is indispensable in a theory of ellipsis.

For the present purposes, we assume the influential view of Merchant (2001), making

crucial reference to “semantic isomorphism”. Along the lines advocated by Merchant (see

also Schwarzschild 1999 and references cited therein), ellipsis of FinP is licensed only if the

semantic content of the antecedent clause and that of the FinP entail each other. For example,

the FinP in (26) can be elided.

(26) A. [FinPMari-ga dare-o karakaw-ta] no?

Mari-Nom who-Acc make-fun-Past Q

‘Who did Mari make fun of?’

B. <Mari-ga e karakaw-ta no wa> otooto desu.

Mari-Nom make-fun-Past C Top brother Cop

‘It was (her little) brother that Mari made fun of.’

In this instance, the inference (27) must obtain as a prerequisite for the deletion of the FinP

of the antecedent clause, where the existential quantifier binds the argument position of

the verb make-fun-of, ignoring tense. (At this point, it does not matter whether the in-situ

wh-phrase actually moves or is interpreted without movement. But see section 7.)

(27) ∃x.make-fun-of(m, x)

The interpretation of FinP of (26B) also permits the inference spelled out as (27). Hence the

antecedent entails the elided site, and vice versa.

If this mutual entailment relation is not met, ellipsis is not allowed, as illustrated by (28)

as reply to (26A).

(28) B. a. [FinPMari-ga e tibi-to iw-ta] no wa otooto desu.

Mari-Nom shorty call-Past C Top brother Cop

‘It was (her little) brother that Mari called Shorty.’

4 Short answers and connectivity 15

b. [FinPMari-ga tibi-to iw-ta] no wa otooto desu.

Mari-Nom shorty call-Past C Top brother Cop

‘(It was) (her little) brother (that Mari called Shorty).’

The potential antecedent does not entail the elided site: Calling somebody Shorty entails

making fun of that person, but the other way around does not hold. For more detailed

discussion on this subject, the reader is referred to Merchant (2001, chapter 1).

4 Short answers and connectivity

Merchant (2004) points out the following connectivity effects exhibited by short answers

(‘fragment answers’ in his terms). We will discuss some of those connecivity effects here.

4.1 Case-matching

The morphological case form of a short answer DP is the same as the case found on the

corresponding DP in a fully sentential answer.

(29) Whose car did you take?

a. *John.

b. John’s.

In Japanese, the morphological realization of structural case is retained in short answers.

(30) A. Mari-ga nani-o kaw-ta no?

Mari-Nom what-Acc buy-Past Q

‘What did Mari buy?’

B. Ringo-o 3-ko desu.

apple-Acc 3-Cl Cop

‘Three apples.’

Since accusative case needs to be assigned by a verb, (30B) has to contain the case assigner

in the structure, even though it is not pronounced.

In Japanese, the morphological case markers -ga (nominative) and -o (accusative) are gen-

erally omitted in short answers, the retention of these case markers leading to unacceptability

with varying degrees.


(31) A: Dare-ga kawari-ni kuru no?

who-Nom instead come Q

‘Who is coming instead?’

B: a. Taro(??-ga) desu.

Taro-Nom Cop

b. Kawari-ni kuru no wa Taro(??-ga) desu.

instead come C Top Taro-Nom Cop

‘It’s Taro that’s coming instead.’

(32) A. Taro-wa nani-o tabe-te-ru no?

Taro-Top what-Acc eat-ing Q

‘What is Taro eating?’

B. a. Susi(*-o) desu.

sushi(-Acc) Cop

b. Taro-ga tabe-te-ru no wa susi(*-o) desu.

Taro-Nom eat-ing C Top sushi-Acc Cop

‘It is sushi that Taro is eating.’

The omission of the case markers is what is observed in the focus constituent in the pre-

copuar position, as seen in the cleft constructions in (31b) and (32b). The retention of the

case-marker in this position leads to unacceptability just to the extent that the corresponding

short answers with the case-marker are unacceptable. The parallel pattern as seen in (31)

and (32) can be taken as telling evidence that short answers are derived from focus (or cleft)

constructions plus deletion.

As has been pointed out in the literature (e.g. Koizumi 2000, Kuroda 1992), inserting an

element such as a floating quantifier between XP-ga/o and the copular improves the status of

the sentence, as is the case in (30).


4.2 Binding connectivity

Phenomena having to do with binding in general provide strong evidence for connectivity

shown by short answers.

4.2.1 Bound pronouns

As seen in the following examples from Merchant (2004), short answer (33a) contains a

pronoun bound by a quantifier contained in the question.

(33) A. Who does every Englishmani admire?

B. a. Hisi mother.

b. Every Englishmani admires hisi mother.

This is straightfowardly captured if we derive (33a) from a full sentential form (33b). Also,

(33a) is an instance of functional answer, also referred to as relational answer (Engdahl 1986,

1988). A functional answer, as applied to each individual in the relevant domain of discourse,

yields a different individual as a referential value. For discussion of functional answers, cf.

Chierchia (1991), Hornstein (1995), among many others. Functional answers play a crucial

role later in this article.

The following examples from Japanese show the same point.

(34) A. Minnai-ga dare-o syootai-suru ka osiete.

all-Nom who-Acc invite-Pres Q tell me

‘Tell me who everyone invites.’

B. a. Zibun-zisini-no kazoku-o hutari-zutu desu.

self-Gen family-Acc 2-Cl each Cop

‘Two of his or her family members each.’

b. Minnai-ga syootai-suru no wa zibun-zisini-no kazoku-o

all-Nom invite-Pres C Top self-Gen family-Acc

hutari-zutu desu.

2-Cl each Cop

‘It is two of his or her family members each that everyone invites.’


(35) A. Kaku syai-ga dare-o syootai-suru ka osiete.

each company-Nom who-Acc invite-Pres Q tell me

‘Tell me who each company invites.’

B. a. Sokoi-no kabunusi-o hutari-zutu desu.

it-Gen stockholder-Acc 2-Cl each Cop

‘Two of its stockholders each.’

b. Kaku syai-ga syootai-suru no wa sokoi-no kabunusi-o

each company-Nom invite-Pres C Top self-Gen stockholder-Acc

hutari-zutu desu.

2-Cl each Cop

‘It is two of its stockholders each that each company invites.’

The reflexive in (34a) and the bound pronominal in (35a) pattern with those occurring in the

cleft constructions (34b) and (35b), respectively. Assuming with the standard practice that

variable binding requires c-command by a quantificational antecedent, the functional answer

given in (34a) and (35a) constitutes evidence for ellipsis. If there is no structure containing

the quantifier in the short answer at any point of the derivation, then the availability of the

bound reading would be mysterious. In our analysis, this binding possibility is accounted

for because the binder is available in the clause to undergo ellipsis.

4.2.2 Condition C and B effects

Merchant (2004) discusses cases like (36) and (37), which show the obviation effects show up

with short answers, as is expected under the ellipsis analysis

(36) Condition C:

Where is hei staying?

a. *In Johni’s apartment.

b. *Hei’s staying in Johni’s apartment.

(37) Condition B:

Who did Johni shave?


a. *Himi.

b. *Hei shaved himi.

