Abstract:

Analysing subject omission in English finite clauses - Lumping or splitting?

(Based on joint work with Lieven Danckaert, Lille, and Andrew Weir, Trondheim)

English allows for a restricted set of subjectless finite clauses. (1a) illustrates a missing subject in the second part of a coordination (subjectless second conjunct - SSC), (1b) illustrates a missing subject in diary style writing, (written subject omission - WSO), and (1c) illustrates a missing subject in informal speech (spoken subject omission - SSO).

The talk will examine whether the three identical strings (haven’t heard from her since) in (1) can be lumped together and analyzed as surface manifestations of one grammatical phenomenon, the relaxation of the subject requirement; or whether in spite of their superficial identity, they are actually manifestations of distinct grammatical phenomena, with SSC (1a) set apart from WSO (1b) and SSO (1c), and the latter two either lumped together as manifestations of one grammatical pattern or split up as two distinct patterns.