The Syntax of Semiclefts and Pseudoclefts Constructions in Brazilian Portuguese

Author(s)

Mariana Santos de Resenes

• Document type: Doctoral Thesis
• Press: São Paulo.
• Institution: Universidade de São Paulo (USP). Faculdade de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (FFLCH/SBD)
• Defense date: 2014-05-06

Examining board members

Esmeralda Vailati Negrão; Marcel den Dikken; Carlos Mioto; Ana Paula Scher; Evani de Carvalho Viotti

• Advisor: Esmeralda Vailati Negrão

Abstract

This dissertation aims to describe and analyse semiclefts and pseudoclefts constructions in Brazilian Portuguese, with the background of Generative Theory. Given the heterogeneity of the facts analysed, we propose an approach that divides both constructions in two types. Regarding the semiclefts, one type (and this is the big group) receives a monoclausal analysis, independent of pseudoclefts, which are called true semiclefts, whereas the other, well delimited and restricted, receives a biclausal analysis, as a reduced version of pseudoclefts. In our proposal of a monoclausal analysis to the syntax of true semiclefts, the copula, which immediately precedes the focus, is the spell out of a functional category involved in the establishment of predication relations, either a RELATOR or a LINKER, following the syntax of predication developed in Den Dikken (2006a). Exploring the application of Predicate Inversion, with its implications, such as the emergence of a copula, the freezing of the subject of predication to syntactic manipulations which stays in situ and receives, invariably, the focus interpretation at the interfaces, we enlarge the approach given to the syntax of predication, treating also the \'object of\' relation as an essentially predicational relation. As for the pseudoclefts, the two types recognized receive both a biclausal analysis (contra monoclausal and reconstruction analyses). The proposal of a dual analysis to pseudoclefts, in type A and type B, a la Den Dikken, Meinunger & Wilder (2000), is based on the heterogeneity of the data in our language - especially regarding the differences attested between the two patterns of these constructions (with wh-clause initial or final) and regarding the type of wh-clause that can occur in each of them (an interrogative or a free relative) - data that resist a single fully homogeneous treatment. This dual analysis has crosslinguistic (partial or total) scope, according to the characteristics of the languages. We tried to show how different wh-clauses are related to different patterns of pseudoclefts, each of them with its particular syntactic structure, as well as some consequences that they give rise to and that contrast with each other, as predicted. We also claim that, among the polemic connectivity effects that pseudoclefts can have, some deserve a syntactic account, whereas others do not. Connectivity effects related to anaphors and bound pronouns are better accounted for by a semantic account, given their occurrence even in simple (non-cleft) specificational copular sentences, regardless of the order between the pre and postcopular terms, and for which even an analysis via reconstruction (last chance to still have a syntactic treatment) is sometimes impossible. Crucially, connectivity effects related to NPI (negative polarity items) and Case are the relevant ones to distinguish the pseudoclefts in two types. Type A pseudoclefts receive a biclausal analysis with ellipsis, in which the wh-clause is an interrogative and the counterweight is a full sentence, the complete answer to the question, subject to (strongly favoured) ellipsis of the repeated part. In analogy to the question-answer pairs, these pseudoclefts are called self-answering questions, with a \'topic-comment\' structure, whose order is rigid, resulting only in the wh-clause-initial pattern (question<answer). On the other hand, type B pseudoclefts are based on a predicational structure, a small clause. They also receive a biclausal analysis, but one of the WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) kind, in which the wh-clause, here a free relative, is the predicate, and the XP, its subject, necessarily the focus of the sentence. The free relative, as a predicate nominal, is subject to Predicate Inversion; consequently, the order of type B pseudoclefts is more flexible, resulting in both patterns, wh-clause-initial or final. Finally, we go back to semiclefts, more specifically, to its the second type, the limited group that is a reduced version of pseudoclefts, as indicated by the facts related to the agreement in the lexical verb. The occurrence of such semiclefts is restricted to the subject semiclefts. In face of two types of pseudoclefts, we show that only type A allow \'reduction\'. Factors that contribute to this are the rigid order, characteristic of semiclefts and only of type A pseudoclefts, and the possibility of omission of the wh pronoun (\'wh-drop\'), possible in interrogatives (as an available option in Universal Grammar), but never in free relatives. Since these reduced pseudoclefts are limited to the subject ones, their null wh (an instance of \'wh-drop\') is reanalysed as a prowh in the romance languages that have these constructions. (AU)