It is easy to show the condition A effect in short answers and corresponding focus and

cleft constructions in Japanese.

(38) A. Taro-wa dare-o hihan-si-ta no?

Taro-Top who-Acc criticize-Past Q

‘Who did Taro criticize?’

B. a. Zibun(-zisin) desu.

self Cop

b. Kare-ga hihan-si-ta no wa zibun(-zisin) desu.

he-Nom criticize-Past C Top self Cop

‘It was himself that he criticized.’

In Japanese, the situation with obviation involving pronominals is not so straightforward at

first glance. Imagine that we are talking about a puppy Max.

(39) A. Karei-o doko-e ture-te iku no?

it-Acc where-to take go Q

‘Where (are you going to) bring him?’

B. a.??Maxi-no uti-e desu.

Max-Gen home-to Cop

‘To Max’s home.’

b. ?*Karei-o ture-te iku no wa Maxi-no uti-e desu.

he-Acc take go C Top Max-Gen home-to Cop

‘It is to Max’s home that we are taking him.’

The acceptability of short answer (39a) is slighltly higher than that of the corresponding cleft

(39b), at least to some speakers.

A solution to this puzzle may lie in ‘vehicle change’, which we discuss in the next

subsection.


4.2.3 ‘Vehicle change’ effects

This is apparently a sign of non-connectivity effect, for while (40b) shows a condition C

violation, no corresponding deviance is found in the parallel short answer (40a).

(40) A. Who did you tell t about Billi’s raise?

B. a. Himi.

b. *I told himi about Billi’s raise.

Merchant (2004) claims that this discrepancy is due to the effect called ‘vehicle change’

(Fiengo and May, 1994), which is widely observed in ellipsis phenomena, concluding that

that this effect is found in short answers is a ‘welcome and expected’ outcome, since this can

be taken as additional evidence that ellipsis is involved in the derivation of short answers.

Similar facts can be observed in Japanese.

(41) A. Dare-ni Taroi-no mozi-ga kaidoku dekiru no?

who-Dat Taro-Gen handwriting-Nom decipher can Q

‘Who can decipher Taro’s handwriting?’

B. a. Karei-ni dake desu.

he-Dat only Cop

b. ?*Taroi-no mozi-ga kaidoku dekiru no wa karei-ni dake desu.

Taro-Gen handwriting-Nom decipher can C Top he-Dat only Cop

‘It is only he (him) that can decipher Taro’s handwriting.’

The judgment we obtain in Japanese seems to pattern with that of the English example we

have seen, so the short answer (41a) is considerably better than its fully sentential source

with a condition C violation (41b). A natural explanation here is ‘vehicle change’ by which

the name in (41b) is replaced by a pronoun in the source for ellipsis.

Now consider the following, where he in the question sentence (39) in the previous

subsection is replaced by a name.

(42) A. Maxi-o doko-e ture-te iku no?

Max-Acc where-to take go Q

‘Where (are you going to) bring Max?’


B. a. Maxi-no uti-e desu.

Max-Gen home-to Cop

‘To Max’s home.’

b. Maxi-o ture-te iku no wa Maxi-no uti-e desu.

he-Acc take go C Top Max-Gen home-to Cop

‘It is to Max’s home that we are taking Max.’

Our intuition is that (42a) is considerably improved over (39a). Given that the Condition C

effect disappears when the antecedent is a name in Japanese (e.g. Lasnik 1991), the contrast

between (39a) and (42a) can be accounted for if ellipsis takes place; that is, Max in the

former example is bound by the pronoun while Max in the latter is by the name in the cleft

construction (42b).

We consider this as a case of ‘vehicle change’: the pronominal which appeared in the

elided site is now replaced by a name. One might find this reasoning perverse, because in

the usual cases of ‘vehicle change’ discussed in the literature, the name in the elided site is

replaced by a pronominal, so the situation that we are saying is holding in (42) is going in

the opposite direction.

But notice that the way ‘vehicle change’ is stated in Fiengo and May (1994, 218ff.) does

not stipulate directionality:

(43) Nominals can be treated as non-distinct with respect to their pronominal status

under ellipsis.

In Merchant’s (2001) theory, ‘vehicle change’ is subsumed under semantic identity. This

approach does not imply any directionality of ‘vehicle change’ either.

Notice that ‘vehicle change’ as conceived this way does not save the condition C violation

as seen in (36) in the previous subsection, because English does not allow a name to be bound

by a name as in Japanese.

(44) Where is hei staying?

a. *In Johni’s apartment.

b. *Hei’s staying in Johni’s apartment.


c. *Johni’s staying in Johni’s apartment.

d. *It is in Johni’s apartment that Johni’s staying.

4.3 Scope

We have seen in section 2.3 that cleft sentences (or more precisely examples involving Focus

movement) exhibit scope reconstruction. Short answers also exhibits this property, which is

naturally expected under our approach to short answers. Short answers allow for the same

kind of scopal ambiguity found in fully sentential answers.

(45) A. How many diplomats did every translator greet?

B. a. Three.

b. Every translator greeted three (diplomats).

In (45a), B’s answer has both the scopal possibilities attested in (45b).

The same point can be shown in short answers and cleft constructions in Japanese.

(46) A. Minna-ga samba-o nan-kyoku utaw-ta ka osiete.

all-Nom samba-Acc how many songs sing-Past Q tell me

‘Tell me how many sambas everyone sang.’

B. a. 3-kyoku desu.

3 songs Cop

b. Minna-ga utaw-ta no wa samba-o 3-kyoku desu.

all-Nom sing-Past C Top samba-Acc 3-songs Cop

‘It was three sambas that everyone sang.’

Short answer (46a) has the same scopal ambiguity as the cleft construction (46b) does. So

both of these have the interpretation on which there were three songs that all the relevant

people sang (maybe as a group), or every member of the group sang three songs, possibly

different from other members of the group sang.

If no ellipsis is involved in (46a), namely if it does not derive from a full sentential

structure, it would be hard to imagine how three sambas could interact scopally with the

quantified phrase everyone.


4.4 Ellipsis and MaxElide

“MaxElide”, as has been referred to in the current literature (Merchant 2001, Fox and Lasnik

2003, Takahashi and Fox 2005, among others) constitutes an argument that helps establish

that ellipsis is involved in the derivation of short answers.

As has been observed since Lasnik (2001), VP-ellipsis does not apply naturally where

Sluicing can apply. Here is one example.4

(47) They said they heard about a Balkan language, but I don’t know

a. which they heard about.

b. which.

c. *which they did.

The following generalization essentially captures the idea of this concept (see Merchant 2001,

Fox and Lasnik 2003, Takahashi and Fox 2005 for further discussion).

(48) Where XP is a constituent to be elided and YP is also a possible target for deletion,

YP must not properly contain XP.

In (47), the TP is the constituent elided by Sluicing and the VP is a target of deletion

by VP-ellipsis. Since the TP properly contains the VP, (47c), in which VP is deleted in the

presence of a larger constituent TP which properly contains it, is ruled out by (47).

The effect of MaxElide is also observed in ellipsis which is considered to be responsible

for the derivation of short answers in Japanese.5 Consider the following.

