A constraint-based analysis of that-complement clause extraposition

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

This paper aims to provide how the corpus-based properties of that-complement clause extraposition (hereafter CCE) are couched in the framework of Sign-Based Construction Grammar. At first glance, with the aid of a total 3,791 data from Corpus of Contemporary American English, singular head noun of CCE is highly favored while definite article is clearly in the lead. Not only does intransitive verb largely precede extraposed CP, but present tense preponderates in matrix clause as well. The epistemic modality of head noun shows the highest rise, whereas the illocutionary force of self-assertion predominantly resides in extraposed CP. Reflecting these properties, Head-Extra Construction featured with nonlocal dependency is subcategorized into Head-Noun-Extra Construction. The main verb of CCE, licensed by core-cl, is constrained by English Declarative Sentence rule. Taken together, CCE (i.e., that-comp-cl-extra-cx) inherits multiple constraints from core-cl and hd-noun-extra-cx through inheritance hierarchy.