On the Asymmetry of Quantifier and Non-quantifier Genitives in English Nominative Structure = On the Asymmetry of Quantifier and Non-quantifier Genitives in English Nominative Structure

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

In this paper I propose a fine-grained DP-internal structure of English that allows us to explain the distribution of quantifier and non-quantifier genitive phrases in nominal structure. Previous literature suggests that there exist cross-linguistic variations of the highest projection in nominal structure (so called DP/NP parameter (Boskovic 2008)), and that unlike NP languages, DP languages project a functional projection (i.e. DP) on top of NP, resulting in genitives buried deep in nominal structure and prohibited from binding anaphors in a clause. Based on the previous research, this paper presents another interesting asymmetry in English; namely, unlike non-quantifier genitives, quantifier genitives may undergo extraction out of the nominal structure. I appeal to Larson`s (1991, 2014) DP-shell structure where Spec of dP is allocated to scope material, and propose that quantifier genitives raise to SpecdP. Since quantifier genitives are now in the highest Spec position in nominal structure, they can be extracted and bind a variable out of the nominal structure, hence able to explain the asymmetry between quantifier and non-quantifier genitive phrases. (Kyungpook National University)