(49) A. Hanako-wa [kyoozyu-ga nani-o koogi-su-ru tokoro]-o rokuon sita no?

Hanako-Top prof.-Nom what-Acc lecture-Pres C-Acc tape-rec do-Past Q

‘Lit. What did Hanako tape-record the professor lecturing?’

B. a. Gengogaku-o desu.

linguistics-Acc Cop

4See section 7, especially footnotes 11 and 12.5To our knowledge, Susumu Kuno (Kuno, 1978, 1980) is the first to point out the effect of what is now familiar

as MaxElide (the “Ban against Partial Discourse Deletion” in his terms). The range of data he looked at is muchwider than that we cover here.


b. Hanako-ga [kyoozyu-ga koogi-su-ru tokoro]-o rokuon sita

Hanako-Nom prof.-Nom lecture-Pres C-Acc tape-rec do-Past

no wa gengogaku-o desu.

C Top linguistics-Acc Cop

‘It was linguistics that Hanako tape-recorded the professor lecturing.’

c. *Gengogaku-o Hanako-ga ∅ rokuon sita no desu.

linguistics-Acc Hanako-Nom tape-rec do-Past C Cop

d. *Hanako-ga ∅ rokuon sita no wa gengogaku-o desu.

Hanako-Nom tape-rec do-Past C Top linguistics-Acc Cop

While (49a), which on our analysis derives from cleft sentence (49b) (which involves no island

violation), is a normal short answer to question (49A), (49c), derived by focus movement and

deletion, is so bad that it is hard to give an English translation. Sentence (49d), a cleft

construction obtained from (49b) by Topicalization of FinP, is equally bad. If anything, they

can only mean ‘Hanako tape-recorded linguistics,’ which hardly makes sense. This shows

the extent to which a violation of MaxElide causes a severe degradation.

To see the point, let us consider how (49a–d) are derived. First, focus movement moves

gengogaku ‘linguistics’.

(50) [FocPlinguisticsi [FP[TPHanako recorded [CPthe prof lecture ti tokoroC]] no] desuCop]

Given this, deletion of FinP leads to the normal short answer (49a).

(51) [FocPlinguisticsi [FinP[TPHanako recorded [CPthe prof lecture ti tokoroC]] no]︸��︷︷��︸

desuCop]

⇓∅

The almost gibberish (49b) is derived as in the following.

(52) [FocPlinguisticsi [FinP[TPHanako recorded [CPthe prof lecture ti tokoroC]︸��︷︷��︸

] no] desuCop]

⇓∅


This is bad, because CP now purporting to be elided is properly contained in FinP, another

potential deletion target. Subsequent movement of FinP to SpecTop yields the cleft (49d),

ending up in an equal near-gibberish.6

Thus the contrast as seen in (49a) and (49c) is readily explained by MaxElide — such an

account is possible only if one supposes that ellipsis is involved in the derivation of short

answers.

Notice that it is not the case that deletion or ellipsis involving circumstantial clauses

headed by tokoro (literally meaning ‘place, spot’) is prohibited. To see this, consider the

following as a possible answer to (49A).

(53) ?Saa. Demo, Hanako-ga ∅ satuei sita no wa

don’t know but Hanako-Nom cam-rec do-Past C Top

gengogaku(-o) desu.

linguistics-Acc Cop

‘Don’t know, but it was linguistics that Hanako cam-recorded (as being lectured).’

We consider this as a significant improvement in comparison with (49d) on the intended

reading on which (the professor’s lecture of) linguistics was cam-recorded. The reason for

this improvement lies in the presence of a verb distinct from the one used in the question.

In fact, this verb needs to be pronounced with stress to obtain the intended interpretation.

The derivation of this answer involves focus movement of gengogaku ‘linguistics’ within the

complement clause, followed by deletion of the remnant clause. MaxElide is irrelevant, and

the sentence is improved as expected.

6In the analysis of Takahashi and Fox (2005), it is crucially necessary to assume that there is no intermediatetrace at the periphery of the tokoro-complement clause, for otherwise this would not constitute a re-bindingenvironment, to which the effect of MaxElide is restricted in their analysis. The fact appears to indicate thatthere is an intermediate trace. As we will discuss in section 5.2, the presence of an intermediate trace makes itpossible for the matrix subject to be the antecedent for the reflexive zibun-zisin which derives from a positionin the complement clause. An answer such as the following to (49A), in which zibun-zisin can be interpreted asHanako, shows that re-binding does not take place here.

(i) Zibun-zisin-no repooto-o desu.self-Gen report-Acc Cop‘Her own term paper.’

However, the intermediate trace itself is not bound within the complement clause, and it is possible to assumethis as causing re-binding.


5 Short answers and focus movement

Given the familiar assumption that ellipsis only targets constituents, most of the arguments

for ellipsis that we have made in the previous section constitute arguments for a movement

analysis of short answers as well. For instance, our bound variable binding paradigm tells us

that if the carrier of the bound variable were base-generated outside the elided site and, say,

binds a null pronoun in the object position, there would be no chance for the quantificational

antecedent to A-bind into the accusative-marked phrase.

(54) *[FocP selfj’s motheri [FinP everyonej V proi]]

In this section, we will present two more arguments for movement.

5.1 Polarity items

Merchant (2004) discusses the distribution of negative polarity items (NPIs), but this is not

in the context of his discussion of connectivity retained by short answers. As (55) shows, the

NPI any is unable to appear as a short answer.

(55) A. What didn’t Max read?

B. *Anything.

Rather, he discusses this issue as part of his argument for the derivation of short answers

from left-dislocation, for NPIs are unable to appear in a left-dislocated position.

(56) *Anything, Max didn’t read.

In this respect, NPIs in Japanese appear to behave differently. We use sika, whose best

approximate in English would be ‘but’ as in ‘He eats nothing but hamburgers.’7

7Watanabe (2004) extensively discusses negative concord items like nani-mo ‘anything’ in Japanese and theirinteractions with ellipsis, arguing for the semantic isomorphism condition of Merchant (2001). (iB) (from Watan-abe 2004) is a representative example of negative concord, where the antecedent clause does not contain overtnegation but deletion of “I didn’t see” is allowed.

(i) A: Nani-o mita no?what-Acc saw Q‘What did you see?’

B: Nani-mo mi-nakat-tawhat-Mo see-Neg-Past‘(I saw) nothing.’

5 Short answers and focus movement 27

(57) A. Kono neko-wa nani-sika tabe-nai no?

this cat-Top what-sika eat-not Q

Lit. ‘This cat eats nothing but what?’ or ‘Only what does this cat eat?’

B. *Maguro-sika desu.

tuna-sika Cop

Intended: ‘Only tuna.’

Although (57B) is as bad as (55B), left-dislocation of the same NPI is not so bad.

(58) Maguro-sika kono neko-wa tabe-nai no desu.

tuna-sika this cat-Top eat-not C Cop

Lit. ‘This cat eats nothing but tuna.’

