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Article published In:
Concentric
Vol. 46:2 (2020) ► pp.206–239

Deriving Chinese alternative questions

Feature percolation and LF movement

| National Taipei University of Business

This study proposes an approach which derives Chinese alternative questions by means of feature percolation and LF movement. This approach is argued to fare better than a movement approach as proposed by C.-T. Huang (1998) and a non-movement binding approach as proposed by R.-H. Huang (2010) in that it may successfully explain why Chinese alternative questions are only sensitive to the wh-island constraint, but not to other types of island constraints. The LF movement analysis may receive empirical support from the observed fact that Chinese alternative questions exhibit focus-intervention effects, generally assumed to be induced by LF movement.

Keywords: alternative, percolation, movement, island, intervention
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Dilemma: To move or not to move?
    • 2.1Absence of island effects
    • 2.2Presence of island effects
    • 2.3Intervention effects
    • 2.4Interim summary
  • 3.Previous analyses
    • 3.1Movement approach
    • 3.2Binding approach
    • 3.3Focus alternatives approach
  • 4.Proposal
    • 4.1Disjunctive scope
    • 4.2Feature percolation
    • 4.3LF movement and intervention effects
    • 4.4On the presence/absence of island effects
  • 5.Conclusion
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • Abbreviations
  • References
Published online: 28 October 2020
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/consl.00018.hua
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