We take this as due to the equivocal status of left-dislocation as seen in (58). That is, left-

dislocation in this example may either be focus-movement or scrambling, and it has been

claimed by Ishii (1997) that the restriction on scrambling is less strict than on canonical

varieties of A′-movement, of which we consider focus-movement is an instantiation. It is

highly likely that the acceptability of (58) is due to this aspect of scrambling. On the other

hand, the following cleft construction is very low in acceptability.8

(59) *Kono neko-ga tabe-nai no wa maguro-sika desu.

this cat-Nom eat-not C Top tuna-sika Cop‘What this cat does not eat is but tuna.’

Intended: ‘What this cat eats is nothing but tuna.’

We do not have much to say about this interesting topic here, but two things might be worth mentioning. First,sika-phrases differ from negative concord items in that they are barred as an answer to (i).

(ii) B: Hebi(*-sika)snake-sika

Second, ellipsis of the kind investigated by Watanabe seems to be a different phenomenon from one we find inshort answers. Compare (i) and (iii).

(iii) B: *Nani-mo desuwhat-Mo Cop

When the copula is attached to the fragment seen in (iB), no acceptable answer to the question is obtained. If thepresence of the copula is an indication that clefting is involved, the status of (iiiB) suggests that fragments thatWatanabe is looking at do not involve cleft or focus movement in our sense.

8Facts like this are also discussed in Kizu (2005).


We take this as a strong piece of evidence that the focus element of cleft constructions is

what short answers derive from. Given that the cleft construction is a subspecies of focus

constructions, we continue to assume that short answers derive from focus.

Notice that a short answer without sika is possible as an answer to (57A).

(60) Maguro desu.

tuna Cop

But this answer is arguably from a source other than a focus construction, and must be from

the bare-copular frame discussed in 5.3, which does not observe connectivity. We have two

arguments for this. One is that (57A) does not allow a functional answer.

(61) *Zibun-no emono desu.

self-Gen catch, game Cop

‘Its own catch.’

As we will see in subsection 5.4, a short functional answer must be derived from a focus

construction, not from a bare-copular frame.

Second, short answers exemplified by (60) do not retain a postposition used in the ques-

tion, another hallmark of the absence of connectivity.

(62) A. Sono mise-wa dono miti-kara sika ike-nai no?

that store-Top which road-from sika go-Not QLit. ‘One can go to the shop from no way but which way?’

‘Only from which way can you go to the store?’

B. Kita-gawa-no miti(??-kara) desu.

north-side-gen road -from Cop

‘(From) the north side way.’

For some reason which we do not understand, B’s answer sounds even better without the

postposition. This might be taken as suggesting that this answer is only derived from a

bare-copular frame.


5.2 Binding intermediate positions

In section 2, we posited focus movement as an essential ingredient in the derivation of

focus and cleft constructions. This is a movement of a focused constituent to SpecFocP, a

layer of the CP domain. One expectation arising from this is that focus movement, being a

movement in the CP domain, has the properties associated with A′-movement, among them

being successive cyclic. While this was already shown to be the case in section 2, we will

consider additional cases to confirm this point.

Consider the following discourse, in which the question sentence involves a wh-phrase

in the embedded clause:

(63) Minnai-ga [Akiraj-ga dare-o sonkei-si te-iru to] iw-ta ka osiete.

all-Nom Akira-Nom who-Acc admire be that say-Past Q tell me

‘Tell me who everyone says Akira admires?’

(64) a. Mother Teresa-o desu.

Mother Teresa-Acc Cop

‘Mother Teresa.’

b. Zibun-zisini/j-no hahaoya-o desu.

self-Gen mother-Acc Cop

‘His/her mother.’

Of interest to us is the functional answer in (64b). The reflexive that appears in this short

answer can be coindexed either with the matrix subject or the complement subject.

Notice that the anaphor zibun-zisin requires local binding, and does not allow binding by

an antecedent across the clause.

(65) Minnai-ga [Akiraj-ga zibun-zisin∗i/j-no hahaoya-o sonkei-si te-iru to] iw-ta.

all-Nom Akira-Nom self-Gen mother-Acc admire be that say-Past

‘Everyone said Akira admires his own mother.’

So the ambiguity of the reflexive in (64b) would be unexpected if we suppose, for example,

that this short answer derives directly from (65) by deletion. In that case, we would expect

that the anaphor would be bound only by the embedded subject.


On the other hand, along the lines of the present analysis in which short answers are de-

rived from focus/cleft constructions, which in turn involve focus movement in their deriva-

tion, the ambiguity in question is just what is expected. The following cleft construction,

which we claim is the source of (64b), is also ambiguous.9

(66) Minnai-ga [Akiraj-ga sonkei-si te-iru to] iw-ta no wa zibun-zisini/j-no

all-Nom Akira-Nom admire be that say-Past C Top self-Gen

hahaoya-o desu.

mother-Acc Cop

‘It was his own mother that everyone said Akira admires.’

We take the following, obtained by focus movement, as the representation for the possible

functional answer.

(67) [[selfi/j’s mother] everyonei said [([selfi/j’s mother]) Akiraj admires ([selfi/j’s mother)]]]

In this structure, the reflexive can be licensed either in the complement object position, in

which case it is bound by Akira, or in the intermediate SpecCP position, where it can be

bound by the matrix subject.

This result is consistent with our hypothesis that focus movement, involved in the deriva-

tion of focus/cleft constructions, shares one property associated with A′-movement: succes-

sive cyclicity.

5.3 Interlude: Non-movement source of short answers

Up to this point, we have developed an analysis of short answers in terms of focus movement

and ellipsis. However, there are cases where we find some discrepancies between short

answers and fully sentential focus/cleft constructions in Japanese. In this subsection, we will

consider why.

One case of discrepancy has to do with postpositions. The postpositions are retained

9Kizu (2005) claims that only the matrix subject can be the antecedent for the anaphor in cleft constructionslike (66). While we agree that binding by the matrix subject is dominant, we consider binding by the complementsubject also possible.

Recall that we have independently shown in section 4.3 that focus movement can start off inside the complementclause, based on scope reconstruction.


in the focus position — the same postposition is found in a short answer as seen in a fully

sentential answer.

(68) A. Doroboo-ga doko-kara okane-o nusun-da no?

thief-Nom where-from money-Acc steal-Past Q

‘Where did the thief steal the money from?’

B. a. Kono ginkoo(-kara) desu.

this bank-from Cop

‘From this bank.’

b. Doroboo-ga okane-o nusun-da no wa kono ginkoo(-kara) desu.

thief-Nom money-Acc steal-Past C Top this bank-from Cop

‘It was from that bank that the thief stole the money.’

As the parentheses in answer (68a) suggest, the postposition -kara ‘from’ appears to be

optional in short answers. This is also reflected on the cleft construction (68b), in which the

postposition on the focus constituent appears to be optional. This runs counter to our basic

premise that a specificational cleft retains connectivity.

Hoji (1990) argues that a cleft construction with its focus constituent lacking a postposition

has a derivation distinct from those involving focus with a postposition. Saito (2004) takes

the following, with pro as the gap in the presupposition clause, as the structure for clefts with

focus without a case-marker or postposition.

(69) [NP[TP . . . pro . . . ]]-wa NP-da.

-Top -Cop

Since, on the usual understanding, pro is not generated by movement, construction (69),

which Saito (2004) refers to as ‘bare NP cleft’, is base-generated. From this, it is expected that

this construction lacks the type of connectivity observed in (specificational) cleft construc-

tions. Thus, the cleft construction without a postposition (68b) can be thought to derive from

(69).

However, later in the paper, Saito (2004, 43) refutes the use of structure (69) for his analysis

of short answers involving bare NPs, because the subject of the short answer not deriving


from a specificational cleft is indeterminate.

Instead, Saito (2004) suggests that a ‘bare NP’ short answer has an alternative source,

which has a general form:

(70) pro XP da/desu

Cop

in which pro is an empty version of the pronominal sore ‘it’ vaguely referring to the circum-

stance related to the event depicted in the sentence. We call (70) the bare-copular frame.

We will not attempt to present a precise analysis of the structure of (70), except to note

that it is presumably a case of deep anaphora in the sense of Hankamer and Sag (1976),

where pro is base-generated in SpecTopP. The fact that this frame exhibits a certain degree of

connectivity in such a way that, for instance, the identical postposition is used in the question

and answer in (68), exclusive of other postpositions which may be semantically synonymous

(if such exists), suggests that some copying operation at the discourse-level takes place in the

formation of XP in (70).

5.4 Controlling variability

In the previous subsection, we have seen that short answers have at least two possible sources

and derivations. One is from focus or specificational cleft plus ellipsis, the other from bare-

copular forms. The former type is faithful to connectivity and shows the behavior of ellipsis,

while the latter does not observe connectivity and shows no sign of syntactic movement. But

are all short answers ambiguous having variable sources?

Our answer is no. Functional answers and pair-list answers require that they derive from

focus/cleft constructions plus deletion. This point can be straightforwardly demonstrated by

the following examples, where functional answers and pair-list answers are ungrammatical

in the bare-copular frame (70).

(71) A. Minna-ga dare-kara meeru-o uke-tor-ta ka osiete.

all-Nom who-from e-mail-Acc receive-Past Q tell me

‘Tell me who everyone received an e-mail from.’


B. a. Sore-wa Koizumi-san-kara desu.

it-Top Mr. Koizumi-from Cop

b. *Sore-wa soitu-no zyoosi-kara desu.

it-Top the guy-Gen superior Cop

‘It was from his or her boss.’

c. *Sore-wa Taro-ga Koizumi-san-kara, Mari-ga Abe-san-kara desu.

it-Top Taro-Nom Mr. Koizumi-from Mari-Nom Mr. Abe-from Cop

‘It was, Taro from Mr. Koizumi, Mari from Mr. Abe.

That pair-list answers are incompatible with the bare-copular frame (70) is also noted by

Saito (2004).

In section 4.1, we pointed out that the retention of the morphological case-marker in

a short answer is a hallmark of connectivity, subject to deletion in pre-copular positions.

Postpositions are generally retained in short answers (and focus positions of focus/cleft

constructions as well) even in pre-copular positions. However, answer (72a) to question

(71A) suggests that retention of the postposition is optional, also noted in the previous

subsection. The fact is, the optionality of retention of the postposition only applies to

individual answers, and the functional answers and pair-list answers show the obligatory

retention of the postposition.

(72) B. a. Koizumi-san(-kara) desu.

Mr. Koizumi-from Cop

b. Soitu-no zyoosi*(-kara) desu.

the guy-Gen superior Cop

‘From his or her boss.’

c. Taro*(-ga) Koizumi-san(-kara), Mari*(-ga) Abe-san*(-kara) desu.

Taro-Nom Mr. Koizumi-from Mari-Nom Mr. Abe-from Cop

‘Taro from Mr. Koizumi, Mari from Mr. Abe.’

While the presence of the postposition is optional in the individual answer (72a), its presence

is obligatory in the functional answer (72b), its omission leading to ungrammaticality. In the


pair-list answer (72c), the nominative case-marker ga, which is normally omitted in focus

constituents and short answers, is obligatorily retained. While the postposition kara ‘from’ is

optional in the first conjunct of the pair-list answer, its presence is obligatory in the second

conjunct. This is a general pattern of ellipsis found in Japanese, such as the equivalent of

Gapping in Japanese.

Short functional answers will play important roles in the remainder of our discussion.

This type of answer is faithful to connectivity, which arguably comes from its syntactic source

and derivation: functional answers unequivocally derive from focus/cleft constructions.10

6 LF Pied-Piping and short answers

6.1 The pied-piping analysis

Question sentences like (73), in which a wh-phrase appears inside a relative clause, have

given rise to an important issue in the current linguistic theory.


all-Top Akira-Nom where-at take-Past picture-Acc see-Past Q tell me

‘Lit. Everyone saw a picture that Akira had taken where?’

(74) a. (Kare-ga) Tokyo-de tor-ta {syasin / no}(-o) desu.

he-Nom Tokyo-at take-Past picture / one Cop

‘The picture/one that he had taken in Tokyo.’

b. Tokyo(-de) desu.

Tokyo-at Cop

‘(In) Tokyo.’

The acceptability of answers like (74b) has been taken to indicate the lack of the effect of

relative clause islands in Chinese, Japanese, Korean and other ‘wh in-situ’ languages. Huang

(1982) specifically argued that no island constraint applies to LF-movement and subsequently

approaches have been developed under which some non-movement operation licenses wh

in-situ (Reinhart 1998, Tsai 1994, among others).10We discuss syntactic properties of pair-list answers at length in our other work [reference suppressed].

6 LF Pied-Piping and short answers 35

On the other hand, the fact that (74a) is a possible answer to questions like (73) is one of

the reasons that led Nishigauchi (1990) to hypothesize that in Japanese (and other languages

in which wh-questions exemplified by (73) are permissible) the entire complex NP containing

the wh-phrase can be moved and occupy the operator-position at LF. (‘Large-scale Pied-

Piping at LF.’) This idea has later been modified by Watanabe (1992) so that the wh-feature

of the entire complex NP, instead of the whole NP itself, is moved to the operator position

either in overt syntax or at LF. We’ll call this the LF Pied-Piping (LFPP) approach.

According to this latter approach, the large constituent containing the wh-phrase, which

itself moves inside the relative clause island, thereby making it [+wh], is moved to SpecCP

in the covert syntax.

(75) [CP [DP[+wh]a pic that Akira took where[+wh]]︸��︷︷��︸

[TP everyone saw t]]

The derivation of this structure involves no island violations.

Assuming that short answers involve movement of the answer fragment plus deletion

under identity, the analysis of the question-answer pair, (73)–(74a) would be captured in the

following way: (74a) must be derived by movement of the complex NP out of the FinP to the

Spec-FocP, followed by deletion of the FinP which contains the trace of the large NP. Deleted

material is represented by < . . . > here.

(76) [FocP[DP[+foc]a pic that Akira took in Tokyo[+foc]]︸��︷︷��︸

<[FinP[TP everyone saw t] Cop]>]

The corresponding focus construction, as predicted, is acceptable.

(77) [Akira-ga Tokyo-de tor-ta syasin]-o minna-ga mi-ta no desu.

Akira-Nom Tokyo-in take-Past pic-Acc all-Top see-Past C Cop

‘A picture that Akira took in Tokyo, everyone has seen.’

As expected, corresponding to (74a), the following cleft sentence is also grammatical, again

suggesting the strong parallelism between wh-questions and their answers.

(78) Minna-ga mi-ta no wa [Akira-ga Tokyo-de tor-ta syasin](-o) desu.

all-Nom see-Past C Top Akira-Nom Tokyo-at take-Past picture-Acc Cop

‘Lit. It was a picture that Akira had taken in Tokyo that everyone saw.’


6.2 Whence short answers?

Given that a LFPP option exists and a ‘pied-piping’ answer (74a) is available, let us ask why

a short answer like (74b) is a possible answer to (73).

Nishigauchi (1990) claimed that short answers like (74b) are obtained by ‘truncating’

the ‘Pied-Piping answers’ like (74a) via some discourse-deletion process that operates in

discourse such as:

(79) Q: Is it the picture that you took in Tokyo?

A: No, in Washington DC.

We’ll turn to this possibility later on.

Now, if we pursue the idea of the present work that short answers are derived by focus

movement plus deletion, it appears that we must derive (74b) from the following focus

construction.

(80) *[Tokyo-de]PP minna-ga [Akira-ga tPP tor-ta syasin]-o mi-ta no desu.

Tokyo-in all-Nom Akira-Nom take-Past pic-Acc see-Past C Cop

‘In Tokyo, everyone has seen a picture that Akira took.’

This sounds like a grammatical sentence, but it is ungrammatical on the intended reading

on which Tokyo was the place where the pictures were taken (not where everyone saw the

pictures), so we cannot view it as the source of (74b), so it seems.

7 Relative clause island repair

7.1 Island repair by deletion

There has been a growing body of literature in which (at least some class of ) island violations

are viewed as PF-phenomena. In this subsection, we will re-examine the problem of short

answers presented in the previous subsection in light of island-repair.

Merchant (2004) develops an analysis of the problem posed by sentences like (81), in

which he invokes the PF theory of islands.

(81) They hired someone who speaks a Balkan language — guess which!

7 Relative clause island repair 37

In this theory, island violations are considered to be due to properties of pronounced syntactic

structure, not to constraints on derivation or representations of LF themselves.

According to this theory, intermediate traces created by crossing syntactic islands are

defective and cannot remain in a structure that gets pronounced. These traces are assigned

*, a PF-uninterpretable feature. Alternatively, * may be assigned to XPs that form islands, as

in Fox and Lasnik (2003). If ellipsis can apply, the structure which contains the * feature(s)

are eliminated from the PF object.

As Merchant (2004) proposes (see also Fox and Lasnik 2003, Merchant 2001), this analysis

not only accounts for (81), but also captures the well-known asymmetry between sluicing

and VP-ellipsis:11

(82) They want to hire someone who speaks a Balkan language, but

a. I don’t remember which.

b. *I don’t remember which (language) they do.

Assuming that wh-movement targets every intermediate maximal projection along the way,

deletion of TP (sluicing) and vP (VP-ellipsis) are shown to have different consequences.

11 Note that MaxElide may be violated in (81b), as clear from the discussion given in section 4.4. We wouldlike to mention here one alternative that analyzes the difficulty of VP-ellipsis in cases that involve no island (i.e.cases like (47c), repeated as (i)) as a case of “failure of island repair”.

(i) *They said they heard about a Balkan language, but I don’t know which they did.

Fox and Lasnik propose that their Parallelism requirement for ellipsis forces the wh-phrase in (i) to move inone-fell-swoop fashion, because there is no intermediate binders in the antecedent clause. They argue that thisone-fell-swoop movement causes a Subjacency violation in Chomsky’s (1986) sense, and that deletion of the VP,unlike deletion of the TP, does not help to remove the cause of the Subjacency violation that results from the‘long’ movement.

A couple of questions arise. Is a principle like MaxElide needed independently from island repair? If it is,when is the condition active and when is it not? Why is it active (or inactive) when it is (or when it is not)?We will not address these issues in detail here. The reader is referred to Takahashi and Fox (2005) for relevantdiscussion and a wider range of data. See also footnote 12.


(83)

TP-deletion eliminates all *-traces

vP-deletion leaves *t′′i

. . . CP

[DPwhich]i C′

C TP

*t′′i TP

they(do) vP

*t′i vP

want to hire [DPsomeone [CPwho speaks ti]]

With the type of approach to islands just outlined in mind, let us turn to Japanese. This

analysis is plausible as an account of the acceptability of the short answer (74b) as a reply to

(73).




(74) b. Tokyo-de desu.

Tokyo-at Cop

‘In Tokyo.’

As we have seen above, the ‘full’ focus construction (80) from which (74b) is supposed to be

obtained by deletion displays the island effect. The following cleft construction shows the

same effect.

(84) *[[Minna-ga Akira-ga tor-ta syasin]-o mi-ta no]-wa Tokyo-de desu.

all-Nom Akira-Nom take-Past picture-Acc see-Past C-Top Tokyo-in Cop

Lit. ‘It is in Tokyo that everyone saw a picture [that Akira had taken t].’

Thus the contrast between (74b) and (80)/(84) follows if ellipsis ameliorates the island viola-

tion.

Furthermore, this analysis also predicts, correctly, that argument deletion, which deletes

the remnant of the relative clause from which the answer fragment has moved, yields a bad


answer to (73).

(85) a. *Tokyo-de (minna-ga) ∅mi-ta no desu.

Tokyo-in all-Nom see-Past C Cop

‘Lit. In Tokyo, everybody saw ∅.’

b. *(minna-ga) ∅mi-ta no wa Tokyo-de desu.

all-Nom see-Past C Top Tokyo-in Cop

‘Lit. It was in Tokyo that everybody saw ∅.’The answer in these sentences only means Tokyo was the place where they saw the pictures,

never where the pictures were taken.

The following structure shows how this analysis makes the distinction between (74b) and

(85) as an answer to (73).

(86)

FinP-deletion eliminates all *-traces

vP-deletion leaves *t′′i

DP-deletion leaves *t′i and *t′′i

FocP

(Focus)[in Tokyo]i FinP

TP

∗t′′i TP

everyone vP

∗t′i vP

VP

DP

pictures [CPAkira took ti]

Vsaw

v(saw)

Fin-no

Foc--desu

As the structure indicates, deletion of FinP erases all the offending traces, and this explains

why the short answer (74b) is an acceptable answer to (73). In contrast, if (85) is derived by

deletion of DP (argument deletion), then both the offending traces created by the movement


of the answer fragment, *t′i and *t′′i , remain in the structure, which ends up being ungrammat-

ical. Cf. Saito (2004) for the arguments that argument deletion exists in Korean and Japanese.

Alternatively, if the analysis in Otani and Whitman (1991) is correct, what we see in (85) is

VP-ellipsis, with head V raised to v or T, so that either VP or vP is deleted. In this latter

case, *t′′i is left in the structure. In either case, deletion as seen in (85) leaves some offending

trace, and this accounts for their ungrammaticality in contrast to (74b). As the reader must

have noticed, the ungrammaticality of (85) also involves a violation of MaxElide, discussed

in section 4.4.12

7.2 Alternative solutions

There are at least two potential interfering factors with the analysis depicted in subsection

7.1. First, it is not self-evident that the ellipsis site does contain an island to begin with.

Merchant (2001) discusses this possibility for sluicing in English.

Let us first review Merchant’s (2001, chapter 5) answer to the puzzle posed by the fact

12 The unacceptability of cases like (85a,b) can be accounted for as a violation of MaxElide, independently fromisland repair (see section 4.4 and footnote 11). This is perfectly compatible with our story about island repair. Asalluded to in footnote 11, the Fox and Lasnik type theory may treat the bad examples in (49b,c), which involveno island, as instances of failure of island repair. We repeat (49A) and (49Bd) as (iA) and (iB) here.

(i) A. Hanako-wa [kyoozyu-ga nani-o koogi-su-ru tokoro]-o rokuon sita no?Hanako-Top prof.-Nom what-Acc lecture-Pres C-Acc tape-rec do-Past Q‘Lit. What did Hanako tape-record the professor lecturing?’

B. Hanako-ga [kyoozyu-ga koogi-su-ru tokoro]-o rokuon sitaHanako-Nom prof.-Nom lecture-Pres C-Acc tape-rec do-Pastno wa gengogaku-o desu.C Top linguistics-Acc Cop‘It was linguistics that Hanako tape-recorded the professor lecturing.’

Fox and Lasnik report that, in English, when overt A′-movement takes place in the antecedent clause, deletionof a smaller constituent becomes easier. Sentences (iia,b) are from Fox and Lasnik (2003), with their judgments(cf. Takahashi and Fox 2005).

(ii) a. *I know John said that Mary read a certain book, but YOU don’t know which one he did.

b. ??I know which book John said that Mary read, but YOU don’t know which one he did.

We observe that the effect in question seems to hold for Japanese as well. The status of (iB) seems to improvewhen it follows the question in (iii), compared to when it follows (iA).

(iii) Hanako-ga [kyoozyu-ga koogi-su-ru tokoro]-o rokuon sitaHanako-Nom prof.-Nom lecture-Pres C-Acc tape-rec do-Pastno wa nani-o desu ka?C Top what-Acc Cop Q‘What was it that Hanako tape-recorded the professor lecturing?’

We cannot discuss exactly how “MaxElide” works in Japanese question-answer pairs for space reasons. Moreresearch and groundwork needs to be done; see Kuno (1978, 1980) for relevant data from Japanese.


that sluicing can be grammatical even when its source structure involves an island violation.

Consider a well-known case of the CNPC violation, which we repeat.

(81) They hired someone who speaks a Balkan language — guess which!

Sluicing in (86) is acceptable although the sentence from which it can be derived is ungram-

matical because of the CNPC.

(87) *Guess which Balkan languagei they hired someone who speaks ti.

Merchant’s (2001) answer to this puzzle is that the CNPC may not be violated even when

ellipsis yields a grammatical output. Merchant (2001) argues that the source structure of the

sluiced portion in (81) is the following:

(88) Guess [which s/he speaks]

This structure involves a portion within the island which itself does not constitute an island.

Also, this portion contains an E-type pronoun referring to the head of the relative clause. In

the case of (88), the pronoun s/he is an E-type pronoun that refers to the person who speaks a

certain language.

Although this idea appears to work for the range of the sluicing data involving relative

clause island violations, it does not provide a real solution to the problem posed by the fact

that (74b) is a possible answer to (73) — A non-elliptical answer that has an E-type pronoun

referring to the head of the relative clause in the question and does not involve an island in

the answer, which the type of analysis represented by Merchant (2001) would posit for (73),

does not function as an appropriate answer to the question because it does not satisfy some

of the pragmatic conditions imposed on question–answer pairs.

(73) Minna-ga [Akira-ga doko-de tor-ta syasin]-o mi-ta ka osiete?



(89) #Tokyo-de Akira-ga sorera-o tor-ta no desu.

Tokyo-in Akira-Nom those-Acc take-Past C Cop

‘It was in Tokyo that Akira took them.’


So even if (89) provides a good antecedent for the ellipsis site in the sense that it does not

involve an island, that must not be the source for (74b), because it is not a good answer.

The second factor that may interfere with the ‘island repair’ analysis of (74b), which we

will defend, has to do with what we call the bare-copular strategy, discussed in section 5.3.

Examining the absence of the island effect in examples like (74b), Saito (2004) proposes the

possibility that the subject of (74b) is occupied by a phonologically empty pronoun (as in

(90a)) and therefore it does not have to involve either movement or deletion. The empirical

basis of this claim is that an overt version of that pronoun is available in Japanese, sore “it”,

which is illustrated in (90b):

(90) a. pro Tokyo-de desu.

Tokyo-at Cop

b. Sore-wa Tokyo-de desu.

it-Top Tokyo-at Cop

(90b) is acceptable as an answer to question (73), as Saito observes based on the same type of

example. It is worth stressing here that when the derivation of (74b) utilizes the bare-copular

strategy, the identity condition for ellipsis is trivially satisfied. The argument for island repair

based on the contrast between (74b) and (80)/(84) is considerably weakened if (90) is a source.

For the sake of discussion, we assume that the null version of sore is available.

Now it is clear from the discussion so far that, in order to show that deletion can fix an

island violation in short answers in Japanese, we have to find an environment where sore/pro

is not available and that short answers do not exhibit the island effect that their non-elliptical

counterpart exhibit in that environment.

Recall, as discussed in section 5.4, functional answers are not compatible with the bare-

copular strategy. Observe that when an answer contains a bound variable inside, the bare-

copular frame with sore cannot be used.

(91) A: Minna-ga John-ga dare-to atta to omotteiru ka osiete.

All-Nom John-Nom who-with meet-Past that think Q tell me

‘Who does everyone think that John saw?’


B: a. Sore-wa Hanako-to desu.

it-Top Hanako-with Cop

b. *Sore-wa soitu-no hahaoya-to desu.

it-Top the guy-Gen mother Cop

The contrast seen in the a- and b-examples of (91) suggests that the presence of sore prevents

the binder for the bound pronoun from occurring in the structure. Thus functional answers

help us to force the derivation of a short answer to involve deletion.

7.3 Functional answers

Now let us consider (73) again, in light of the possibility of functional answers.




(92) a. (Akira-ga) soitui-no kokyoo-de tor-ta {syasin / no} desu.

Akira-Nom the guy-Gen hometown-at take-Past pic / one Cop

‘The picture/one that he had taken in his or heri hometown.’

b. ?Soitui-no kokyoo*(-de) desu.

the guy-Gen hometown-at Cop

‘In his or heri hometown.’

Answer (92a) is a functional answer derived by LFPP, in which, if all the people concerned

are from different areas, each person saw a different picture taken in his or her home town.

The acceptability of this answer corresponds with the acceptability of the following focus

sentence, also derived by ‘large-scale pied-piping’.


(93) [Akira-ga soitui-no kokyoo-de tor-ta syasin]-o minnai-ga t

Akira-Nom the guy-Gen hometown-at take-Past pic-Acc all-Nom

mi-ta no desu.

see-Past C Cop

‘Lit. It was the picture that Akira had taken in his or heri home town that

everyonei saw.’

The availability of the functional answer (92a) finds its basis on the fact that the pronominal

(epithet) soitu appearing in the complex NP is bound, as desired, by the quantificational

subject minna ‘all, everyone’ in the position designated by t of the cleft sentence (93), from

which (92a) is derived.

The status of short answer (92b), which we find quite good, is very significant. As we will

show shortly, this example provides a very important piece of evidence that island-repair is

the only solution available in the derivation of this short answer.

As the asterisk outside the parentheses indicates, the omission of the postposition -de ‘at’

leads to total ungrammaticality to all speakers. This is a sign of connectivity, and we take it

as indicating that we cannot find the source of (92b) in the bare-copular strategy, discussed

in 7.2. In fact, such a putative source is itself ungrammatical.

(94) *Sore-wa soitui-no kokyoo-de desu.

it-Top the guy-Gen hometown-at Cop

‘It was in his or heri hometown.’

This also shows that the analysis suggested in Nishigauchi (1990), according to which

(92b) is derived from (92a) by a discourse deletion rule, is on the wrong track, for this

approach presupposes what is similar to the bare-copular frame.

The only possible source for (92b) is (80), which we have shown to be ungrammatical for

the violation of the relative clause island even when its focus portion contains an individual

name. As expected, the following focus and cleft sentences are also ungrammatical.


(95) a. *[Soitui-no kokyoo-de]PP minna-ga [Akira-ga tPP tor-ta syasin]-o

the guy-Gen hometown-at all-Nom Akira-Nom take-Past pic-Acc

mi-ta no desu.

see-Past C Cop

‘In his or her home town, everyone saw a picture that Akira took.’

b. *Minna-ga [Akira-ga tPP tor-ta syasin]-o mi-ta no wa

all-Nom Akira-Nom take-Past pic-Acc see-Past C Top

[soitui-no kokyoo-de]PP desu.

the guy-Gen hometown-at Cop

‘It was in his or her hometown that everyone saw a picture that Akira took.’

Thus, the grammaticality of (92b) can only be accounted for by island-repair, as described

in section 7. We consider this a very important result. This consideration provides a com-

pelling piece of evidence that wh-movement in covert syntax is free from the relative clause

island constraint effect and that the derivation of the relevant answer involves focus or cleft

construction plus ellipsis, where island repair plays a crucial role.

7.4 Scope: another case for island-repair

In section 4.3, we pointed out that retention of relative quantifier scope is an indication

of connectivity effected by movement. Given that this is correct, we can establish another

argument that relative clause island violations may be repaired by ellipsis. Consider (96).

(96) A. Taro-wa [sankasya zen’in-ga nankyoku utaw-u] paatii-o

Taro-Top participant all-Nom how many songs sing-Pres party-Acc

hirai-ta no?

hold-Past Q

Lit. ‘Taro held a party such that all the participants sing how many songs?’

B. a. 3-kyoku desu.

3 songs Cop


b. *Taro-ga [sankasya zen’in-ga utaw-u] paatii-o hirai-ta no wa

Taro-Top participant all-Nom sing-Pres party-Acc hold-Past C Top

3-kyoku desu.

3 songs Cop

Lit. ‘Taro held a party such that all the participants sing three songs’

c. [Sankasya zen’in-ga 3-kyoku utaw-u] paatii desu.

participant all-Nom 3 songs sing-Pres party Cop

‘A party where all the participants sing three songs.’

The question sentence given in (96A) is to ask the number n such that Taro held a party where

each of the attendees is supposed to sing n-many songs, where the universal quantifier takes

wide scope over the numeral, and the identity of the songs that each attendee chooses does

not matter. The non-elliptical answer in (96b) is hopeless irrespective of the scope relations,

whereas its elliptical version (96b) is fine.

Moreover, the latter answer, like the pied-piping answer in (96c), retains the narrow scope

interpretation of the numeral. If scope reconstruction signals overt movement, the difference

between (96a) and (96b) in acceptability strongly suggests that application of ellipsis remedies

the island violation that would be observed otherwise.

Notice further that here again, the derivation of (96) cannot be from the bare-copular

frame.

(97) Sore-wa 3-kyoku desu.

it-Top 3 songs Cop

This answer cannot have the interpretation on which the numeral quantifier takes scope

narrower than the universal quantifier in the relative clause. It can only be interpreted in

such a way that the total number of songs sung by everyone was three, or the attendees sang

three songs in chorus.

Therefore, short answer (96) must really be derived from a focus or cleft construction

followed by ellipsis, where its acceptability is supported by island repair.

8 Concluding remarks 47

8 Concluding remarks

In this article, we have presented a number of arguments that at least some species of short

answers must be derived from focus or cleft constructions, followed by ellipsis.

Various facts stemming from morphological case-markers and postpositions, binding,

and scope relations provide the evidence of connectivity shown by short answers, showing

that derivation of short answers must come from focus or cleft constructions, in turn derived

by focus movement.

Further, facts related with vehicle change, MaxElide, and island repair have shown that

derivation of short answers involves ellipsis.

It has also been shown that short answers can have at least one possible source other

than focus or cleft plus deletion. Some short answers have as their source what we call the

bare-copular frame, which shows little or no sign of connectivity and ellipsis. However,

it has been shown that functional answers cannot have this latter derivation, and must be

derived from focus and ellipsis.

With this much background, cases involving wh in-situ in relative clause islands were

reconsidered. Short functional answers in these cases have provided compelling evidence

that their derivation in fact involves relative clause island constraint violations (at PF), where

island repair plays a crucial role, although LF pied-piping operation remains as a viable

option.

This paper closes with one very important problem area unaddressed. If we consider

the possibility of getting pair-list answers out of questions like (73) or (98), in which the

universal quantifier is replaced by a wh-phrase, making it a multiple wh-question, the result

is somewhat different.


all-Top Akira-Nom where-at take-Past picture-Acc see-Past Q tell me.



(98) Dare-ga [Akira-ga doko-de tor-ta syasin]-o mi-ta no?

who-Nom Akira-Nom where-at take-Past picture-Acc see-Past Q

‘Lit. Who saw a picture that Akira had taken where?’

Restricting our attention to pair-list answers, there is a clear contrast between pied-piping

answers and short pair-list answers.

(99) a. Anna-ga (Akira-ga) Moscow-de tor-ta syasin(-o), Johann-ga

Anna-Nom Akira-Nom Moscow-in take-Past pic-Acc Johann-Nom

Berlin-de tor-ta syasin(-o) desu.

Berlin-in take-Past pic-Acc Cop

‘Anna saw the picture that Akira took in Moscow, Johann saw the one that

(Akira) took in Berlin.’

b. *Anna-ga Moscow-de, Johann-ga Berlin-de desu.

Anna-Nom Moscow-in Johann-Nom Berlin-in Cop

‘Anna in Moscow, Johann in Berlin.’

It is impossible to understand (99b) as meaning Moscow and Berlin were the cities in which

the pictures in question were taken, not where they were seen.

We will leave these and other important issues related with LF pied-piping to another

work of ours [reference suppressed].

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